April 13, 2005: The unlikely new Parisian celebrity is a 52-year-old Pakistan newspaper hawker who has become a well-known and beloved fixture in the tony Saint-Germain area, which he refers to as his “kingdom.” What’s he famous for? His humor and personality: Ali Akbar always gets a laugh from the normally reserved Parisians sitting on the terraces of the chic Left Bank cafés when he shouts out his own attention-getting versions of the day’s headlines in Le Monde or Le Journal du Dimanche: “Ça y est. Ça y est,” he cries. “Prime Minister Raffarin agrees to retirement age of 35,” or “Ça y est. Ça y est. Bernadette Chirac now president of the United States,” or “Ça y est. Ça y est. The king of Morocco buys the Eiffel Tower.” When friends and acquantainces see him on the street, they cry out “Ça y est. Ça y est” as a greeting. The expression has become his “calling card,” as familiar as his blue “Le Monde” baseball cap. A devoted husband and father of five, Akbar has known true misery in his life, but his may yet become a rags to riches story. One day, one of his regular customers, publisher Jean-Claude Gawsewitch, suggested that Akbar write a book about his life. Ça y est. Ça y est. Ali Akbar has published his memoirs, entitled Je Fais Rire le Monde...Mais le Monde me Fait Pleurer (I Make the World Laugh, but the World Makes Me Cry). The book offers vivid descriptions of the exhausting hustle of his current life and the hardships he faced as an impoverished, abused child in Pakistan and an immigrant in France, where the streets were often his home before they became his workplace. In spite of it all, the optimism and warmth of this book-loving man shine through. At last, a celebrity with substance. Let’s hope he gets his modest wish: permission from the City of Paris to set up a souvenir stand near Odéon so he will no longer have to spend his days running around the beaux quartiers hawking newspapers.
Je Fais Rire le Monde...Mais le Monde me Fait Pleurer, by Ali Akbar. Published by Jean-Claude Gawsewitch. €18.50.

© 2005 Paris Update