A teaching center in North Jakarta is attempting to increase a sense of dignity in the lives of street children through environmentally friendly activities with high economic value.

Jakarta. Dindin Komarudin’s concern about the way of life of street children first emerged during a trip to Sumatra a few years ago. Aboard the ship he was traveling on, Dindin witnessed close up the difficult and violent way of life of a group of street minstrels. ”They seemed to lack any direction in life,” Dindin says.

This experience motivated Dindin to do something to help the street singers and the other children and youths living on the street so that they could have a clear direction for their futures. When he got back to Jakarta, Dindin started striking up conversations and interacting with street children and singers at train and bus terminals. He was trying to gauge what kind of activities these street people engaged in besides hanging around without any clear purpose the entire day. As part of this effort, he started inviting them to his home for light and lively discussions about their living environment.

During these discussions, one of the street singers suggested finding a way to do something constructive with waste paper. This motivated Dindin, after intensive research into how to process and utilize waste paper, to establish the Street Children’s Learning Center (Rumah Belajar Anak Jalanan (RBAJ) in Rawa Badak, North Jakarta, in 2003.

Things didn’t always go smoothly in the initial stages of RBAJ’s establishment and activities. ”A lot of the street kids ran away with anything they could get their hands on to steal,” said this alumni of a Social Welfare Institute in Bandung. However, slowly but surely the intense efforts of Dindin and the street children that he fostered began to show fruit. In 2004, a recycled paper distributor offered to act as distributor for the paper being reprocessed and recycled by the street children. DBE3 (Decentralized Basic Education 3), a program funded by USAID assisted RBAJ with the technical aspects of recycling paper, while RBAJ got funding for its daily routine expenditures from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).

Dindin prefers to call the paper produced from the street children’s recycling efforts ”recycled art paper”. This is due to the smoothness of its surface and the various textures they can achieve. This RBAJ recycled paper can be purchased at various handicraft and accessory exhibitions and at the RBAJ itself if you happen to be visiting there.

At the end of December 2008, children from all of the schools being counseled and guided by Jakarta ESP took part in a recycling course and practice held by RBAJ at K’Qita Gallery in Jakarta. This workshop began with a brief explanation of the theory behind recycling paper, and continued with familiarization with materials and equipment, and culminated with actual hands on practice with recycling paper. One of the main challenges in the process of recycling paper is how to ensure the regularity of the surface of the molded paper when removing it from the molding container that had been filled with paper pulp. Creating handicrafts and artworks for the recycled paper also turned out to require a specific kind of skill. “I will teach my friends at school how to make boxes from recycled paper,” said Reihan, a student at the Ibtidaiyah Al-Ifadah Islamic School in Penjaringan.

Currently Didin is fostering 13 street children in Rawa Badak Utara. “I also hope to bring in some kids that have become addicted to drugs to learn with these street children,” Didin said at the end of the interview.

Siti Ngaisah, ESP Jakarta