Photo:Travel Photography Scholarship 2012 entry-TPA Benowo,Rubbish or hope?

INDONESIA | Saturday, 5 January 2013 | Views [1089] | View Smaller Image

Mountains of rubbish come from all over Surabaya city placed to this place as the proof of forgotten things which society ignored after all. Vast area with 37.2 hectare is fulfilled with several mountains of garbage and has average height for one pile is 787 inches, dangerous toxic gas made from the rotten trash which is abandoned for many years, and very damp environment caused by the local rain. Heavy equipment like tractor and truck, people who work as scavenger and animals such as cow, goat and bird in this place have the same purpose, feeding their needs.

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One of the scavengers sitting on the rubbish quietly and working diligently to collect old shoe soles said, “The life in this place is pretty difficult indeed, I cannot get definite income every day and it depends on how hard I work collecting this stuffs.” Just using old rusty knife, dirty basket for putting the goods, and poor outfit with traditional hand-made straw hat on his head to prevent hot sun light hitting the face, he does his job patiently without any proper safety equipment like gas mask and rubber boots; the interesting matter is that he realizes living in this such environment shorten his life because the exposure of the gas causes chronic lung diseases, headache, harmful skin diseases and other similar health problems. “The fact is I must work in this way to sustain my family needs,” he said.

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Photo:Travel Photography Scholarship 2012 entry-TPA Benowo,Rubbish or hope?

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