Innholdsfortegnelse for 23-11-20 i The Big Issue

VENDORS Lockdown measures in England and parts of Scotland mean The Big Issue has asked more than half its 2,000 vendors to temporarily stop selling the magazine. Elsewhere our sta›f are working closely with vendors to make sure it is safe for them to be selling, and safe for customers to buy. We are providing masks and hand gel, and encouraging vendors to follow government guidelines. If you can, please support your local vendor by buying The Big Issue from them. PITCHES Towns and cities across the country are quieter than normal so our teams are moving vendors to pitches where they have the best chance of selling magazines, depending on local safety measures and circumstances. An ever-increasing number of vendors are offering contactless payments so they are not losing…

Sophie Winkleman joins actors Christopher Eccleston and Daniel Mays, architect and TV presenter George Clarke and firefighter Sabrina Cohen-Hatton on our team of Big Issue Ambassadors. They are getting the word out about our vital work and the challenges facing vendors during lockdown. Eccleston said: “Nothing has been worse for Big Issue vendors than this pandemic. So say to your best friend, my gift this Christmas is a subscription to The Big Issue. I’m very honoured to become a Big Issue Ambassador. I want to say to vendors, who at the moment are out of sight, I will try in my small way to give them visibility.” LOOK OUT FOR OUR INTERVIEW WITH DANIEL MAYS NEXT WEEK…

This was a fashion shoot with a difference. When The Big Issue teamed up with British heritage fashion brand Belstaff, the models were all Big Issue vendors. The photographer was a Big Issue vendor. And the beneficiaries of the hook-up – in which Belstaff are donating 10 per cent of all full-price sales over Black Friday weekend (November 27-30) to The Big Issue Foundation, having previously donated hundreds of warm jackets to vendors this spring – will be Big Issue vendors. Carlos Gonzalez Perez has been selling The Big Issue, on and off, for a decade. But he is also a self-taught photographer whose work has been exhibited around the world, documenting city life, exploring architecture, searching for unusual subjects with an eye for interesting angles and unlikely juxtapositions. And…

Anthony is a Big Issue vendor who has sold the magazine for several years – his pitch is at South Kensington Tube station in west London. “The Fishing Village comes from my imagination and my love for my African culture,” he explains. “I want to thank all my Big Issue customers for helping me to pursue my love for art,” Anthony adds. “Keep safe and God bless.” There’s more of Anthony’s work in the Big Issue Shop and on Facebook – and turn to page five to get his top tips. The work on this page is created by people who are marginalised. Contact street.lights@bigissue.com to see your art here. To see more and buy prints: bigissueshop.com At least half of the profit goes to the artist.…

Kirkland Ciccone 01 The Boy Detective Fail by Joe Meno Ever wondered what happened when Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys grew up? This novel by Joe Meno skewers the cosy mystery stories we read as kids, bringing them into the real world. The result is dazzlingly smart and ferociously readable. 02 Dogrun by Arthur Nersesian If you know about Arthur Nersesian, we can be friends. In Dogrun, Mary – a struggling writer – finds her lazy boyfriend dead on the couch. What transpires is a hilarious story about a woman finding out she knew nothing about the man she loved. Luckily, he had a lot of exes and they live nearby… 03 Popular Hits Of The Showa Era by Ryū Murakami A gang war starts between two groups: a…

The Big Issue: How did you get involved with The Book of Homelessness? Mitchel Ceney: I was homeless for a few years and I ended up sleeping rough in Westminster with my girlfriend at the time. The No Second Night Out scheme ended up getting me into Passage House in Pimlico. They ran an arts workshop on a Thursday and through that I went to Accumulate’s events. That got me talking to Marice [Cumber, Accumulate founder] and I showed her my pictures and drawings. She invited me to workshops for what would become The Book of Homelessness. What do you enjoy most about art? I’ve been drawing pretty much all of my life but I have put it down in the last few years while I’ve been addicted to drugs…

