'I'm afraid I'll get infected living on the streets," said Vee (not her real name), cautiously removing her face mask to eat lunch at the Hub Saidek, a refuge for Bangkok's vulnerable children.
Young Vee has been sleeping on the streets for months and sharing a tent in front of the Hub with five others for the past two weeks. Last night, she managed to rent a 250 baht room, allowing her to have a morning shower and come for lunch at the Hub feeling fresh and clean.
She will have to scrape together 10 baht for an evening shower at the hotel. She doesn't feel safe washing in the gas station toilet like the boys.
Living on the streets since she was 12, the Suphan Buri native spent a year with her mother's new family when she was 15 but her time under a roof was cut short. Slapped by her stepfather, she fled from home.
"I left and came back to live here," she said, gesturing towards the streets of Hua Lamphong. She regularly comes to the Hub for food and help.
Founded by the Childline Thailand Foundation in 2011, the Hub is a refuge for vulnerable children under 18 to seek food, counselling and shelter if they have nowhere to sleep overnight. Before the Covid-19 pandemic, there were as many as 15 children staying every night.
Vee is among the 20,000 children living on the streets nationwide, the Foundation estimates. Most end up on the streets because of domestic violence and abuse, both physical and psychological.
The Hub has distributed basic items and food to children as young as 11 living on the streets over 10,000 times each year for a decade now. Its staff have worked closely on around 400 cases of vulnerable children, half of which have been closed, meaning that some have managed to escape the vicious cycle of homelessness.
But the refuge has been forced to close its doors in accordance with the government's Covid-19 restrictions since late April this year. Undeterred, its committed staff have found ways to continue supporting vulnerable children living on the streets. Unicef is also supporting the Hub by supplying soap, cleaning disinfectant, hand sanitiser and face masks and has donated more than 100,000 items of personal protection equipment to communities and non-profit organisations working with vulnerable groups in Bangkok.
Kanyapak Sukyu, the Hub's manager since 2014, and her team have tried their best to provide support to homeless children during the pandemic.
Snacks and three meals a day are now distributed through a small glass window and conversations are continued from a distance.
"This is the best we can do to support them at the moment," said Kanyapak Sukyu, the Hub's manager since 2014. "Children can come to us for food, hygiene supplies and other necessities."
With support from Unicef, the Hub has also provided psychosocial care and child protection support to 8,500 vulnerable children and through the Foundation's 1387 contact centre since June 2020.
Children are assisted in their emotional recovery after an extremely distressing event and can access protection, care and support for their physical and emotional safety.
"For children facing homelessness amid the Covid-19 pandemic, their childhood is put in jeopardy and they lack the basic needs to survive and thrive," said Parinya Boonridrerthaikul, Unicef Thailand Child Protection Officer. "It is important that they have access to psychosocial care and child protection support even if other doors are closed."
These days, the Hub's small window for distributing food and hygiene supplies and exchanging a few words limits not only the chances of Covid-19 transmission but also communication and ways of building trust and rapport. Staff worry that the temporary closure will drive a wedge between them and the children.
Kanyapak says it takes a while to earn trust with children from vulnerable groups. It could be three months before they start to talk to the staff, and in some cases, it can take a whole year for them to open up. Building trust is critical for staff to reach out to children facing physical or mental health challenges, such as appetite loss or depression.
"This is worrying because we can't talk to them like before," said Kanyapak. "These children don't want to live this kind of life but without an education, they have nowhere else to go and will remain in a vicious cycle where they are taken advantage of."
Unicef's Parinya says the Covid-19 pandemic is making it more difficult to get the children off the streets and into safe homes. It will take every effort for Unicef and partners to find ways to continue extending a helping hand even in the hardest of times.
