ON THE STREET, SEXISM IS JUST ANOTHER BURDEN

KATTY'S fingers, with their sugar-pink painted nails, work the machines at
an amusement parlour with dexterity as she sneaks a sip of Pepsi and flips
back her hair to focus on the task at hand. But on the street outside, the
same pair of hands has in the past received and distributed quantities of
heroin.

Now Katty, 23 is trying, through her involvement with research and
community projects, to help other young people with heroin problems, so if
you can't find her at the pinball parlour, try the trade centres outside
Cabramatta railway station or one of the suburb's many arcades selling
fabrics, hot bread and produce.

In the early 1990s Katty was one of a group of about 15 teenagers called
The Cabragirls, who entered the male-dominated drugs market to feed their
habits.

Today only a handful remain - many are in prison or dead - but down at the
arcades, girls as young as 12 are queueing up to take their place.

More and more young addicts in Cabramatta are female and they are
increasingly turning to crime to support their addictions.

Lisa Maher, the author of several studies of drug use and the market in the
heroin capital of Australia, describes the drug market as "more sexist than
the labour market".

Traditionally, she says, women performed functions auxiliary to those of
men, such as domestic duties or lesser roles in crimes such as prostitution
or shoplifting. Few women used drugs.

But during 1992 and 1993 the Cabragirls, a looseknit grouping affiliated
with young men in gangs such as the 5T gang, began using heroin and then
selling it to support their habit.

Dr Maher says the group dissipated in 1994-95 because social and cultural
factors put women involved in criminal activity at greater risk of harm
than their male counterparts.

"The streets are not very kind to women," says Dr Maher, who during the
past four years has conducted more than 100 interviews with Indochinese
women in the area aged between 14 and 22.

Katty is no stranger to the risks, but has developed street-smarts and a
toughness she says are absent in many of the new girls.

"There's a lot more girls here who shouldn't be because they're young and
innocent," she says.

To a newcomer, female sellers and users can be difficult to spot. Personal
grooming and style are often integral to maintaining a sense of dignity and
respect in the face of community disapproval and disgust.

It's not uncommon to see young women applying each other's make-up on the
streets or doing one another's hair, in an effort to reclaim the space as
their own.

Stylish outfits are worn almost always with platform shoes, tiny bags and
long shiny hair.

Impeccable manners mean few are turned away from coffee houses or
restaurants. It's usually the Anglo-Australlans who are the "messy" ones.
But all the lip-gloss in the world cannot protect these women from the
gritty realities of the street.

Coming out to play - ra choi - is an expression young Indochinese use to
describe the process of entry to and immersion in street life and culture.
Some initially view coming out to play as fun and egalitarian.

"Nobody judges you on the street," says 22-year-old Vietnamese Australian Tu.

Many young women come out to play to escape problems at home, often
exacerbated by cultural differences.

"My parents brought me here from Laos because they wanted me to have a
better life than what they did," Katty says.

"They wanted me to go to university, but I didn't."

Ironically, young women are particularly vulnerable to the high
expectations of some South-East Asian cultures once they are on the street.

They are often stereotyped as prostitutes or junkies, even if they're not,
and stigmatised and shamed by the entire community.

If they are discovered to be injecting-drug users they are often estranged
from the group of young people they once called friends and so turn to
selling to generate their own income.

But female dealers lack the more formalised norms and structures of the
groups of males involved in heroin distribution.

In many ways gangs such as 5T recreated a traditional family structure,
with strong rules about selling heroin without using it.

But Dr Maher says an absence of rules for women makes them more likely to
become addicts, and therefore more vulnerable.

Other females become competitors rather than friends, as one young woman
recently found out. She overdosed and was found by an Anglo-Australian
youth after her "girlfriends" left her for dead - after stealing all the
money in her purse.

"The guys stick together like brothers, but I guess it's natural for women
to bitch and nag." says Katty.

Dr Maher says women who do commit crimes with men are likely to end up with
the "shit jobs", and the men with the lion's share of the profits.

If they are suspected of unlawful behaviour or concealing drugs, strip
searches conducted by police are particularly humiliating.

But for the young women selling and using drugs in Cabramatta, the pain of
withdrawal can seem worse than remaining on the streets.

Tu, a former heroin user who has been through the prison system, was one
young woman who decided to take the risk: "It was very hard. I was sick all
the time."

Tu is now back on Cabramatta's streets doing community work and has a
position after Christmas providing post-detox support at the Cabramatta
Community Centre.

"I want to work and help them to grow their spirit." she says of those
still on the street.

Tu's spirit is strong, but others might not be so lucky.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski