So, as planned, I conducted some research this week into the question of how one gets a job in a streetcorner newsbooth.
This research took the form of patronising several of said newsbooths scattered around the Melbourne CBD, as a pretext for asking the people working in them how one comes to find oneself in their enviable shoes.
But not a single one of them would tell me – on the grounds that I was better off not knowing.
Quoth the guy in the booth on the corner of Queen & Bourke Streets: “It’s shit, mate. You have to get up at 5am every morning.. stand in here all day.. It’s – trust me, you do not wanna work in one of these.”
They all said basically the same thing.
Inevitably, part of me suspects some kind of conspiracy.
But a larger part was basically convinced.
Heh — I used to tell my students (basically) the same thing about journalism.
Was one of the reasons I finally quit — figured I prlly wasn’t the best mentor going for them.
Well, I dunno about that..