Paper boy becomes millionaire overnight

Paper boy becomes millionaire overnight

M. Taufiqurrahman, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Celebrated American pop-artist and filmmaker Andy Warhol said
in the late 1960s that "in the future, everyone will have their
15 minutes of fame."

Earlier this month, Warhol's prediction came true for paper
deliverer Agus Misyadi; he also went home with a fortune that he
could only imagined having days before.

After taking part in a gripping contest, Agus was awarded Rp
500 million (US$52,600) for correctly answering an array of
questions asked by host Tantowi Yahya in the Who Wants To Be A
Millionaire quiz show. The questions ranged from naming the
founder of the international Boy Scout movement Lord Boden Powell
to picking the ship that transported evolutionist Charles Darwin
to the Galapagos island.

Agus could have gone home with Rp 1 billion, if he could have
identified what field of research the Nobel Prize for Science was
awarded for in 1928; the final question in the local adaptation
of the famous U.S. quiz show from broadcaster RCTI.

Sticking to his Rp 500 million winnings, Agus opted to give no
answer to that question, as a wrong call would have meant his
prize money was reduced to Rp 32 million.

After 35 percent tax, Agus went home with Rp 350 million, an
almost 1,000-percent increase from his monthly pay for delivering
newspapers; Rp 400,000.

"I was blown away by the prize, the money is just so much. If
wasn't for the quiz, I don't think I would ever have been able to
earn so much money even if I worked hard for the rest of my
life," he told The Jakarta Post during an interview at his rented
house on the outskirts of Cibubur, East Jakarta.

Agus and his older brother rent the modest house from their
uncle on the side of a road connecting Bekasi in West Java and
Cibubur.

Going home from the quiz recording session at the RCTI studio
in Kebon Jeruk, West Jakarta, the overjoyed Agus started
pondering what he would do with his newly gained wealth inside a
packed economy-class city bus.

Topping his to-do-list was getting a university education and
buying a new motorcycle to help him deliver newspapers every
morning.

Graduating from high school in 2000, Agus was eager to pursue
a higher education at the Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB).
However, he now has put his plans on hold after realizing there
was a person his family who had a greater need for the money.

"I thought that I could keep all the money for myself. But now
I realize that my sister needs the money more than me. I will use
some of the money to help her attend university," he said.

After doing some math on his own, Agus concluded that a large
sum of the money would be reduced if they both spent the money on
tuition.

"I will probably spend a lot of money to pay for her living
costs and tuition fees for a considerably long period, while I
don't have the assurance that I will get a decent job with an
expensive education," he said.

Thus, apart from the large sum money that he now keeps in a
bank account, nothing has changed much in Agus' life.

The 23-year-old still delivers newspapers every morning from 3
a.m. to 7 p.m on his bicycle, his daytime job in the past four
years and his house remains as it was before. No new appliances
were visible and Agus still get his news from an old black-and-
white small screen television set and stacks of old newspapers.

Although so far no people with bad intentions have approached
him to try and swindle him out of his newly gained wealth, some
people in his neighborhood have come and offered him plots of
land as long-term investments.

"Of course I turned down the offers as the price of land here
is unreasonably high," he said.

Born from a peasant family in Wonogiri, a dry region in the
eastern part of Central Java, Agus finished his high school only
with the aid of a Christian missionary group as his parents were
too poor to pay for his school fees.

Soon after graduating, like thousands of other youths from
impoverished regions in Java, he left for Jakarta to try his luck
in the big city.

Upon arriving here, he soon took up a job as a shop assistant,
an occupation he held until his older brother offered him a place
in his venture as a paper deliverer.

"The job does not require much time as I work only for four
hours in the morning and I do nothing for the rest of the day...
I got so bored that I decided to apply for the quiz show," Agus
said.

He had to wait for one and a-half years to be given the go-
ahead to take part in the contest. "I was probably the only high
school graduate to take part in the series," he said.

Agus considers that he was lucky to get into the quiz show, as
he says it did not take genius-level intelligence to answer most
of the show's questions. Those in the early stages of the show
were pedestrian, if not stupid, he said.

He did not study before taking part.

With a long road ahead of him, there is no telling what the
future might bring, but Agus has promised himself he would use
the money wisely.

"This is probably just the beginning of my success, This is
not real success," he said.