Families are in colour code

The escalator rolled into itself one platform at a time and from there the first family ascended to the gantry level. The mother bent down to propel her daughter forward, then looked up and saw us.

My teacher told me that that was another one of his students, the mother of course, not the young girl. I exchanged greetings with her, the peculiar kind of bowing and repetition out of eagerness to not offend an adult. The mother then turned her attention to my teacher, indicating a clear line that this is where we will meet for the first and last time.

I noticed that the mother was draped in purple cardigan and a strange, mindless ensemble of black top and loose pants. Her child was wearing a purple tulle skirt, shouldering a clumsy, albeit weightless, purple bag with a princess and her purple unicorn on it. Of all the pieces the mother threw onto herself, only the purple cardigan was intentionally there to match with her daughter. Purple seemed to be code for their family unit.

This drew my attention to the way my teacher and I were dressed. He was in a checked shirt with a riot of colours and blue jeans, carrying a long, newspaper bound roll of paper. The child had noticed a Doraemon on the newspaper and some conversation started there. I on the other hand, had swamped myself in a white hoodie and black skinny-jeans, on the account of the cold rainy weather.

Whoever we were waiting for finally rose from the moving horizon on the escalator and onwards marched a family of three. A grey family. The mother in grey jacket and pajamas-like pants, the father mousy and bespectacled in grey polo shirt, the boy in matching grey shirt and shorts but striking blue shoes.

Formalities were issued. The usual sizing up and comment on my age and height. Excluding me, everything seemed otherwise accounted for in this group: middle aged parents bringing their child along for some trip. Was my teacher seen as the father of the purple family? Where in the world do I, the strange teenager tagging along, come into the picture then? By default, our interests do not align. Where could our strange cast be headed? The colour coded loitered slowly, and my teacher and I strode on ahead. Any relations between me and all other casts were eliminated both by my colour scheme and towering height. The way I was an outsider disgusted me briefly. The way I was worried about what onlookers made of our strange cast disgusted me too.

There is not a single piece of Barnie purple clothing in my closet whereas some greys do exist in my palette, but my inclinations for the colour codes of the families can be misleading. That is not to say I had unexpectedly liked the purple family and disliked the grey. My point being, surprisingly, I disliked everyone in this ragtag group, especially after observing them in the art gallery.

As the crowd of us stood a distance from the paintings and pretentiously peer at it, the mother made it a point to voice how she could not understand what was being portrayed and that it was nothing like what our teacher had discussed during lessons. The purple dad laughed and said that it was not for normal people like us to understand. That was an invitation to float one another’s boat. My teacher tried to explain. That gave way to a debate that would help them feel more like an art critic. The mother giggled when my teacher mentioned the generations of teaching behind the art style. She started talking about how she would become famous as the next generation succeeding the teachings of my teacher and the teacher before him. I suppose she was waiting for someone to praise her for her tremendous improvement in her few months of lessons. She followed that up with a vague invitation to her exhibition when she gets better at it.

We dissipated once the art exhibition offered what it could to us. The grey family excused themselves to have dinner in the area and probably forget about everything today. The purple mother and daughter pair parted too, with no clear accounts for their rush home. I dislike people who belittle the process of learning and I am so glad I did not wear anything to associate myself with the colour coded families.