Monkey Business

The music is uncharacteristically loud in the reception. He is sat on one of three couches, wearing a cheap black nylon suit. Surrounding him and the room are his contemporaries. Though their suits may not be cheap, they too look a little bewildered and anxious before this second interview. Behind the large reception bar is a petit and pretty lady, with curly brown hair, copper highlights, sauntering, as she walks in and out the room about her business, to the loud pop tunes on the surround sound system. He suspects that the music is on her insistence, though other employees seem to expect and enjoy the pop noise, as they rush in and check details with the reception.

In their suits and blouses, is a young and educated sundry of races, behind spectacles and under gelled hair. Perhaps some of them actually studied marketing and sales. Perhaps some of them are really looking forward to quickly climbing the promotion ladder and running their own office. But not he. He is looking for a simple job with simple cash. This seems a little too full of pomp and self confidence. His interviewer of two days prior he hated instantly, before they had spoken even. A six foot three guerilla of a man in a smart suit with an untidy chin and a gruff, roaring rumbling voice sounding platitudes of performance and promotion.

He does not exchange small talk with is couch companions. Indeed, there is little conversation in the room under the din of the pop music. Some of the girls page through the out of date frayed fashion magazines from the flimsy carbon steel rack by in the corner of the room.

But curiously, he, and probably none of the occupants of the couches know what this company actually does. He was informed that on this day, of the second interview, he would, as would the others, have the opportunity to see how the company operates. He knows that the company markets products by venturing to other businesses, however. Behind the three closed doors that open into the reception, there seems to be much activity. Formally dressed men and women storm in and out, over the cheap carpet, carrying big black bags and with huge strides, in what seemed to be an every morning routine. In another room, beyond two doors there seems to be some sort of a celebration.

After a defeating long wait (considering how he ran up the street to be on time) names are quickly called out in groups of five. Quickly ushered into a plain and bare boardroom with a long rectangular table, he is introduced to five people in suits, standing straight against a wall. The names faintly stain his mind and then drop from his memory. He hopes to be paired with the lady but instead gets a gentleman named Vincent. He knows not why they are being paired at this stage. Vincent then leads him to the fire escape staircase to give him, among other impromptu discussions, an interview. Vincent asked simple questions about education and address that he had confessed in the first interview already. He is told he is going to observe what they do. ‘So are we going to be marketing products today?’ he ventures. ‘You will see’, Vincent replies.

On to the grey, carbon monoxide, traffic besieged street, Vincent leads him, taking with him two huge black gym bags that crowd the elevator on the way down. He meets Lieska, a short compact polish girl with crop brown hair, a hockey players physique and a cigarette in her mouth. She is friendly but does not say much at first. When she smiles however, it is a full enthusiastic smile that reveals all her smoker browning teeth. Vincent quickly points out to Lieska and he that he is only to observe and that Vincent and her are to work as usual.

Vincent is a Ghanaian with the usual creep of a London accent corrupting his speech. His face is fleshy with a tidy trim chin and short hair. He is well built and stands a few inches taller than him. Lieka and Vincent dragging their heavy full load of black gym bags, they make for Moorgate, the underground train station, over pavements and busy side streets, dwarfed by the London concrete city blocks. Vincent launches into a tirade of praise of the job he is to observe, all the while avoiding the actual details of what the job entails. He explains that he studied Psychology at university in Ghana. That he had an IT company in London. That the marketing job was so good he shut down his IT company for it. At the tube station, Vincent offers breakfast at the vendor but does not cover the 4 pound extension fair to zone 3 on the tube.

They are going to Golders Green. A Jewish borough, Vincent explains on the train. Scattered about their feet are the gym bags. He still does not know what the bags contain, as full as they were. While woofing down his vendor sandwich, Vincent begins to tutor him for the third round interview. It takes him 10 minutes to get across the concept of the economy of scale over some example of a distribution contract. About how one man had built the company by working phones and being tenacious. About the ‘laws’ of marketing. He is advised to take notes, as he does. He, the observer on this mission, thinks little of the weak and propounded claim to scientific authenticity.

