THE FINAL RUSH

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 150, 22 December 1938, Page 11

THE FINAL RUSH

POST OFFICE BESIEGED

ABNORMAL ACTIVITY

BEHIND THE SCENES

The Post Office normally expects a. rush during the week befofe Christmas, a rush which reaches its highest peak a couple of days or so before Christmas Day. It is getting the rush this year, and getting it on a larger scale probably than in any previous year.

The peak of the rush would seem to have been reached today: one glance at the interior of the main Post Office in Wellington today would give the impression that it would be impossible for a larger crowd of the public to gain admission to the building. Long queues were at every counter dealing with the sale of stamps and the receipt or dispatch of letters and packages. A perpetual stream of parcel-laden people were wanting to know how . much postage to ' affix. Every available weighing machine seemed to have been requisitioned, giving the public a chance of weighing their packages themselves and reckoning out the postage. But for every one who did this, a dozen or more wanted officials behind the counters to do it for them. NO RESPITE. , Not a moment's respite have the counter officials had—weighing packages, selling stamps, answering questions, and a hundred and one other things connected with post office business. Smilingly and with unfailing courtesy they have dealt as quickly as humanly possible with every request^- . any "impatience being with the few customers who have shown no appreciation o£ the. unusual circumstances, ,but they have been very few. Although the officials do not show it, one can easily imagine the relief they feel when the time comes for them to be relieved for a. brief spell. The- scene of animation inside the public' portion of the Post Office was quite equalled by what is going on in the many rooms to which the ordinary public have no access. The. casual observer poking, his head round the door of the mail rooms, > where letters are sorted and dispatched, would at first think that he was confronting a scene of utter chaos in which puny and pigmy postal officials were waging an unsuccessful war against an army of mail bags. But further observation Would show that, after all, the officials were not so puny and pigmy, and that 'the mail bags, far from being the vie-; '.tors in an unequal struggle, were being marshalled and dealt with with an orderliness and " precision that could only be derived from long experience and good organisation. ' THE POSTMAN'S BURDEN. From various exits from the building could be seen local postmen staggering under huge loads with mail for local delivery, and one wondered how they could ever get round with it all. Then there were lorries being unloaded and loaded up again with mails for trains, not to mention the host of message boys, many especially enrolled for the season. There was a scene of activity everywhere. A '"Post" representative, who .penetrated behind the scenes, finally, , es-caped-.without being sealed in : a dispatch . sack. His presence was tolerated (for postal officials are always courteous), but was obviously, and reasonably, too, superfluous/To a question about figures came the quick answer: "Our own figures by Saturday night will be (adjectivally) thinner than they are now/ From what was witnessed, that seems highly probable, as does also the fact that when the •figures of the Christmas rush are available they will show that it has been the most hectic Christmas in the annals of the New Zealand Post Office.