Families lining up at fast-food restaurants, others blowing their faces off at restaurant tables or rushing into the dark rooms of the multiplex, clusters of teenagers laughing in the escalators and crowded stores… Welcome under the large glass dome of Quatre-temps in La Défense (Hauts-de-Seine).
Like a snub to rumors of re-containment and before the curfew forces them to return home, customers were present this Tuesday afternoon in droves in the most frequented shopping center in France.
A few days before the start of the school year, we meet many parents worried about the fate that will be reserved for their children on Monday.
Like Henri, 47, father of four boys aged eleven to twenty-two.
Seated with his wife Patricia and their younger brother Noé, these inhabitants of Alès (Gard) would rather be in favor of “high school and college students continuing their studies at home”.
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A final year teacher, Henri says he saw some of his students, outside of class, “kissing or smoking the same cigarette.
In class, they respect the wearing of the mask but, among themselves, they do not pay any attention to barrier gestures.
"However, we have an elderly person at home, so we are at risk", adds his wife Patricia, as if to justify this wish to put a little more distance between them and the students.
Patricia and Henri, Noah's parents, are not against returning home classes, fearing for the health of the elderly. / LP / Fred Dugit
While the loudspeakers of the shopping center regularly deliver “special covid” prevention messages, Henri nevertheless recognizes that re-confining children is not an ideal solution: “If we want to stop the spread of the virus, we have to distance ourselves. , but it will do damage in terms of academic progress, recognizes the teacher.
I saw it clearly during confinement: children tend to drop out very quickly.
"
Crossed near an automatic dispenser of masks and hydroalcoholic gel with her three daughters, Bahria, she lives in the "fear" of confinement with her children.
"It gives a bit of the image of an ungrateful mother, but frankly teleworking with three young children, it was complicated, synonymous with nervousness and white hair, jokes the mother.
I also had to have recourse to a home teacher because in educational terms, we cannot ask parents to take the place of teachers.
"
All in all, Bahria would prefer to have an “earlier curfew” imposed on him in the evening, but implores that schools be left open.
Most of the parents we meet under the dome are on the same wavelength.
"We learn much better when we are in class"
"Especially no confinement for the children, it was too hard", sighs Estelle, legal assistant at La Défense.
This resident of Rueil-Malmaison (Hauts-de-Seine) had a very bad experience having to work at home while taking care of her ten-year-old daughter Julie.
"We are always cut in half and in the end, we do everything in half," said the mother.
"And again, my daughter's mistress kept a blog during confinement and she could do her homework on the Internet but, this year, it is no longer the case and I fear that she will find herself left on her own if she finds herself at home, ”she adds.
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At his side, his daughter Julie abounds.
"Anyway, I prefer to go back to school because when mom works, she's not very nice or very available", gently tackles the girl.
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Domiciled in the Eure, Emmanuel admits having “suffered less” from confinement with his children than his “Parisian colleagues”, but he and his two boys would experience the closing of the school very badly.
“In France, the school is not adapted to remote work, asserts the father.
And then we stopped living for the first time, so now that's enough.
"In addition, we learn much better when we are in class", abounds his son Antoine, in second class.
His brother Pierre, in his final year, is the most worried: "Distance courses when you're in the middle of the baccalaureate year, frankly, that wouldn't be terrible."
Estelle had a terrible time having to work at home while taking care of her ten-year-old daughter Julie.
/ LP / Fred Dugit
Before “going to rue de Rivoli” to go shopping, Catherine and her daughter Faustine enjoy lunch together.
The mother came up from Royan (Charente-Maritime) to see her daughter who is studying in Paris and alternates distance lessons and practical internship in a hospital.
If new distancing measures were taken for the students, she worries above all for her son, in computer science BTS.
“At his age, seeing friends is important and I'm afraid he will find himself socially isolated, isolated behind screens when there is already a lot for his studies.
With this Covid, it is also the living together of the youngest which takes a hit.
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