At Golders green, the tube emerges from the underground to the overground, making the mole of a train look incongruous in the bright natural light. When they alight, they walk out, pulling and dragging their gym bags, that he is not allowed to carry, on to the high street of one of London’s many satellite suburbs. Across a road, the bulk of the mysterious goods are unloaded at a tile shop, round the back of a property shop. The buildings are of carbon stained red bricks and the high street roars with red London buses and impatient cars.

Finally, the contents of the gym bags make their debut. To his horror, the goods to be marketed are tape measures, with a battery powered red laser, accounting calculators and flying screaming monkey toys. The businesses to whom these products are to be marketed to are street shops and their shopkeepers, irate customers and unsuspecting pedestrians. Lieska sucks hard on her cigarette as Vincent and her plot their marketing routes. Which streets, how not to get lost and when to meet where. As Vincent’s disappears again into the tile shop, Lieska speaks of her Scottish boyfriend and his following Saturday return from the United States. She longs for the end of the day and sleep. Lieska prefers to work, or shall I say hustle, on the same side of the street as Vincent. In a way, she seems like Vincent’s prodigy.

He can’t believe it. Vincent, this educated man, this lion of Africa uses his might, strength and eloquence to walk into shops, door after door to produce lasers, calculators and monkeys. Up steps and around a narrow corridor to a reception of a nondescript business. On seeing Vincent’s black bag she, the receptionist, takes her mouth off the phone and quickly, though politely, declines Vincent’s overtures. He smiles and smears his charm about the room. Back on the street Vincent points out that it is a numbers game. The important thing is to keep your spirits up he says. He says there are ‘laws’ of marketing. ‘Factual’ and ‘proved’. That for every ten clients approached, one bytes. A ten to one ratio, however true, does not impress him however, given the opprobrious attacks on strangers solitude. Nine frustrated and uncomfortable people to one happy customer, neither of whom asked to be disturbed.

The town is indeed Jewish. Nothing like the Jewish neighborhoods he had seen in South Africa. Here, it was more like the Jewish communities he watched recreated and vanquished in holocaust films. Young and old bearded men pacing the pavement in black suits, white shirts and tall tops hats, with long curly hair dangling from their sideburns. Some walked in pairs. In the shops was genuine Jewish accents and fluent Hebrew. People with Semite noses, pale olive skin and curly hair. Jewish shop keeper charm, some of which humored Vincent’s banal soliciting. On the pavement Hebrew wafted freely and one had the impression that most people new each other, from the conversations that were openly shouted overheads. Some people, who he presumed were not Jewish, made jokes about what a tough neighborhood it is to sell goods (to Jews, that is). He, however, witnessed all manner of Jews and non Jews buy the excess stock peddled by educated foreigners.

Vincent was animated and though forced, affable. He would have enjoyed watching him, had he not felt such shame for him and himself. On each encounter, be it in a shop or on the pavement, the first item Vincent produced was the tape measure with its laser. Vincent claimed it was 20 pounds in ‘the shops’ but was offering it to the frustrated customer at only ‘ten pounds’. He made sure they held the item in their hands, to force on them the sense of premature ownership, while he produced from his gym bag, a massive bright yellow halogen lamp. He asked the victim to envisage being stuck on a highway while waiting for the AA. Most victims at this point politely declined, while looking the other way in palpable frustration. To this, Vincent responded by producing the accounting calculator. On declining this, with a deep sigh, Vincent, full of words and one sided banter produced the monkey. Here, he had to roll his eyes and cringe in sympathetic frustration. The monkey made the most excruciatingly painful shrieks to the touch. Vincent would place its toy hands on his finger tips and launch the little toy by its elastic arms into the air to the shrieking sound of its cry. A couple of shopkeepers chased Vincent out their shop. In some restaurants, Vincent, without hesitating disturbed  customers launches and coffees to offer them a tape measure with a laser. I was amazed that he got away with so much. I was amazed how much people tolerated. Some customers bought his goods. Some made multiple orders. Vincent did better than the 10-1 ‘law’.

