Pool Story

This story came up in various pieces of the German and British press....so I went to a number of sources, and I'll tell it in a simplified fashion.

About forty miles to the west of Stuttgart (way down in the southern quarter of Germany)....there's this town along the German-French border of Kehl.  About five minutes away is Strasbourg, which is a fairly known city in France, which has the EU presence.  Kehl has maybe 35,000 residents, and has a direct relationship with it's French folks just minutes away.

A weekend or two ago.....at the public pool complex in Kehl....a number of North African 'kids' (young men) showed up.  Things went into 'turbo' and some young men/boys....got into some serious misbehavior. 

The German life-guards are the folks who maintain tranquility at German public pools, and once they blow the whistle.....they give you the signal to clean up your act.  From my various pool visits in Germany....it just takes one single whistle to get German kids/young men to straighten up.  A second whistle?  It generally means someone is leaving the pool complex, and they might not be allowed back for a week or two.

Well....in this case, the north African kids (young men) didn't react to the whistle or the comments from the lifeguards.  The cops got called.  It's stupid to waste the time of cops on something like this....but if things look 'out-of-control'.....you've got no choice. 

No one says how many cops, but it appears that 'multiple' vehicles were in the mix.....meaning more than a couple of cops.

Upon arrival, the cops established authority, and individuals left (no one utters the phrase 'banned' but it appears that this action might be in the works). 

But the news journalists come to the pool and ask questions about the fifty-odd kids/young men.  The pool manager?  He refers to a police comment and the cops (Germans) uttered the phrase....'Nafri', which is a slang term (don't use it in front of any German who claims to be a liberal).  The term would be negative and refer to North Africans in a less-than-positive way. 

Naturally, the journalists hyped this up, and the cops had to go and explain things to them.

This may come back to slam the cops and require them to take a class in terms not to utter.

But here's the thing.  This has been a fairly hot summer (not just in Germany but France as well), and this year has seen more than a couple of events where young men (boys) were lacking respect or showed disrespect to the pool authority or police.  Part of this I think....is heat related....but part of it might relate in some way to either drug-use or alcohol.

What happens now in Kehl?  No one really says, and I think the political folks (maybe the cops too) hope that the mess just dissolves away.  The pool folks may be thinking about a bouncer-system being enacted....private security....to avoid the cops in the future.  Course, that would trigger cost upon the city recreation department, and you could be looking at 20,000 Euro a month to pay for four guys to be there on weekends to settle disturbances in a professional way.  Go figure the cost to the consumers, and you might be looking at your pool entry fee going from 3-Euro to 6-Euro....just to ensure peace and tranquility. 

I know, it's stupid, and you shouldn't have to pay for four bouncers to be standing around a pool complex to toss young men out because of their stupid behavior.  But this is the only way to 'manage' your way out  of a mess without looking racist.