On the steps leading to the secondary school, a long-legged beauty in ten-centimetre red-soled stilettos, a leather miniskirt and a white blouse stands leaning against the railing. She is talking to a friend wearing flat ankle boots, a knee-length skirt and a sweater.
A moment ago, Mass to mark the start of the school year ended in the church. It is not obligatory, but it is part of the start of the year at a secular school. Some of the children are returning from it, while others are only now heading to the ceremonial school assembly.
More girls are walking down the street in stilettos, tight miniskirts and sparkling, skimpy dresses that accentuate their feminine shapes. They stride like models. Or awkwardly and heavily, unable to keep their balance in excessively high shoes. There are also girls dressed ordinarily. Attractive, but in flat shoes and looser skirts.
Jak reagujesz na widok pijącej młodzieży?
In the city centre, at around 11 a.m., several young boys are drinking beer, all wearing white shirts, most of them in suits and ties. They are not embarrassed, and nobody tells them off. They are lining the bottles up neatly in a row; there are quite a lot of them.
“Gentlemen,” I say, without malice. “Are you allowed to drink beer? Are you students?”
“It’s for the start of the school year,” a friendly, handsome boy tells me. He looks about 15 or 16, though I would not be surprised if he were 13.
“But beer before noon?” I ask. “Do your parents know? Do they allow it?”
The group is disconcerted, but more by my question about the time. One of the boys even asks a friend what time it is, and whether I am right that they are drinking before 12:00. They do not understand why that, specifically, seemed inappropriate to me. They do not know that a gentleman does not drink before noon, and that drinking from early morning is associated with a lack of manners or alcoholism. They scatter after I mention the municipal police.
The mall is crowded with young people, all dressed up, sitting on benches and playing with their phones. They are in no hurry, exchanging hugs and loudly and joyfully greeting their friends. The girls throw their arms around the boys’ necks and kiss them on the cheeks.
I look at them as though they were strangers. A spaceship carrying Martians might just as well have landed in the city. An alien civilisation. I am an adult. I am supposed to protect them, set an example and warn them about the consequences of youthful folly. But I do not even know their language.
And I have something to tell them, based on experience and the knowledge I have gathered in life. I could explain to the girl in the red-soled stilettos that elegance lies in choosing an outfit suited to the occasion. Her friend in ballet flats and a simple sweater is elegant. She, although her outfit is far more elaborate and probably more expensive, has dressed inelegantly. Perhaps nobody has told her that you wear ordinary clothes when going shopping, just as you do to school or work, while for a party, a disco or dinner with someone you love, you put on stilettos and sequins. I could also tell her that whatever she does, she will be judged and labelled because of what she wears. She may not like all the labels, and certainly none of them will tell the truth about her.
I could tell the boys with the beer what a gentleman is, and that some of them will manage to stop at that one beer in order to impress their friends, while some will not. And it will not be a matter of willpower or convictions, but of statistics indifferent to human life. Quite simply, some of them will become alcoholics.
I look helplessly at the small white-and-navy crowd of young people outside the mall. Teenagers full of life, open to new experiences and joyful. And I do not know how to reach them. They have already heard their share in the sermon, at the school assembly and probably from their parents. They were told how to live, how to behave and what to do. And yet they will choose something of their own. I cannot protect them from stilettos, beer and the mall.
Grażyna Hanaf