The woman around the corner, Carmen, has just died.
The soul of Malasaña's district - Madrid.
Hard to believe.
The neighbours keep on bringing her coffee as ever, they put it down at her working place : the corner of the street. Children stick full of hearts - drawings on her wall, several sweets... Shopkeepers offer her flowers, nice words on pieces of paper, fruits... Everyone stops for a while in the suddenly so quiet corner :
hard to believe she's gone.
She had been selling stuff here for 66 years, even if the weather was bad... Always there.
Quite a character ! 80 years old... With such a strong personnality, such a cockney accent.
Meeting her and her daughter in a shop around, we could hear her saying suddenly :
"Hombre hija, he dejado el puesto solo, y el aceite qué?"
"Hey girl ! I've left my stand alone, and what about my stuff ?"
But nobody would have touched anything, because everybody knew it was Carmen's basket, even if she were not there.
Carmen went away, she lets us with a big emptiness, and the nostalgy of the old Madrid she took away with her...
Interview here.
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