Wanakerta women fluff their way for a living

By Agus Maryono and Ngudi Utomo

PURBALINGGA, Central Java (JP): The woman and her two teenage children could not stop sneezing as heaps of kapok floated in the air around them. Even the afternoon downpour did not dampen their working spirit. With the silky fibers of kapok flying all around them and settling onto their bodies, they kept stuffing kapok into a large cloth bag to make a mattress.

Rasni, 40, is one of the women working in a mattress-making center in Wanakerta hamlet in Banjarkerta village of Purbalingga district. Almost all of the women in Wanakerta, which has a population of some 350 families or about 1,200 people, work as mattress-makers. Usually they get help from their children. When the mattresses are ready, it is the men's job to sell them in other towns. They may be away for weeks selling mattresses.

Before the crisis began in July last year, they made good money. As evidence of this success, many houses in this hamlet have ceramic floors and are equipped with expensive electronic gadgets. Now business is sluggish. Some people have given up the business and turned their hand to selling spring beds, which they usually buy in Tegal, Central Java. Some try their luck at finding work in nearby towns, while others remain in the business because they have no other alternative to earn a living.

"What else can I do for a living? Those working in the city have now returned to their village," Rasni told The Jakarta Post.

Since 1978, Wanakerta residents have been making mattresses in a very traditional way. To make one mattress they need stuffing, mattress cloth and thread. There are two kinds of stuffing with which they are familiar: kapok and a fibrous yarn called benglon which is made from textile factory waste. The products have a good market not only in Purbalingga but also in other urban centers like Surakarta, Tasikmalaya and Jakarta.

The mattress-making business in Wanakerta was pioneered by Mahwari, 50, and the late Rasmadi. Before trying their hand at mattress-making, they sold agricultural products in a number of areas in Java. When they were at a textile mill in Bandung, West Java, they saw heaps of textile waste, the kapok-like polyester benglon fibers.

"It struck me that these fibers could be utilized to make a mattress," said Mahwari.

Back home, he and his wife used the benglon he bought in Bandung to make a mattress. "I bought 200 kilos of benglon just to experiment in making mattresses. A kilo cost Rp 300," said Mahwari. First he found buyers for his mattresses among his neighbors, but then orders started coming in from people in other areas. His success prompted his neighbors to follow his example.

Now Mahwari supplies benglon to all mattress-makers in his hamlet. "I am not strong enough to sell mattresses and at the same time supply the raw materials."

The process of making a mattress in a traditional way is simple. "Before it is put into a cloth bag, the kapok or benglon must first be put in the sunlight so that it will expand," said Rasni.

Then it is put into a cloth bag the size of a mattress. The bag is sewn up with mattress thread.

"When the mattress is ready, it will be again put in the sunlight so that it will expand further," she added.

Because of the crisis, the prices of all raw materials have increased by over 100 percent.

"Before the crisis, one piece of mattress cloth (35 meters) cost Rp 35,000 but now it costs Rp 100,000," said Nuryadi, 44, another mattress-maker.

The price of thread has also gone up from Rp 500 per roll the size of a tennis ball to Rp 1,500. Kapok has increased in price from Rp 40,000/100 kg to Rp 70,000/100 kg while benglon has risen in price from Rp 50,000/100 kg to Rp 200,000/100 kg.

To make a single mattress, nine meters of mattress cloth is needed, 20 kg of kapok or 25 kg of benglon and two rolls of thread. One mattress sells at an average price of Rp 90,000.

"The net profit from one mattress is only Rp 5,000," said Nuryadi.

He makes only an average of 10 mattresses a day now compared to 30 mattresses a day before the crisis.

He has also had to reduce his employees from 15 to five because he cannot afford to pay them.

Respiratory

The employees are paid according to how much work they do. For stuffing a mattress, one gets Rp 1,000 per mattress, someone who does the sewing also earns Rp 1,000 per mattress, according to Rasni.

"Not bad. I can buy ingredients for meals," said Sikas, 15, an elementary school dropout working for Rasni. She stuffs mattress bags and can make 10 mattresses a day. "If you do the sewing you can sew 15 mattresses a day," she said.

Respiratory

The mattress-makers handle heaps of kapok and benglon every day and do not wear protective masks, leaving them vulnerable to health problems. The biggest risk they run is when they unpack the stuffing, put it in the sunlight and fill the mattress bags.

"We are used to this condition," said Rasni, who has stuffed mattresses for over 10 years.

"We'll be all right, even without protective masks. The worst thing that can happen to us that we could get a cough," she said, without the slightest idea that a cough could be a symptom of respiratory trouble.

"Sometimes we see a doctor at the community health center because we cough too often. Is this because of kapok?" she inquired.

Rasni and other mattress-makers do not realize that their coughs are caused by pollution. Every day, for hours on end, they inhale air mixed with fiber particles and kapok.

"Now, if I don't put on a mask to cover my nose, I often sneeze and cough," said Wasirah, 47, another worker.

An interesting feature to observe among the lives of mattress- makers in Wanakerta is that the hamlet is dubbed a hamlet of seasonal widows. Why? Often about 80 percent of the population in Wanakerta is made up only of women because the men are frequently away for a month or two to sell the mattresses.

"Our husbands are often away for a long time. Anyway, we are used to this condition and we have a lot of friends," said Darsinah, 30, a mother of two. Her husband has been in Tasikmalaya for two months.