A day in the life of a child beggar
Ahead is a day of begging. They will joke and laugh and pester people as if they didn’t have a care in the world but their objectives are deadly serious: enough money to eat and purchase another night of shelter. Four lari (US $2.50), a huge sum for a child living on the street, buys a place to sleep at the café and security from rain, freezing temperatures and human predators.
Sometimes the boys stay up all night playing computer games. Then they buy a bus ticket and sleep in the back seats. But today, after a good night’s rest, they are heading for the central streets of Tbilisi to beg by the fancy shops, supermarkets and five-star hotels.
Kakhelo, 13, is Vasiko Simonishvili. His nickname is the name of his home region in eastern Georgia. The country is renowned for good wines and the people for their hard work, good character and directness. They tell you exactly what they think.
Although Kakhelo avoids eye contact, looking down as he shares his story, he is direct. He tells the brutal truth. A natural leader to whom even older street boys defer, he lets down his guard here. Bottom line, he appreciates that someone is interested in the life of a street kid.
My mother left me when I was little, so I lived with my grandparents and father until my father went to prison. He was given three years for stealing. My grandfather is a drinker. He came home nights, argued with me and sometimes beat me up.
“My mother left me when I was little, so I lived with my grandparents and father until my father went to prison. He was given three years for stealing. My grandfather is a drinker. He came home nights, argued with me and sometimes beat me up.
“I found my mother but she told me I was not her son. Sometimes I think my life would be different if my mother did not leave us. It was then my father began drinking.”
Sitting on a park bench, Kakhelo regards other children walking with their parents. His eyes reveal his longing to be in their shoes.
“My father will be released (from prison) this year. I don’t know, maybe I’ll go home then,” Kakhelo continues. Then he hangs his head and reminds himself of reality: “But my father does not care about me. Even when he was home, he would always break everything. I had a small TV and tape recorder, but he broke them both in one of his fits.”
“Freedom is good because you can do anything you want and nobody can tell you what to do.” He articulates the addictive nature of street life, no one to tell you its time for bed or you can’t go play with friends. It is unbridled freedom.
But he knows the coin has two sides: “On the other hand, I miss my grandparents and the people who raised me. I am alone here and miss their warmth.” He is careful to speak in a low voice so his friends don’t hear. Kakhelo the leader is careful to maintain his strong image among his peers.
Kakhelo’s life is a paradox. He knows the street robs children of education and thus their futures, that it kills many kids with glue, drugs and alcohol. But he feels he has no place else to go. He fled to escape the brutality of the adults he loves.
He could not cope with the beatings just as those adults could not cope with the loss of jobs and dreams crushed by the harsh side of the nation’s transition from centrally planned communism to a free market economy. He fled to the streets. His father and grandfather fled to the bottle. Both are deadly.
It is very bad to live in the street. What can I learn here? And if I don’t get money I stay on the street all night. Here you begin smoking and sniffing glue.
“It is very bad to live in the street. What can I learn here? And if I don’t get money I stay on the street all night,” says Kakhelo. “Here you begin smoking and sniffing glue.”
He is quick to add he has never touched glue. “I’ve never tasted glue. I hate it. Once I saw my friend doing it and I began arguing with him, telling him to stop. I don’t do bad things in the street, I don’t steal, don’t tell lies.” He is keen to be seen as a good kid. He knows too well what passersby think of street children.
Kakhelo basically claims to live a double life. He says he has a girlfriend: “I met her at Mushtaeti park. When I meet her I change my clothes. She does not know that I am begging,” he says. He stops talking about her when the other boys come near. Is the girlfriend real or a fantasy born of his longing for normalcy and to impress the listener? Impossible to say.
The stresses of street life and Kakhelo’s leadership role can become too much to bear. He simply loses it by early afternoon because hangers on are crimping the earnings from begging by him and his two friends. He pounds his fist on a stone wall as tears stream down his face.
His buddies, Giorgi Abramidze, 12, and Boria Iakubovich, 13, comfort him and support him like a wounded soldier as they continue walking.
The boys have much in common. Giorgi left his home in Tbilisi 10 months ago to escape the beatings he was taking from his stepfather. Boria ran away four months ago. When his father drank a lot he beat Giorgi.
Sometimes we eat two or three times a day, but sometimes we don’t eat at all. It depends how much we get that day.
