If you’re ever in Bucharest, Romania, I recommend visiting The People's Palace. The People's Palace is the second largest building in the world (points if you know what the largest building in the world is) and crafted with the finest materials you can come by. And if you do visit the grandiose Palace, then you must also pay a visit to the sewer kids who live mere blocks away.  

There are a handful of situations and things seen from my travels abroad that continue to haunt me. With my time in Romania, it’s the sewer kids. 

I was with a handful of people who were being shown around by the Teen Challenge Bucharest division. The site we walked upon to meet the kids was nothing like I had imagined. I had pictured a secluded area that was removed from city life. I was wrong. We were on a main street with heavy rush hour traffic flying by. We stood on the side of the busy street just above a main sewer line where hundreds of children were living.

Above the ground was a make shift tent where a 17 year old Gypsy girl lived with her newborn. A Teen Challenger worker from Spain brought her milk for the baby. Along a nearby chain linked fence I saw a manhole leading to the sewer world below. A guy in his early 20’s came up first. You could tell the sunlight hurt his eyes as he winced in a bit of pain. He made his way towards us and I noticed immediately his arm was bleeding. He had shot up just before coming up to the light.

Through a translator, this young man began to tell us he was ashamed of his habit but saw no other way.  Unfortunately he was singing the tune of so many of this sewer generation. Glue is the drug of choice for these kids simply because it’s easily accessible. With a trash bag and some glue, these kids sniff away their unfortunate reality. The glue suppresses their appetites and keeps them awake for days. If they want food they have to steal it. If they want sleep, they risk the possibility someone around them may steal the only possession they have; most likely something they’ve found on the street or stolen themselves.  The kids we met that day were so high it was impossible to carry on a conversation with them. They looked at us with glossy eyes as if they were staring at a brick wall. The children as old as 15 and 16 looked 10 due to malnutrition and chronic drug use.

The plan that day was to go down into the sewers to spend some time with the children who were down there. We never got that time. After the first guy came up after having shot up, the Teen Challenge leader we were with decided it wasn’t safe at that time for us to go down. I have to admit I was both relieved and ashamed.