Graduation time again

Scores of the country’s teenagers who have been attending secondary school for the past several years will be graduating this week, some to go on to University or other tertiary institution, yet others to see what prospects the job market holds for them. They will be bidding farewell to old schools, old relationships, with many holding on to old dreams flavoured by sentiment, as have generations of other graduating students before them. They will exchange addresses and telephone numbers, and those who will be off to foreign Universities will perhaps promise faithfully to write, to keep in touch. A major fun part of it will be the retelling of old tales of exploits during their school years, and of college masters, their verbal “clashes” with them, and how they outwitted them. Many will recall the witty sayings of their teachers.

Looking back a bit, invariably when Old Boys of Queen’s Royal College meet, who attended the grand old school decades ago they seek to push their memories to the proverbial limit. Some will speak of the former student, who as QRC lore has it, famous for his pranks climbed up a ladder on the inside of the College tower, tampered with the mechanism of the clock and had it chiming every quarter of an hour and hour in quick succession for an interminable period. The annual QRC Old Boys’ dinner has been, traditionally, anecdote time. Some who were at Queen’s Royal during the war — World War Two that is — would recount what they would never dare tell their children. Of how they would regularly cycle past Bishop Anstey High School. (St Hilary’s) on the Abercromby street side and would whistle and “soot” the Bishop’s girls, many of them quite attractive at that, as they sat in class. The more daring of the girls would vigorously wave their appreciation. It all came to an end, however, when the Principal of St Hilary’s protested to the Principal of Queen’s Royal.

Some of the boys would later meet the girls, on occasion, socially, at the Flappers’ dances held at Bishops, albeit under the watchful eyes of the Principal and teachers. Incidentally, unlike parties or fetes of a general nature held throughout Trinidad and Tobago today at which many teenaged school children attend, the Bishop Anstey High School Flappers’ dance ended at the very proper time at 10 pm! Meanwhile, thousands of students who will be graduating this week will be attending graduation balls. Parents should advise their teenage children, particularly their daughters, never to accept drinks from strangers, nor to return to beverages left untended. It is a vicious world outside there, and even many of the young men have to be vigilant. Regrettably, there are persons willing to settle old scores, to right imagined wrongs. Whether it is through jealousy, insecurity, thinking it as one huge joke, or what have you, decent young people must be on constant alert lest sickos place illegal substances in their drinks.

And while it may be done to induce a sense of intoxication in the intended victims and to have dubious fun at their expense, in some instances the intent may be to sexually assault the girl or girls. I believe the term is gang rape. And while it is not my intention to cause any parents or any youngsters undue worry, yet should one of the predators be suffering with HIV/AIDS then a sentence of death would have been handed down. All too many Trinidadians and Tobagonians are copy cats, willing to follow blindly what is fed to them by some of the United States television majors, or even by their own peers. The average teenager should be able to enjoy herself or himself without the burden of having to look constantly over the shoulder. In turn, there is nothing unusual in parents giving their children a needed word of caution, or for their children to be on the defensive, while simply seeking to enjoy themselves at functions.