“Since I’ve been living on the streets, my brother found me once and asked me to come back home,” says Giorgi. “I said I would come home if my father promised to never beat me again. I know that he is looking for me but I don’t want to see him anymore.” He has three sisters. He has not seen them since he ran away.
Meandering through the streets, the boys actions reveal how desperate they are for the world to take notice, for simple attention. They dash between pedestrians, steal flowers from an aged vendor and quarrel with store owners. The behavior reflects the complete lack of guidance and constraints in their young lives.
Kakhelo and Boria begin limping. Their second-hand shoes are too tight. They hope to go to a public bath today where they shower and apply ointment to their bleeding feet. But bathing is a luxury. First they must beg enough money for food and shelter.
After walking four hours, the children have not received a single coin. Tired and upset, they head to a different spot to beg. Kakhelo and Boria lag behind because of their sore feet. After an hour of begging in front of a bakery, they still do not have enough money for the baths.
“I need a minimum of seven lari per day, four lari for the Internet café and three lari to eat,” says Kakhelo, whose pockets remain empty.
“A bath is an extra four lari. Sometimes we eat two or three times a day, but sometimes we don’t eat at all. It depends how much we get that day. Some days are very lucky. Once, a foreigner gave me 87 lari. I shared with all of my friends. We were very happy,” he says.
The boys move on to a supermarket, almost always a very profitable spot. Some hours later they have money. They head for the baths, a long walk but they are once again in a buoyant mood. Kakhelo begins to ignore his sore feet but Boria’s pain increases. He walks stiff legged with a constant grimace.
Approximately 2,000 children live in the streets of Georgian cities like Tbilisi, Telavi, Kutaisi and Batumi. Thousands more youth 10 to 16 years are at risk of becoming street kids.
When they reach the final stretch, two meters of uphill cobblestone street, Kakhelo hoists his friend on to his back and carries him to the bath house door.
When they emerge, they are different boys. Their scrubbed faces shine. Their hair is slicked down and in place. Kakahelo has spent ages in front of a full-length mirror getting his hair just right. Before he walks out the front door, he turns his coat inside out to hide its tattered shell. “We buy clothes at a secondhand shop, but Kakhelo does not care what he wears,” his friend, Boria, said later. But he obviously does.
The boys strike out for a store where they can budget out some coins for food, typically junk food and soft drinks. They may head for one of the big hotels to beg some extra money but by midnight they must reach the internet café. That’s when the doors are locked.
Everyone locked inside can do as they please, pull chairs together and sleep, watch cartoons on the web or play typically violent computer games on the 15 computers in the gloomy basement. It’s like a sleep over party without parental supervision. Do what you want for as long as you like. Every night.
It is surprising how long they can play at the keyboards after such a long day. But when the need for sleep prevails, they can sleep on anything while the rooms swirls with laughter and the digital sound effects of alien creatures being zapped into virtual oblivion.
There is no predicting tomorrow, whether passersby will be generous or irritated, whether it will rain and there won’t be many pedestrians. They will face whatever the next day demands in the morning. 9 a.m. sharp.
Approximately 2,000 children live in the streets of Georgian cities like Tbilisi, Telavi, Kutaisi and Batumi. Thousands more youth 10 to 16 years are at risk of becoming street kids, according to World Vision Georgia program reports.
World Vision staff work on the streets with these children, trying to earn their trust so that encouragements to leave the streets for shelters and then build new lives are heard and heeded. A new program teaches emergency first aid to street kids so they can deal with exposure and overdoses.
The training doesn’t replace proper medical care but gives the kids the tools to save a friend’s life in the critical first minutes of a problem. It doesn’t encourage them to continue life on the streets either. The goal is to gain trust and an ear among the street children.
World Vision is also working to increase understanding of the issues surrounding street children among social workers, youth centres and government bodies in Georgia to see the design and implementation of prevention and care services.
Street children often appear wild and even dangerous but their young lives are a conundrum of deep longings for love and family, determination to escape abuse and the addictive freedom of street life.
“Sometimes I get away from everyone to sit alone, and I think about my grandparents. I envision their faces and tears come to my eyes,” says Kakhelo.
“At times like that I think of going back to my village. Then the next day I am having fun with my friends. We are planning to go to Tbilisi Sea, which I am looking forward to. When I am alone I am very sad, when I am with my friends I am having fun.”