Before noon he was famished and finished. The emotional strain of watching so many peoples times wasted by a shrieking monkey was stressful. Also walking up and down the same high street half a dozen times in an hour grated at the mind. To and from the tile shop depot for more monkeys, tape measures and calculators. Lieka never far away, with her own little success stories. Back alleys, cell phone shops, kitchens, building works. Every little nook of this line of shops was covered. The KFC lunch was welcome. He was mildly surprised that Vincent covered his meal. He had secretly vowed to himself to run off home otherwise.

Before lunch however, another group of street hustlers of the same company were seen lurking. They too wore black suits and carried black gym bags. They too were in the same borough. This was an error. Only one team was to cover a borough. One of them was an Iranian and the other a Nigerian. He thought how ridiculous the situation was. Five suited individuals, a Zambian, Ghanaian, Nigerian, a Pole and an Iranian selling toy monkeys in London in a Jewish suburb. Vincent had a long argument with the second team over jurisdiction.

Before the lunch was over, and after much coming across shops that had been covered by the Iranian and Nigerian already, he conceded to Vincent that he could take no more. Vincent, in his extemporary lectures, had inquired, rather searchingly, whether he thought he could do it. For all his frustration and genuine disgust about the whole business, he was initially timid and evasive in his response. But still, Vincent had provided the vocabulary for an exit. ‘Vincent, I don’t think this is for me…actually’ he said, feeling a great relief come over him. He was already across the road waiting for the next bus before Vincent thought to check that he knew his way home. He was glad to sit upstairs on that London bus and wonder through the Jewish high street without having to call at every shop.

The God of Small Things, by Arundhati Roy

The Story is magic. Given that the book is a Booker prize winner, my expectations were naturally high. However, I don’t think I was prepared to be as touched, moved and shifted as I was reading The God of Small Things. Also, before I got into the book, I was doubtfulof the reading experience, given that I read it, a story set in monsoon soaked western India in Karala, while hopping on and off trains and buses in damp grotty London. The God of Small Things, however, triumphed over the vagaries of London’s public transport system and pulled me into its world.

 Central to the stories constellation of characters, most of whom of the same family, spanning across 5 generations, are ‘two egg’ twins, Rahel and Estha. Much of the story follows their experiences and is told via their perceptions. The narrative takes on their childish little songs, fears and rhymes. The story takes on their perspectives as legitimate narratives. Before you have found characters to despise, you have fallen for the ‘two egg’ twins and their childhood world. Arundhati creates an endearing bond between the twins you quickly come to envy. It is this vulnerable and sweet childhood you quickly fear for and want to protect. For which you hope the best, to cling on to, though from the stories beginning you, you know that it all fell apart at some point, yet you cling on it all the while never the less. Even after you turn the last page, you still hold on to this childhood of sibling bliss.

The tale is a masterpiece. A great fugue. With each characters story unravelled, the anecdote is summarised and added to the growing library of sentences used as a library to refer the characters past. Standard story telling procedures perhaps, but here is it executed with such consistency and flare. Cannons are added to the building fugue, until the whole tale is a roaring orchestra. Each one a sweet little story, but together, weaved together so that the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, the story roars a mighty tale before the intrigue is finally revealed. The children’s rhymes and their innocent explanations for the adult world around them is also weaved into the great fugue, and becomes genuine wisdom, though spun out of children’s games.

 The tale is poweful and touching, but thankfuly, there is a crusade embedded. The tale is a vehicle for a noble crusade. Into the fray, are various macro phenomenons such as India’s caste system, Christianity, class, colonialism, consumer culture and race. In this tale there is greed, unlikely creeds, deceit, courage, cowardice and fouled innocence. It is carefully constructed, without blatant proselytising. Only when the stories finaltragedy is unveiled, and you have finally appreciated the depth of the loss and the dust settled, you see how each has contributed to the loss by serving to each of their individual sins. That said, by the stories end, the nuances are few. The baddies are clearly bad and the innocent clearly victims. Not that the perpetrators don’t have their stories told, they do. But this does not really lead you to sympathise with their actions. It just makes you hate them more. On the whole, the weak are the innocent and the strong are guilty but the genius is that you only realise this at the stories very end.

