I walked round this corner, coming round the building from the left, on my way back from lunch in Lavapies the other day.
There were 5 Sub-Saharan immigrant guys hovering over that big patch of pavement by the blue motorbike, covering the flagstones with their ragged ‘top manta‘ meter-squares of cotton sheets, full of the latest Hollywood Blockbuster DVD copies, idly browsed by the bored tourist trade..
…and the second they came into my view everything exploded into sudden action, as the men reached down to get the stings that attach to all four corners of the cloth laid out before them, and in one smooth movement the cloth had gathered the DVDs, they had turned on their heels, and sprinted through cars across the zebra crossing to sit things out nervously in the middle of the road.
Then I saw the police car that had pulled up just behind them. One of the agentes lazily made a show of pretending to get out, realised he’d achieved his aim of scattering them to the wind, and pulled his foot back into the car while his partner headed back into the traffic. A tourist bent down and picked up 5 of the DVD’s that had been dropped during the escape, and wandered off casually, showing them to his friends.
I stopped and watched the guys still hovering in the central reservation, sheets clasped tightly in their hands, ready to run again. I walked over to wait at the crossing. Looked into the window of McD’s – some teenagers with mum and dad, eating a burger – lettuce, slab of grey meat, looked like the bun had chocolate chips on top – what?!
Looking down, I saw I was right next to a palid, sad 40-something guy sitting on a scrap of cardboard, his back up against the wall below the burger-eaters window. He had a few coins laid out in front of him, a half-tin of catfood, and a tiny tabby kitten. Every time the kitten made it to the boarders of the cardboard he reached out, grabbed a bit of fur or a limb, and dragged it back. Again, and again, and again, and again.
But something in his half-dead eyes convinced me later that the kitten gave a scrap of meaning to his life, and that the kitten wouldn’t have made it without him either…
katie
14 Sep 10 at 3:17 pm
i know that corner well. the top-manta situation is too depressing to think about. word has it some mafia runs the whole thing; i wish people would boycott them. the guy with the cat is always there–but the cat changes. it’s a fairly clever ploy.
Ben Curtis
14 Sep 10 at 5:13 pm
Hopefully the cat changes because people can’t see it being treated like that, give him a chunk of cash, and take kitty home… I was tempted…
Carolina
15 Sep 10 at 4:58 am
That was so poignant. Made more so by the fact that although I have been very few places in Spain, I have been to that corner and I recognized it at once.
Ben Curtis
15 Sep 10 at 7:54 am
I’m glad you liked it Carolina.
DBMark
15 Sep 10 at 9:09 am
Ben, not directly related to the post, but perhaps you could do an entry on
http://www.viviendomadrid.com/101-cosas-para-hacer-en-madrid-antes-de-morir/
Thinking about it, maybe interacting with the topmanta street traders should be on the list?
Ben Curtis
15 Sep 10 at 10:30 am
Good list Mark! I’ve added it to notesfrommadrid.com which I hope to occasionally update again!
Claire
17 Sep 10 at 12:17 am
I also know that corner from 10 years ago when I did my Erasmus in Alcala de Henares. I so very nearly got hit in the face by the bag of CD’s as the guy swung it over his shoulder, to this day I cringe thinking about how nasty that would have been, but what a great story the scars would have told…
Lee
19 Sep 10 at 6:04 pm
I pass that corner several times every day. The cat guy does good business and people buy food for the cats as well (as far as I can see, he treats the cats well).I gather he gets them from the flock of strays that live across the road in the Botanical Gardens. Earlier this year he had a ginger tabby; then had a momcat with one kitten, and now he just has the kitten. (I think I saw the tabby the other day living as the house cat in a restaurant on c/Huertas.) I agree; I think the cats keep him going.
Ben Curtis
20 Sep 10 at 8:43 am
Thanks for adding to the story Lee!