But about his future he says, “I don’t think about the future; I don’t know how I will live.”
Sometimes the boys stay up all night playing computer games. Then they buy a bus ticket and sleep in the back seats. But today, after a good night’s rest, they are heading for the central streets of Tbilisi to beg by the fancy shops, supermarkets and five-star hotels.
Kakhelo, 13, is Vasiko Simonishvili. His nickname is the name of his home region in eastern Georgia. The country is renowned for good wines and the people for their hard work, good character and directness. They tell you exactly what they think.
Although Kakhelo avoids eye contact, looking down as he shares his story, he is direct. He tells the brutal truth. A natural leader to whom even older street boys defer, he lets down his guard here. Bottom line, he appreciates that someone is interested in the life of a street kid.
My mother left me when I was little, so I lived with my grandparents and father until my father went to prison. He was given three years for stealing. My grandfather is a drinker. He came home nights, argued with me and sometimes beat me up.
“My mother left me when I was little, so I lived with my grandparents and father until my father went to prison. He was given three years for stealing. My grandfather is a drinker. He came home nights, argued with me and sometimes beat me up.
“I found my mother but she told me I was not her son. Sometimes I think my life would be different if my mother did not leave us. It was then my father began drinking.”
Sitting on a park bench, Kakhelo regards other children walking with their parents. His eyes reveal his longing to be in their shoes.
“My father will be released (from prison) this year. I don’t know, maybe I’ll go home then,” Kakhelo continues. Then he hangs his head and reminds himself of reality: “But my father does not care about me. Even when he was home, he would always break everything. I had a small TV and tape recorder, but he broke them both in one of his fits.”
“Freedom is good because you can do anything you want and nobody can tell you what to do.” He articulates the addictive nature of street life, no one to tell you its time for bed or you can’t go play with friends. It is unbridled freedom.
But he knows the coin has two sides: “On the other hand, I miss my grandparents and the people who raised me. I am alone here and miss their warmth.” He is careful to speak in a low voice so his friends don’t hear. Kakhelo the leader is careful to maintain his strong image among his peers.
Kakhelo’s life is a paradox. He knows the street robs children of education and thus their futures, that it kills many kids with glue, drugs and alcohol. But he feels he has no place else to go. He fled to escape the brutality of the adults he loves.
He could not cope with the beatings just as those adults could not cope with the loss of jobs and dreams crushed by the harsh side of the nation’s transition from centrally planned communism to a free market economy. He fled to the streets. His father and grandfather fled to the bottle. Both are deadly.
It is very bad to live in the street. What can I learn here? And if I don’t get money I stay on the street all night. Here you begin smoking and sniffing glue.
“It is very bad to live in the street. What can I learn here? And if I don’t get money I stay on the street all night,” says Kakhelo. “Here you begin smoking and sniffing glue.”
He is quick to add he has never touched glue. “I’ve never tasted glue. I hate it. Once I saw my friend doing it and I began arguing with him, telling him to stop. I don’t do bad things in the street, I don’t steal, don’t tell lies.” He is keen to be seen as a good kid. He knows too well what passersby think of street children.
Kakhelo basically claims to live a double life. He says he has a girlfriend: “I met her at Mushtaeti park. When I meet her I change my clothes. She does not know that I am begging,” he says. He stops talking about her when the other boys come near. Is the girlfriend real or a fantasy born of his longing for normalcy and to impress the listener? Impossible to say.
The stresses of street life and Kakhelo’s leadership role can become too much to bear. He simply loses it by early afternoon because hangers on are crimping the earnings from begging by him and his two friends. He pounds his fist on a stone wall as tears stream down his face.
His buddies, Giorgi Abramidze, 12, and Boria Iakubovich, 13, comfort him and support him like a wounded soldier as they continue walking.
The boys have much in common. Giorgi left his home in Tbilisi 10 months ago to escape the beatings he was taking from his stepfather. Boria ran away four months ago. When his father drank a lot he beat Giorgi.
Sometimes we eat two or three times a day, but sometimes we don’t eat at all. It depends how much we get that day.
“Since I’ve been living on the streets, my brother found me once and asked me to come back home,” says Giorgi. “I said I would come home if my father promised to never beat me again. I know that he is looking for me but I don’t want to see him anymore.” He has three sisters. He has not seen them since he ran away.