Folly

He set the alarm on both phones for 5am and woke up in a child’s room. The room had been hit by a bomb, the bomb that a result of chidrens limitless toys and play. Broken and forgotten toys lay all about the room. In the dark they crunch under his feet. He will not switch on the light for fear of waking the child. He draws the curtain and packs his back-pack in the gleam from the street lights. As he crept into bed the midnight before, he discovered to his horror that his flight was for 8:45 am and not mid day. That is why he pack his back-pack in the dark.

 Eventually, the child stirs and wakes to the chaffing of clothes being packed into a resilient parcel.

“Where are you going” the child inquires.
“I am going back to Geneva” he says.
“Your going back to Switzerland” the child still inquires.
“Yes, to Geneva in Switzerland”.
“Why can’t you stay here with us?” is the next inquiry.
“It is not my home, this your home for your family” I reason, feeling my self being pushed up a wall, knowing full well that with this child, every answer leads to another question.
“You can stay here, in this room, I don’t mind. When are you coming back?”
“I don’t know, soon maybe. 3 weeks” he confesses, his mind racing off and wondering why he is going back to Geneva at all.
“Why do you have to go back Geneva?”

There was never an end to the child’s questions. The only relief was by physical escape or a cunning change of topic. He made his escape from the cannonade of the child’s questions to gather his belongings from downstairs.

Before he left out the house, Sheila and her husband descended from their bedroom and slipped him 10 pounds good luck. He was on the street at 7am, thinking he would make Gatwick airport in an hour. Only two train rides he thought. One to East Croydon, and another to Gatwick. It was simple, or so he thought.

Sat on the dreary wrought iron bench at Thornton Heath train station, he watched the overhead electronic schedule with dismay. There were no trains to East Croydon it seemed. The only train was to West Croydon. He did not know how to get from West to East Croydon but, he boarded anyway. There was a tram from West to East Croydon, and he hat to run, with his huge back-pack to catch. He did not know any part of London had trams. It reminded him of Geneva. And like Geneva, you could get away with not paying on the tram, as he did. At East Croydon, there were delays with the Gatwick train. When it did come, it went past the platform without stopping, out foxing everyone who had assembled on the platform edge to board. The next train was another 15 min. The Gatwick train made most stops on the way, and they were lengthy leisurely stops. It was unlike the train ride he took in the opposite direction on his arrival. But that was Saturday. This was Sunday. At the airport he ran, with his massive back-pack bouncing on his back, through the corridors and onto another tram for the north terminal. At the check in desk, lady posing as his ally made phone calls and solicited his case for boarding the plane. Alas, it was too late. Though still a whole 10 min to take off, his baggage would not get there on time. He was directed to the ticket sales desk, while being given advise on how to board planes. At the sales desk he discovered that it would cost him 200 pounds to fly with in the next 3 days. The budget airlines did not offer anything better. He was trapped in London.

The train ride back to Thornton Heath, that black country of immigrants, went smoothly. No delays or connections through West Croydon. He was shrouded in shame. He had never missed a plane before. He was foolish. He knew the trains were slow on a Sunday. He knew he did not leave enough time.

Sheila opened the door in her dressing gown. Her face was very long and her eyes red. She was expecting him and aware of his folly at the airport, however, by way of a phone call of shame from a public phone. But still the grief on her face was from more than just having to harbour a hapless aberration of her childhood a few more days. There had been an argument with her husband, she explained, with a running nose and a faltering voice. She had not consulted him before she allowed me to lodge with her and her family for a week. She was very distraught. I had never seen her like this. But then I had hardly seen her in the last 15 years. She nearly broke down completely. I was lost for words. She said it was not my fault, which was not completely true. As we stood in her dinning room, with her three children in the adjacent sitting room sat on the couch watching Sunday morning Wrestling, able to hear all we said surely, Sheila shed a tear.