REBECA MARIN, 23 USUAL PITCH: Tamworth Street Boots in Lichfield Rebeca uses her income from her work as a Big Issue vendor to support her two young children and has developed “something like a friendship” with her regular customers. “It’s hard to be away from them because every week they are there,” she says. “I have a few customers who I think will do it. It would be like a lifeline.” ANABEL, 65 USUAL PITCH: Buchanan Street, Glasgow “Thanks to readers who have gone on supporting us even though we aren’t selling on the street.” ANTHONY OKUYEDI, 60 USUAL PITCH: South Kensington Tube station in London RICHARD BROADWAY, 54 USUAL PITCH: Birchington and Westgate-on-Sea “I’ve had a lot of support. It’s nice to know that people are always looking out…

The fight for Christmas is a curious concept. The argument has gathered momentum in recent days. It says take a hard lockdown now, with the normal apparatus of life closed off for millions of people for weeks, then you can enjoy family time together on December 25. And then potentially another lockdown. It doesn’t make sense. The idea that Christmas is one day, an afternoon, of warm- hearted gluttony, sleep in front of the TV, a fraught moment with your extended family and arguments over a quiz doesn’t quite fly. For one thing, I haven’t mentioned the essential nature of Mrs Brown’s Boys Christmas Special. Christmas is now. This is Christmas. Christmas is all the lead up to the day. It’s the lights coming on in streets. It is shop…

This week Rishi Sunak will unveil his vital Spending Review, which will determine the cash heading to local councils. Our Ride Out Recession Alliance members are demanding that funding prevents homelessness and protects jobs With Covid-19 putting the UK on the verge of an employment disaster, all eyes are on this week’s Spending Review. Campaigners, charities and hard-working families are calling for Chancellor Rishi Sunak to take radical action that will protect people from falling into homelessness through no fault of their own. Extending the furlough scheme until the end of March was a start. It will help thousands of people, who were earmarked for redundancy when the scheme was set to end in October, to stay in their jobs and keep roofs over their heads – the goals of…

When I was a boy I heard of a man called ‘Bird’. I heard of him in comparison with another man called Thelonious Monk. They were jazz players and they seemed to produce music that to my young ears was off tune and nothing like Elvis or Cliff. Yet I was caught in this strange world of late nights and all nights; that is, I was rough sleeping, on the run from family and police. And it was only London’s West End clubs, and nearby clubs in Earl’s Court where I could shelter until the early hours. There I had to listen to this scratchy, blowsy, shrill kind of music. After quite a few weeks of this it changed my music patterns and preferences; I became habituated to it. I…

Crime fiction continues to expand its boundaries, with new and exciting novels coming along seemingly every week that defy and confound the traditional idea of a police procedural. This week we have two wonderfully original offerings, one from either side of the Atlantic. First up is These Women by Ivy Pochoda. The book is set in the author’s home city of Los Angeles, in a nondescript neighbourhood split by a freeway, with a wide range of demographics, from expensive townhouses to homeless people and sex workers. It’s the latter which come under the spotlight in this thoughtful feminist story about a serial killer, told by the women on the periphery of the killer’s life and actions. So we meet Dorian grieving for her teenage daughter killed in a spree in…

Possessor Available on VOD from November 27  In this clinical and unsettling thriller, Andrea Riseborough plays a stressed-out consultant who seems to be having some issues with remote working. In a world that looks pretty much like our own, her ashen-faced specialist Vos uses mysterious tech to hijack the minds of unsuspecting innocents, blotting out their consciousness and using them as weapons in a lethal game of corporate espionage. Imagine a genuinely nightmarish episode of Quantum Leap where Sam has to murder someone then turn the gun on himself and you are halfway there. Writer/director Brandon Cronenberg leaves the mechanical details pretty vague but brusque technicians and a shady overseer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) talk in such euphemistic jargon that it is obvious the whole business is rotten. Vos’s next assignment…

Real TV reviewers are right in there with sizzling hot takes on the latest shows, waxing lyrical about The Queen’s Gambit (chess and drugs and rock ’n’ roll) or Industry (The Apprentice’s best bits uncut). I, however, prefer to absently trawl terrestrial TV like an elderly lady in a care home, occasionally stumbling across programmes that were made a million years ago and mumbling “Ooh, what’s this, then?” to myself in a small, reedy voice. The latest of my ‘discoveries’ is Harlots, which has been on Hulu since 2017 and was cancelled last year the end of its third series, but is enjoying a rather bawdy airing on BBC Two. You may have already seen it, and you will almost certainly have scrolled past it. But guess what? With its…