Meandering through the streets, the boys actions reveal how desperate they are for the world to take notice, for simple attention. They dash between pedestrians, steal flowers from an aged vendor and quarrel with store owners. The behavior reflects the complete lack of guidance and constraints in their young lives.
Kakhelo and Boria begin limping. Their second-hand shoes are too tight. They hope to go to a public bath today where they shower and apply ointment to their bleeding feet. But bathing is a luxury. First they must beg enough money for food and shelter.
After walking four hours, the children have not received a single coin. Tired and upset, they head to a different spot to beg. Kakhelo and Boria lag behind because of their sore feet. After an hour of begging in front of a bakery, they still do not have enough money for the baths.
“I need a minimum of seven lari per day, four lari for the Internet café and three lari to eat,” says Kakhelo, whose pockets remain empty.
“A bath is an extra four lari. Sometimes we eat two or three times a day, but sometimes we don’t eat at all. It depends how much we get that day. Some days are very lucky. Once, a foreigner gave me 87 lari. I shared with all of my friends. We were very happy,” he says.
The boys move on to a supermarket, almost always a very profitable spot. Some hours later they have money. They head for the baths, a long walk but they are once again in a buoyant mood. Kakhelo begins to ignore his sore feet but Boria’s pain increases. He walks stiff legged with a constant grimace.
Approximately 2,000 children live in the streets of Georgian cities like Tbilisi, Telavi, Kutaisi and Batumi. Thousands more youth 10 to 16 years are at risk of becoming street kids.
When they reach the final stretch, two meters of uphill cobblestone street, Kakhelo hoists his friend on to his back and carries him to the bath house door.
When they emerge, they are different boys. Their scrubbed faces shine. Their hair is slicked down and in place. Kakahelo has spent ages in front of a full-length mirror getting his hair just right. Before he walks out the front door, he turns his coat inside out to hide its tattered shell. “We buy clothes at a secondhand shop, but Kakhelo does not care what he wears,” his friend, Boria, said later. But he obviously does.
The boys strike out for a store where they can budget out some coins for food, typically junk food and soft drinks. They may head for one of the big hotels to beg some extra money but by midnight they must reach the internet café. That’s when the doors are locked.
Everyone locked inside can do as they please, pull chairs together and sleep, watch cartoons on the web or play typically violent computer games on the 15 computers in the gloomy basement. It’s like a sleep over party without parental supervision. Do what you want for as long as you like. Every night.
It is surprising how long they can play at the keyboards after such a long day. But when the need for sleep prevails, they can sleep on anything while the rooms swirls with laughter and the digital sound effects of alien creatures being zapped into virtual oblivion.
There is no predicting tomorrow, whether passersby will be generous or irritated, whether it will rain and there won’t be many pedestrians. They will face whatever the next day demands in the morning. 9 a.m. sharp.
Approximately 2,000 children live in the streets of Georgian cities like Tbilisi, Telavi, Kutaisi and Batumi. Thousands more youth 10 to 16 years are at risk of becoming street kids, according to World Vision Georgia program reports.
World Vision staff work on the streets with these children, trying to earn their trust so that encouragements to leave the streets for shelters and then build new lives are heard and heeded. A new program teaches emergency first aid to street kids so they can deal with exposure and overdoses.
The training doesn’t replace proper medical care but gives the kids the tools to save a friend’s life in the critical first minutes of a problem. It doesn’t encourage them to continue life on the streets either. The goal is to gain trust and an ear among the street children.
World Vision is also working to increase understanding of the issues surrounding street children among social workers, youth centres and government bodies in Georgia to see the design and implementation of prevention and care services.
Street children often appear wild and even dangerous but their young lives are a conundrum of deep longings for love and family, determination to escape abuse and the addictive freedom of street life.
“Sometimes I get away from everyone to sit alone, and I think about my grandparents. I envision their faces and tears come to my eyes,” says Kakhelo.
“At times like that I think of going back to my village. Then the next day I am having fun with my friends. We are planning to go to Tbilisi Sea, which I am looking forward to. When I am alone I am very sad, when I am with my friends I am having fun.”
But about his future he says, “I don’t think about the future; I don’t know how I will live.”
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