Educated in Semarang and Surabaya, Pah Wongso began his social work in the early 1930s, using traditional arts such as wayang golek to promote such causes as monogamy and abstinence.

In late 1938, Pah Wongso used a legal defense fund, which had been raised for him when he was charged with extortion, in order to establish another school; this was followed by an employment center in 1939.

[4][5] By 1938 Pah Wongso had married and opened a school for poor children, particularly those of mixed Chinese descent, in Gang Patikee; it was funded by donations.

[5][6] He organised night fairs in various cities in the Indies (including in Yogyakarta, Semarang, and Surabaya), holding auctions and selling drinks and snacks in order to raise money to send aid to China, then fighting against the Japanese.

[6] After one of these fairs, in Yogyakarta, Pah Wongso was arrested for writing a threatening letter to Liem Tek Hien, who refused to pay f. 10 for a walking stick he said that he had not purchased, and held at Struiswijk Prison in Batavia.

[b][9] The case was widely followed by ethnic Chinese in the Indies, and the newspaper Keng Po established a defense fund for Pah Wongso, which raised more than f. 1,300 by mid-June 1938; this had reached almost f. 2,000 by the end of the month.

Although Liem regretted reporting Pah Wongso to the police, the prosecutor called for a two-month sentence, while the defence asked for an acquittal, or time served.

Pah Wongso was captured in Bandung on 8 March,[1] and spent three years in a series of concentration camps in South-East Asia, including in Thailand, Singapore and Malaya.

[26] He returned to the Indies, now independent and known as Indonesia, by 1948, when he established the "Tulung Menulung" (literally "mutual assistance") social office;[27] he also worked for Bond Motors' Jakarta branch.

De Nieuwsgier gave the story of one young man, from Bengkulu, who had come to Java to study, been robbed of all his possessions while in Jakarta, then been helped by Pah Wongso to find work.