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Myanmar's hungry street kids turn to glue sniffing
PUBLISHED : Tuesday, 20 January, 2015, 2:51am
UPDATED : Tuesday, 20 January, 2015, 2:51am
Associated Press in Yangon
Myanmar's poor still struggle despite opening. Photo: AP
Sweaty hair matted to his pale, emaciated face, Thant Zin Oo starts his days early, winding through small alleyways outside Myanmar's biggest city Yangon and scavenging through garbage piled up behind shops and factories in search of something - anything - to sell.
Tucked under the 11-year-old's filthy, tattered shirt is a half-empty yellow glue tin.
"It gives me a sense of peace," he said. "I forget my hunger for a moment and dream of things that I cannot do in my real life."
Myanmar's long-time military rulers handed over power to a nominally civilian government three years ago, paving the way for the lifting of Western sanctions and a burst of economic activity.
More than 500 foreign businesses have invested US$50 billion. But as poor families move from rural areas to the big city in hopes of finding work, many find themselves struggling to get by.
Without education or money to buy food - their families often squatting on land illegally seized by gangs - it's the children who are most vulnerable.
Many are left to fend for themselves, easily influenced by the bad habits of other street kids, from prostitution and gambling to drug abuse and gang-style extortion, said Aung Kyaw Myint, local leader of an organisation that provides help for homeless kids.
Every morning, before the sun rises, a growing number of street kids can be seen picking through garbage at city dumps, or sleeping on the pavements.
Oo and his 15-year-old brother Ko Min are among them.
The boys said they earned US$2 to US$3 a day - around half of which went to their parents and the other half to a tin of glue which they shared.
Oo no longer imagines he will one day be a doctor, and Ko Min said even his modest goal of being a soldier seemed unrealistic.
"When I sniff glue, I close my eyes and in my dreams I go to nightclubs and have fun," the older boy said.