A hand up... Our sellers BUY the magazine for £1.50 and at Christmas time can sell it for up to £4 Not a handout… Vendors earn a legitimate income, and gain valuable social and employability skills. With your support now, we can continue to do so now and in the future. The right to citizenship… The Big Issue Foundation, our charitable arm, helps sellers to tackle social and financial exclusion. Prevention… Big Issue Invest o›fers backing and investments to social enterprises, charities and businesses which deliver social value to communities.…

BIG ISSUE AMBASSADORS @thewarriormum Had started day dreaming about @MrGeorgeClarke helping resurrect our old charity building. Nice addition to the @BigIssue team @IndianGirlRuns Incredible interview with @BigIssue Ambassador @DanielMays9 and @ColinMurray on @bbc5live about their Christmas Appeal; importance of acknowledging sellers and subscribing to the mag. Help if you can. It’s a help up not a handout. ADDICTION STORIES @xenatheworrier Really interesting article, and something that we all need to understand more about. Understanding breaks down prejudice, makes us more aware of ourselves and others around us. That can only be a good thing. Dopamine, such a misunderstood part of all of us. @realordinarylad Addictions come in ALL shapes and forms, most people carry an addiction of some sort, excessive or not, legal or not illegal. What makes them acceptable…

While almost everything we do creates carbon dioxide and risks damaging the environment, that doesn’t mean we can’t make adjustments to live a greener life. Whether it’s changing how we shop or travel or what we eat, there are plenty of ways to make a difference. And as Alana Sinclair, a manager at charity Cambridge Carbon Footprint, puts it: “Calculating your carbon footprint is a good place to start. “It can help you better understand where your emissions are coming from, and where you might be able to make a change.” Head to bigissue.com for more top tips to slash your carbon footprint…

I have always bought The Big Issue. I think I was 15 when I first started spending my money on it. I read about it and did a project on it for school. Years later, when I moved to Los Angeles, my mum would send it every week – it reminded me of London, of home. About a year ago, there was a particularly excellent edition and I thought, I just have to tell someone how brilliant this was. I found an email address in the magazine and got in touch with [Big Issue founder] John Bird – I wrote a tiny little fan email about how it had been my favourite weekly for so many years. He wrote back. We met up for a coffee. I told him about…

DON’T LET A STRANGER POKE YOU IN THE EYE Laura spots “rather a nice face” across the Refreshment Room at Milford Junction. Alec (trust him, he's a doctor) removes a speck of coal dust from her eye. It is currently inadvisable to let a stranger stick anything in your eye due to social distancing restrictions, and general common sense. In catering establishments, masks should be worn when not eating or drinking to reduce the chances of spreading Covid – or noticing someone you’d ditch your spouse for. AVOID MEETINGS WITH OTHER HOUSEHOLDS One plus of lockdown is that you’re less likely to be caught by gossipy acquaintances ordering champagne at lunch with somebody who isn’t your spouse. Over another drink (typically tea or tap water) Alec shares his passion for…

I was almost nine years old when my dad and I stood in our garden and looked up. Spread across the night, like the accidental stroke of a paintbrush, was Hale-Bopp, the highly anticipated comet. I remember being cold and exhilarated that I was awake well after dark. When I looked up and saw the comet though, according to my dad, I burst into tears because it was “just so beautiful”. The sight of it triggered a little revolution in my mind. It was one of the first times I grasped there was an entire Universe that we had little control over. I have vague memories of being awestruck, but also oddly sad. This beauty was at the whim of the Universe. This particular comet was in a large orbit…

Can you remember your first gig? I can remember mine as vividly as any I’ve attended in the 23 years since – U2 on the PopMart Tour at Murrayfield, Edinburgh, September 1997. Bono and co were insect-sized specks viewed from the top tier of a rugby stadium, but I was a goofy 15-year-old closer to my favourite band than I could have ever dared imagine, and I was on an ultimate high. Much as I may have fallen out of love in adulthood with the toe-curlingly self-parodic Irish four-piece, I would give about anything to go to that show again now, in the live entertainment wasteland of the age of Covid-19. Or indeed any show for that matter. I would even settle for seeing the support band – John Squire’s…