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We didn’t sleep at all last night. That’s why we’re sleeping now, during the day. Night is the most dangerous for us. The police come while we’re sleeping and catch you off guard, and grab and hit you. They’ll take you to Makadara court and then you’ll be sent to remand [detention] for months. Last night there was a big roundup and we had to move so many times to avoid being caught. There was a large group of police in a big lorry, driving around, looking for kids. They’re cleaning up the streets now to prepare for the Nairobi International Show [an annual international commerce and trade fair].
(Human Rights Watch)
"When I was 13 my Dad sent me into the city to try to find work. There are 8 in our family and he decided it was time that I started to bring some money home to help feed the family. I come from a small village in the east in our country and had only been to the city a couple of times in my life before I went down to look fo work. When I arrived I meet up with some friends of friends including a guy who said he knew my dad, but I found out later that he had lied to me. Anyway we got to drinlking and talking. I'm still not too sure what happened, but I woke up the next morning with an awful hangover and lying naked by this older guy who had given me all the drink the night before. I realised then that he had sex with me when I was passed out - It was the worst experience in my life. I tried to beat the guy up, but he was stronger than me, so I just ran and have been running ever since, from that night and from myself. I hate myself most days. I spent the next two nights at the train station and got into a group of lads who seemed okay and told me they knew how to get a lot of money. I wanted them to go with me to beat up the old guy, but I couldn't give them the real reason and they were more interested in the armed robbery they were planning. Anyway, I helped out with the robbery and then left that group. I was too scared of the guns and prison if we got caught. I drifted from group to group looking for friends and work, but often not finding either. Looking back I was too young and naive, that's why I got into so much troubles. After two years of trying to survive living nowhere and being a nobody, I decided to commit suicide, but I didn't cut my wrists deep enough. I was found and sent to the hospital. From there i was moved to a hostel for young boys. it was okay for awhile, but they said I had to go to school. I knew I couldn't go to school, but had to find a job and send money back home. It's been two and half years now, I am still at the hostel and sometimes I go to school. My dad doesn't talk to me anymore cause I never sent any money back home. If he only knew the hell hole that he sent me into. sometimes I miss some of the excitment of being on the streets, but it is good to know that I have a warm bed each night and some real meals. Some of the other lads are okay too, I wish I was smart like them so I wouldn't feel so stupid at school. then maybe I could make something of myself and drive home in a fancy car and show my Dad that I made it and give some money to my Mom at least."
"I've been living on the streets for the past 5 years. My mother treated me very badly. My grandmother really loved me, but when she died, I left home and made friends with other kids my age. They introduced me to drugs, and I liked it. I've tried just about everything: glue, marijuana, crack, hard liquor and cigarettes. Now I just sniff glue. I do it because I feel very sad. I feel like I'm really alone. My mother doesn't love me. She rejects me. I started selling my body when I was 14. I don't want to do it, but I don't have a choice. The men hardly give me anything. I know you can get venereal diseases, HIV and AIDS. I know there's no cure for them. I always use a condom when I have sex, but a lot of men don't want to.I don't want to live on the streets. I'd like to go with someone who will help me because I don't want to live like this. I've already suffered a lot and I'm only 15 years old."
(Radio Netherland Nicaragua)
Gerson Eduardo Calix Núnez, age 16 (aka, "El Chacal"), Esteban Varela, age 17, Gabriel (last name unknown), age 13 (approximately)...............Died: August 28, 1999, El Progreso, Honduras
The bodies were found in an abandoned house barely three blocks from the police station in the El Progreso suburb of La Lima where at least one of the murdered youth – Gerson - had been detained hours earlier. Each minor had been shot through the head. The triple murder appears to have taken place at approximately 1pm and there is at least one witness.
According to initial judicial reports, Gerson was shot once through the forehead and again through the chest in his right nipple. Esteban was shot once through the forehead and again on the right hand side of his neck. The little boy was shot through the head also (panetal superior).
Gerson and Esteban lived in the area known as “Colonia Centroamericana” in El Progreso. The as of yet unidentified 13 year old is known as “Pantera” and seemingly lived in the city of La Lima, Department of Cortes. The acting El Progreso police chief, Porfirio Escobar, confirmed that the three youth had been arrested and detained in their police cells on Friday, August 27th and released at approximately 12:30pm the next day, just 30 minutes before they were murdered three blocks away. It is a violation of the law for the police to detain children in police cells.
"... You don´t have a life anymore, you just suffer, you don´t know what you should do anymore, you don´t know where you should go, you don´t know what to do with yourself, you..don´t know what you really wanted to do with your life."
"... I don't have any money. I've nothing to wear. I've got nothing to eat. I've got nothing. I want to be like the other children. But I can't. Just look at me. Look, look! Do you see how dirty I am? The people treat me like I am dirty. There's nobody who likes me. I'm Shadrack but nobody likes me."
It is easiest for us if we see them only as statistics, as number like 200 million street children worldwide or 30,000 in St. Petersburg or over 2,000 in St. Petersburg in jails. It is easiest to think of them as statistics but they are not statistics they are individuals from whom the precious time of childhood is being stolen.Rather than statistics they are people like Oleg. At 12 years old he has fled to the streets because his alcoholic mother no longer wants to be troubled by taking care of him. One day after we gave him a coat to keep warm his mother showed up. She stole it so that it could be sold and the cash converted into drink.
I ended up on the streets again at the age of 14. It was the last time I run away from home, which I had been doing since the age of 6. It wasn't a free choice. It was not where I wanted to live. I tried talking with my teachers they didn't believe what I told them about my home situation - the violence and fighting between my parents, the alcohol (I started to drive at the age of 10 when my parents where too drunk to drive home after being in the pub or at other events), the physical and sexual abuse, and often there wasn't food in the house. I went to a social worker and asked her to put me into a kid's home. She said that she would need to talk to my parents. I knew they would go berserk if they found out I had even talked to her. It was "house rules" - family business is private and not to be talked about anywhere. I ran away again to escape the violence. The police found me and took me back home and I suffered another round of beatings and worse. At the time I couldn't talk about the sexual abuse, I was so ashamed and humiliated by my experiences, even now it is difficult. often i wish I was dead. I couldn't deal with being hungry all the time - wine and the church basement parking lot were home, for several of us. Of course, there were also good times with the friends I met and some of the people who tried to help us. Eventually two social workers and from a church related inner city organisation found us a house and six of us moved in with a student who kind of helped us to adjust to not living in the streets. I was one the lucky ones though, some of friends died on the streets and in the streets from drug overdosed, alcohol poisoning, at the hands of their pimps and in the street gang fights. I was just lucky that finally someone cared and listened to me and helped me. I am still not as stable as I wish I could be, but it gets better each month.
(A former North American female street youth)
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