In an earlier blog about Miss Brown, I wrote about how she liked to sit at the back boot of her Hyundai MPV and read her daily newspapers all spread out in front of her.
If there were two things she did (almost) every day, it would be listening to the radio, and reading the newspaper.
She always turned on to the radio in the car.
And she was never without a newspaper whether in the driver's seat, the passenger seat, or the boot.
The newspaper was also always with her in her bag long after she stopped driving.
She would take it out whilst waiting for us to arrive.
She would also read it from time to time during meal times.
If she carried a small bag, the newspaper would be folded into quarters and stuffed inside.
In short, she was hardly without the newspaper.
At first i thought she read the papers so fervently because the articles (and the formal, classical language) reminded her of her textbooks when she studied in school.
But later I realized- it wasn't just the news or the articles or even the style of writing that appealed to her- but the fact that newspapers were an integral part of her life.
She didn't just subscribe to have them sent to her door every morning, or go to the table vendor (by the roadside) to buy the evening Chinese daily.
She actually had been a distributor.
Now, I don't know much about newspaper distribution (and her family- for some reason- don't like questions too many about that season) but from what I've heard thus far, it seems like a lot of dedication, and a lot of work.
To begin with, one had to be early risers.
This meant getting up at the graveyard hour of 3am(?) 4am(?) to collect the papers from the printing house (Times printers?) and bring them to the central distribution area where they would then be sorted into sets for distribution to the individual households.
I don't know whether they had others to help distribute the papers.
I think they did.
But sometimes those people weren't available or there wasn't enough manpower so they did it themselves.
From what I hear, it was quite exhausting.
One needs a good deal of stamina to walk down 20 flights of stairs armed with stacks of newspapers in your arms.
Not every floor had lifts during those days, and even though you could take lifts to the nearest floors, it was apparently much faster to walk down the stairs.
This- according to the family- wasn't the most challenging part.
The most challenging part were the collection of subscription fees.
See, newspapers are often delivered to the homes before dawn at a time when no one is awake.
Which means they can only collect the fees during the course of the day (if there's someone at home) or in the evening (if the person is out at work and only home after dark)
It was exhausting running from house to house to house, I was told.
But they persisted.
For quite a number of years Miss Brown and her husband persisted.
Woke up early, went to the printers, got the papers, sorted them out, sent them to the distribution team, or distributed themselves, then went around collecting the fees- before starting it all over again the next day.
It wasn't all pure career and discipline that kept Miss Brown in the line for over ten years, however.
There was a lot of (self) motivation on her part to keep the distribution business going too.
It might have been the friends and business partners whom she interacted with.
It might have been the availability of access to (not just) newspapers but a host of other printed material like women's magazines, entertainment magazines, and cooking magazines.
Miss Brown particularly loved the cooking magazines.
I know- amongst some of her most precious belongings are carefully cut recipes that have been carefully curated from all the magazines she's read over the years.
It's not just one or two recipes,
They fill up a couple of A4 sized boxes.
It might also have been the (desired) association she got with the newspaper publisher.
Sort of like a dream which she'd always wished to have (since school days) and now finally had.
Because there was a dark green backpack- gifted to her by the publishing house- which she kept in good condition and which she used for many years- whenever she wanted to carry a backpack out.
And then there's this picture.
From her personal collection.
I think that's her in the foreground looking at the material on the table.
I don't know who took the picture.
It might be her husband who'd gone along with her to the publishing house when they held a showcase event for their newspaper distributors.
We don't know for sure which year this picture was taken.
But- seeing the interest she had, and seeing the jubilant smile on her face (in other pictures), one can tell that, yes, it was a proud occasion, and one which she deeply cherished.