Other
street vendors were the papers sellers. They also came almost exclusively from East
London but it was very rare to find young people among them. They worked
outdoors all year long, occupying the corners at the exit of the most important
metropolitan stations, using some of the simple metallic box inside which the
newspapers were and, sometimes, a table with metal chair, and from there emitted
some incomprehensible sounds that merged with the drafters coming from the bowels of the earth, through
the infinite meanders of the subway; and in those sounds one could no longer
recognize the names of the heads of the daily newspapers Evening Standard and
the Evening News, which they pronounced in a short, deformed by habit,
similar to the rattle of a wounded beast, to attract the attention of the distracted and hurried
passengers in transit to the entrances of underground tunnels. The Evening News
was actually just an imitation of the most famous Evening Standard. The latter
was published in multiple editions from seven a.m. until late at night, with a
frequency between two and three hours.
From one issue to the other, only the first page was changed in order to
attract the readers to brilliant news. It was distributed to such vendors with
a truly fantastic delivery network.
The
delivers came in black-yellow van, and from there, with the engine still on, without
descending from the van, they flown the newspapers packages.
The
Evening Standard did not have a precise political physiognomy (at least not in
the sense that we Italians give it to this expression) and perhaps it alternated
its ideology tuning with the political parties
ruling the largest London administrative
body: "The Great London Council ".
All those
vendors gave me a strange impression: that they had always done that job. Not only for the wheeze voice that
characterized them, but also for their very dirty clothing. The skin of their
face looked dark, almost dirty, because of the exposure to
the unhealthy air.
It also seemed to me that they felt always cold, even in the summer, as if in their
bones it was penetrated the humidity and the chilling breath of the freezing
drafts coming from the Tube.
They wore gloved handcuffs in order to easily
grab money and newspapers and warmed up with a tea-milk cup they bought take away
from the nearest snack bar.
Despite
of their appearance, which in the days
of intense fog blended with the surrounding landscape, becoming a
characteristic element, like the red royal columns of the Royal Mail, the
telephone booths and the black cabs, the sensations they conveyed were, however
positive.
I do not say they were cheerful, but may be
jovial. A serene and resigned joviality, as if the diffusion of the events, from
London and the whole world, contained in their newspapers, made them
impermeable to emotions, placing them above the human events, as if they were
impartial messengers from the
underground’s gods.
When
passing by, where I was working, they never lacked to nod at me with sympathy, at the same time giving making a
sound which wanted to be an "are
you all right " but one could only hear a hiss, like the wind that had entered into their
bodies, consisting of three, perhaps only two syllables, veiled, almost died in the throat.
10. to be continued...
