Discarded, Glue Kids of Recife, Brazil

Tyrone Turner

Freelance / ICWA / Black Star

While Brazil struggles to stem the tide of a massive illegal drug trade, and the accompanying wave of crime that kills poor, young males by the thousands, another epidemic is often forgotten. This is the addiction to a legal substance, shoe glue, the preferred drug of Brazil's hardcore street children. These glue sniffers populate the streets throughout the country, evidence of the lack of any social safety net in one of the world's most unequal countries. Numbering thousands in the larger metropolises of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, there are hundreds in the streets of Recife, which lies in the poor Northeastern region of the country. Each kid has a story about why they have escaped to the street, from violent domestic abuse, to sexual orientation, to overwhelming poverty at home. However, one this keeps them together - the sniffing glue from plastic water bottles that hand like appendages from their mouths. This essay looks into the harsh world of a few glue-addicted street children, the ways that they survive, the 'families' that they form on street corners and their complex youth lived through a fog of addiction. Sniff, As rain drips bead on his face, Breno, 4, inhales glue fumes. One inch of glue, about 50 cents, gives a three hour high.

Tyrone Turner, "Discarded, Glue Kids of Recife, Brazil," in POYi Archive, Item #31701, http://archive.poy.org/items/show/31701 (accessed November 23, 2024).