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Tempora mutantur...
Apr. 22nd, 2004 09:19 pmMy "little" brother had his last day of school today. "Little" actually doesn't fit, because he's two heads' length taller than I am; but he was smaller than me for a long time, and he always will be one and a half year younger, so he'll remain my little brother.
So, said otôto had his last day of classes today: Tomorrow they have their pre-graduation party day, called "Abischerz". Basically, it means that they write their names on big sheets of fabric, decorate the school with them, shoot at everyone with water-pistols, make loud music, disturb classes (because officially, the first two classes are to be held) and play their evil games with some teachers, who also get more or less evil gifts.
My "Abischerz" now lies two years back. My name sheet was graced by a beaver (for Canada, and because back in my scouting days, I had belonged to the beaver troop), the Star Wars rebel alliance emblem, the symbols of the Kôdôkan and Shôtôkan, the Ring-spell and my name in Latin and Aurek-besh letters. Our graduation motto was "Abi Park - Something has survived" (yes, I know, it sucks), and thus we had also prepared a dinosaur egg into which our headmaster had to climb later on, and changed the text on a gigantic Jurassic Park 3 poster. We had brought palm trees and rubber trees and shrubbery (ni!) and earth and rocks and baby swimming pools.
We had been asked to arrive at school around 4 a.m. on that Friday (it was April 26th) to prepare the school, and whoever wouldn't be on time, would land on a list which would be printed in our yearbook: so we had been threatened by the organisators.
Of course, I slept too long and got there, panicking and with a very uneasy conscience, at 6 a.m. [since the organisators themselves didn't arrive before 7 a.m., the public humiliation plan was dropped], when most of the hard work was already done. Once the "normal" students arrived, we donned our red "Abi-Park" t-shirts, we attacked them with our water-pistols and lipsticks to write "Abi '02" (graduation '02) onto their cheeks and foreheads; our headmaster and one of the chemistry teachers had to wade through a parcours of the above-mentioned shrubbery, trees, rocks and baby swimming pools, the headmaster blindfolded. Then came the obligatory two classes. During the second one, we commandeered the school's sound system to blare the Jurassic Park soundtrack and jungle sounds across the school. Then we drove the classes to the courtyard.
We were shouting and singing, throwing waterballoons and sweets at the kids below us (for by that time, we were standing on the lower school roof); we were dancing; we were, all in all, absolutely not behaving as though we were about to take the exams whose results, eventually, were meant to attest to our maturity. We behaved absolutely childish: Nothing we did on that day made sense (not even the tidying up afterwards, because as soon as we had finished washing the earth from the street, it started raining, so we had wasted time and labour), and we knew it, and didn't care: We were high with the exhilaration of doing the contrary of what would be expected. Some were still slightly drunk from the night before, others wet to the bone because the kids who lived closer to school had gotten their own water pistols to take revenge. We had three songs, filked to fit our purpose, and we screwed them all up badly. Many teachers hadn't even come on that day, because they were afraid of our games (especially the unpopular ones, on whom we'd have loved to take revenge). Those who were there did acceptably well. Afterwards, we had sandwiches and cake and watched a graduation movie that made even less sense than anything else (a sort of Blair Witch and X-Files off-spin. My English class had played the zombies.), and then, when we had pretty much brought the school into its original state, we went home and slept long; and the next week, the exams would begin.
So that's what my brother will be doing tomorrow, with a different motto. It's strange to watch my little brother grow up like this. During the Easter vacations, he made an internship at a local bookstore, because he meant to become a book trader after school. He must have done well, because they asked him to return right after graduation; but now he's not so sure whether he really wants to go into an apprenticeship right after school or whether he'd rather like to go to university.
My little brother had his last day of school today, and I feel old.
[Also, on our last day of school, two years ago, at another school in Erfurt, a student who had been kicked out much earlier returned - with a gun. He killed several of his former fellow students, and some teachers. I heard about it when I drove home after our party, and suddenly, the whole water pistol thing wasn't funny anymore.]