Sheila kept on repeating her plea. That is was not his fault. That she should have consulted her husband. But the sobs were escalating and through a muffled cry she said “He wants to leave….”
but I could not make out the rest. I was too scared to make out the rest. I put my hand on her shoulder to try and arrest her anguish. I could not bring myself to console her properly. To embrace her. He still saw her as his big sisters friend. A big sister by extension. How could he patronise her and console her. Further more, he was the root cause of the unhappiness in the happy family. The husband was upstairs all the while. He felt he had to leave before he came down.

He made some frantic phone calls to his other Zambian friends in London. Friends he did not think he knew well enough to impose himself, until that morning of course. With in 10 minutes he was back on the street, his massive back-pack bouncing behind him, back to the Thornton Heath train station in the country of black immigrants. He was heading for South East London. For the boys who he had known through his flat mate and their debaucherous outings.

The House Gun, by Nadine Gordimer

I was curious about how this book would tell its story, simply because it was published after democracy and further, because its story is set in post apartheid South Africa. The other books by Nadine Gordimer that I have read, have all been a rally, of various degrees against South Africa’s unequal society and its punitive apartheid regime. Burghers Daughter, A World of Strangers and The Lying Days were all very scathing and critical of the white South Africa that consciously and unconsciously lived off an unequal society. What could she possibly have to write about, now that Apartheid is over.

 The house gun starts off with a tragedy. A son has killed a man with a gun, the house gun, and two self respecting parents, the Lindgards, must come to terms with their sons guilt and what part they have in it. The parents are white South Africans of course, a qualified doctor and board member of a high rise big company. Though they were not heroes in their youth and fully benefited from a very unequal apartheid South Africa. The story mainly traces the parents coming to terms with what their son has done and what had become of him to commit murder. There is denial, at various levels, starting at complete and total denial.

The story is told in a very differen style to the Gordimers I have read from her much eariler work. Here, there is no explicit dialogue, no quotation marks. The text freely moves from the characters words, to their thoughts and to the authors descriptive prose. The chapters are short and austere. Very unlike the Gordimer of before. The book does read like a dream, as one of the quoted critics acclaims, on the back cover. But really it is more like a nightmare. The worst nightmare of simple career couple, successful in their careers and comfortable that they have brought up a child well.

 However, there is some of the usual Gordimer. The parents, as a result of the tragedy of their sons actions, have to move out of their comfort zone, and straddle into the other worlds of Johannesburg. Worlds of a different race. The parents settle for a black lawyer, simplybecause they have been led to believe he is the best. They are liberals and so they smooth over the fact that he is black. But he brings them home on one occasion to his mansion of a house and meet his successful and professional extended family. The Lindgards intersect with the black middle classes for a night and find that they quite enjoy this other middle class South Africa. This is typical Gordimer, swinging characters across social racial barriers, not as a crusade against the evil system, but just as simple middle class adventure. It is not quite the JM Coetzee style of the central character falling from grace and dropping into underbelly of society that supports the white upper crust. In fact, this story missed out on the underbelly of South African all together.

 To my surprise little guilt is poured on to the gun. Little blame is apportioned to a gun culture that is taken for granted. The parents never muse “they should never have kept a gun in the house”, though they are not quotation marks in the story. There are no fingers pointing to the violent past and the upheavals of revolution. No attempt to blame wrongs of today on the evil of the past, as South Africa does for all its big problems (maybe that is why there is suitable action on AIDS, it cannot be blamed on the struggle). Instead the parents come to understand how liberal their son has become, by sexuality and race. How their son took it upon himself to save a girl, over whom the murder was committed, who did not want to be saved and subsequently hated him for it.

 In all, the story seems to have no anchor. I am not sure why it was written. It is like expensive drift wood, made with such a skill full Craft but for what? There is no rally against the state, society or race. The division of modern day South Africa is acknowledged but is not the issue. There is the big court room drama, where their lawyer, with much eloquence, makes a guilty man valiant. The drama is genuine, but for what purpose is it?