The day of the meeting arrived... just before the exams so we didn't have much time to anticipate our thinking about it. The small fractions of time I managed to not be studying desperately I was convincing myself desperately to do so. I had a lift of my father there, and I could feel the contrast between this one and the one that brought me from our conspiracy meeting. Oddly enough I felt much more at ease after talking to Bleach Eyes, but I could tell my father was even more apprehensive.
We parked long before we got there, taking the bus for one stop allowed us to park at all, and yet it was already difficult to find a place. A band of people along the sidewalk on both the right and the left reduced the monumental college gates to unequivocally insufficient. I questioned someone who was dressed as a soldier, like several were spread along the queues to maintain the order, and it seemed that the students were entering through the left while the others through the right. So I left my father and ventured to the left crowd. Soon the end was no longer and though I found some familiar faces amongst the open air sea of anonymous people, the space was compact and I could barely move but for the compact motion forwards. When I reached the gates where this queue pulled and tossed against the walls I found that the reason for the two queues was the security card. We wouldn't get a social security card from our ministry until we finished our graduation, when we were considered responsible adults of our community. So they formed two queues, one which entered by pressing the student card against a magnetic gadget and passing revolving gates and another that split into several which used the social security card in a similar way.
Inside the same chaos shielded the view, there were people every where. I was given a headset by another soldier-looking guy and told to flow to the open court. The further I got from the gates the more the density decreased and I was finally able to see the court and this colossal tent that was mounted on its whole square space. I was poked forward, unable to gain my thoughts when exposed to this strange disfiguration of a familiar place and the movement of all these people.
I entered the tent to find more people, it was crowded beyond anything I had ever seen. There were tv sets in two corners and in the middle a stage supported several desks, with beverages, and microphones. Some time passed and I felt a hand on my shoulder, my prey found me. - ``Heaven a familiar face, thank you!'' - I told her.
- ``No problem! I didn't even know we would be in the same group''
-``How so?''
-``Same group! Same hour? Same turn? Same... you know... family name starting by one of the first characters in the alphabet?''
-``What do you mean?''
-``Well, they had to organize it so we wouldn't show up all at once, after all I don't think there would be a single place able to handle it! You are always so far off on all matters, seriously where do you live? Under a rock? They haven't been talking of anything else all week! You don't even know the minister is missing, do you?''
-``What?'' - I was taken aback.
-``You know, the old guy who called the shots in the ministry and in the council.''
-``How can he be missing?''
-``That's the question now isn't it? They say the issue is so bad that he just bailed!''
-``He wouldn't do that!''
-``That ain't really the question...'' - Her eyes starved for gossip and gestured me to guess.
-``What issue?''
-``I just wish I knew. Today, it's the first meeting, and tomorrow the news papers will already spread the word, but now... now is when the fun begins!'' - She jumped eagerly on her feet, without ever leaving the ground, she was convinced history would be made and we would be a part of its first uncover. I on the other hand feared that things wouldn't be as simple for a long time from now on.
Why does it have to happen now? Why to us? How come our parents lived happily without problems? Sure, our grand-parents had a great war and hunger and horrible working hours to deal with! But I didn't do anything to deserve this; I haven't started doing, corrupting, polluting or anything else. I am getting the power to affect life as I know it, to vote or decide, but up to now I am not responsible for grown up's mess!
Why would I have to be part of the generation post-glory days, when the shit heats the fan and we pay for their innocent careless egocentric manipulation of the world? I say we get in time machines and switch places with them! let us be the ones singing ``peace and love'', preaching against war and in favor of experimenting everything and eventually growing into useful and respectable members of this society. And let them be the ones conditioned in their every move, because the future will never be the same if they step out of place once, and conscious of all the diseases and traumas careless life grants. Let them taste the pressure of limited seats for good life, world wide competition and a vast extent of inferiority complexes caused by world selected role models to follow after. Let them grow with the violent and inconsistent lack of stability.
I just wanted to keep my jeans... and mobile phones...other than that I am ready to switch places!
My prey looked at me as though I was gone for too long. I measured my timing by the density of people standing around us that refute the spontaneous theory. -``Sorry. I was just thinking.''
-``Ya! I've seen you do that!''
-``Really?'' - I always thought I was inconspicuous enough!