- - -
( ...et nobis mutamur in illis )
- - -
So, said otôto had his last day of classes today: Tomorrow they have their pre-graduation party day, called "Abischerz". Basically, it means that they write their names on big sheets of fabric, decorate the school with them, shoot at everyone with water-pistols, make loud music, disturb classes (because officially, the first two classes are to be held) and play their evil games with some teachers, who also get more or less evil gifts.
My "Abischerz" now lies two years back. My name sheet was graced by a beaver (for Canada, and because back in my scouting days, I had belonged to the beaver troop), the Star Wars rebel alliance emblem, the symbols of the Kôdôkan and Shôtôkan, the Ring-spell and my name in Latin and Aurek-besh letters. Our graduation motto was "Abi Park - Something has survived" (yes, I know, it sucks), and thus we had also prepared a dinosaur egg into which our headmaster had to climb later on, and changed the text on a gigantic Jurassic Park 3 poster. We had brought palm trees and rubber trees and shrubbery (ni!) and earth and rocks and baby swimming pools.
We had been asked to arrive at school around 4 a.m. on that Friday (it was April 26th) to prepare the school, and whoever wouldn't be on time, would land on a list which would be printed in our yearbook: so we had been threatened by the organisators.
Of course, I slept too long and got there, panicking and with a very uneasy conscience, at 6 a.m. [since the organisators themselves didn't arrive before 7 a.m., the public humiliation plan was dropped], when most of the hard work was already done. Once the "normal" students arrived, we donned our red "Abi-Park" t-shirts, we attacked them with our water-pistols and lipsticks to write "Abi '02" (graduation '02) onto their cheeks and foreheads; our headmaster and one of the chemistry teachers had to wade through a parcours of the above-mentioned shrubbery, trees, rocks and baby swimming pools, the headmaster blindfolded. Then came the obligatory two classes. During the second one, we commandeered the school's sound system to blare the Jurassic Park soundtrack and jungle sounds across the school. Then we drove the classes to the courtyard.
We were shouting and singing, throwing waterballoons and sweets at the kids below us (for by that time, we were standing on the lower school roof); we were dancing; we were, all in all, absolutely not behaving as though we were about to take the exams whose results, eventually, were meant to attest to our maturity. We behaved absolutely childish: Nothing we did on that day made sense (not even the tidying up afterwards, because as soon as we had finished washing the earth from the street, it started raining, so we had wasted time and labour), and we knew it, and didn't care: We were high with the exhilaration of doing the contrary of what would be expected. Some were still slightly drunk from the night before, others wet to the bone because the kids who lived closer to school had gotten their own water pistols to take revenge. We had three songs, filked to fit our purpose, and we screwed them all up badly. Many teachers hadn't even come on that day, because they were afraid of our games (especially the unpopular ones, on whom we'd have loved to take revenge). Those who were there did acceptably well. Afterwards, we had sandwiches and cake and watched a graduation movie that made even less sense than anything else (a sort of Blair Witch and X-Files off-spin. My English class had played the zombies.), and then, when we had pretty much brought the school into its original state, we went home and slept long; and the next week, the exams would begin.
So that's what my brother will be doing tomorrow, with a different motto. It's strange to watch my little brother grow up like this. During the Easter vacations, he made an internship at a local bookstore, because he meant to become a book trader after school. He must have done well, because they asked him to return right after graduation; but now he's not so sure whether he really wants to go into an apprenticeship right after school or whether he'd rather like to go to university.
My little brother had his last day of school today, and I feel old.
[Also, on our last day of school, two years ago, at another school in Erfurt, a student who had been kicked out much earlier returned - with a gun. He killed several of his former fellow students, and some teachers. I heard about it when I drove home after our party, and suddenly, the whole water pistol thing wasn't funny anymore.]
- - -
( ...et nobis mutamur in illis )
- - -
