The satchel drama

Three days to go until a major event takes place, the significance of which for our family is comparable to the miracle of Bern (1954), the moon landing (1969), the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) or the launch of Ben & Jerry's Strawberry Cheesecake ice cream (2005). The daughter starts school!

However, the school god has placed a few hurdles in front of school enrolment. Firstly, we have to choose a suitable school bag. This is not as easy as it sounds.
When I started school back then - in a distant land before our time - there were, if I remember correctly, exactly two school bag brands: Scout and McNeill. There was one model of each in two different colours. So you had exactly four choices and could make a decision in a very short space of time.

As our daughter's well-being and social life are very important to us, we promised her that we would take the criterion of coolness into account in our selection process.

Today, things are different. There are now around four dozen companies that produce school storage containers: Satchels, rucksacks, wheeled cases, shoulder bags or briefcases, just like the spitters from the pupils' union used to have. And each of the companies offers its models in an unmanageable variety of colours, shapes, fabrics and designs.

As befits modern, responsible parents, we naturally started thinking about the «school bag» project months before we started school. As a couple of academics, we didn't want to make an irrational impulse purchase, but wanted to make an informed decision and choose the ideal school bag that would prevent postural problems for our child, that was made from robust but environmentally friendly materials and for the price of which we wouldn't have to sell the family silver that we didn't have.
The daughter also emphasised that she wanted a really cool satchel and not some totally stupid one for which all her classmates would tease her, so that she would never find a friend and would have to stay alone forever and ever. As the well-being and social life of our daughter is very important to us, we promised her that we would take the coolness criterion into account in our selection process.

And all of a sudden it's the middle of August and the child has no schoolbag

An initial Google search for «satchel test» resulted in more than 250,000 hits. So there should be no shortage of objective facts and incorruptible information on the subject. On the contrary. You would actually have to take your annual holiday to read all this.
After we had spent a whole weekend combing through the advice articles, I suggested to my friend that we put her daughter back by about three to four years. We could then use this time to complete a degree in engineering, train in physiotherapy and take a few seminars in chemistry. This would allow us to examine the construction of the satchels, assess their effects on the child's joints and analyse any plasticisers and other ingredients that may be harmful to health. Based on this, we would then be able to choose the best possible satchel for our firstborn. The look on my friend's face made me realise that such suggestions, lacking in seriousness, were not helpful in the decision-making process.

So we decided to postpone the evaluation of the information and the decision for the time being. After all, there were still a few months to go before our daughter started school. Then Easter came, we renovated our flat, then we decided to move, looked for a new flat, found it, went on holiday and actually moved. And now it's suddenly mid-August and we still don't have a school bag.

Did this satchel pass the elephant test?

As the good child is due to start school in 72 hours, buying a school bag moved to the top of our list of priorities. After all, we don't want our daughter to be standing in the assembly hall with an Aldi bag while her new classmates proudly present their new satchels.

Full of zest for action, we make our way to a large department stores' in the afternoon to buy a school bag. My friend tells me to take the file folder with the 300 printed pages of test reports with me. After all, we want to be prepared for all eventualities.

When we arrive at the department stores', we realise that just before the start of the school year, the selection of schoolbags is not exactly overwhelming, even with the best of intentions. And it's not exactly the most beautiful models that are still on the shelves.
One salesman is euphoric at the prospect of getting rid of some of his junk satchels and offers his advice like a second-hand dealer. He immediately begins to shamelessly exaggerate the advantages of his remaining stock, which he has certainly not spurned without good reason.
Not me, mate, I think, and consult my folder to compare his exaggerated marketing slogans with the reality of my test reports. I bombard him with questions about ergonomics, DIN standards, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, dibutyltin and many other substances that are difficult to pronounce. His evasive answers are evidence of frightening incompetence and ignorance. He is also unable to satisfactorily answer my question as to whether there have been tests with elephants trampling on the satchels to test their robustness.

After almost three hours, the salesman's left eye twitches nervously. In an only moderately polite tone, he tells us that the department stores' will be closing in a few minutes. He then wants to know whether we have any intention of buying a satchel.

Pink fairies intoxicated by LSD

I'm just about to ask for a little more time to think about it, when our daughter takes the decision out of our hands. She drags in a model of dubious beauty. It's covered in elves, fairies and unicorns and the colours are all pink and soft pastels. It gives the impression that the mythical creatures depicted are on a communal orgiastic LSD trip.

So I suggest to my daughter that she should have a look around. She stamps her foot angrily and angrily announces that she wants exactly this satchel and no other or she won't go to the stupid school at all. I wonder which authority I can apply to for home schooling. But her daughter is already carrying the satchel with the fairyland to the cash desk in a drug-fuelled frenzy.

Of course, the model is in the upper price segment despite its questionable aesthetics. I tell my friend that I think it's inappropriate to spend half a month's rent on a satchel. She looks at me as if I had just suggested sending my daughter to school wrapped in old potato sacks and reprimands me, saying that her daughter will only start school once in her life and that I could at least keep my almost pathological and sometimes hard to bear stinginess in check this one time. With these words, she reaches for a pencil case, a pencil case and a sports bag in a corresponding fairy design.

And three years before he starts school, his son thinks school is «totally rubbish».

I admit defeat and wonder how long I can live on toast without anything before the first signs of deficiency such as hair loss and periodontal disease appear. Then my son arrives and shows me a satchel with monster, dragon and warrior motifs with shining eyes. He euphorically declares that he wants it. I patiently reply, like a Zen monk who has drunk a bottle of valerian, that he won't be starting school for another three years and doesn't need a satchel yet.
The son looks at me uncomprehendingly. For him, this is not a comprehensible reason for not buying him a schoolbag and he thinks I'm an unimaginative, narrow-minded small-minded person. The son says that school sucks. No longer quite so relaxed, I tell him that's not a nice word and I don't want him to say it. The son angrily replies that school is just full of poo. Then he throws himself on the floor, shouting. I'd like to do the same now.
As we leave the department stores', the daughter insists on carrying the satchel herself, after all, she's almost going to school. After 100 metres, she finds the carrying too strenuous and hands me the satchel, saying that she is not yet a schoolchild. I try to make my way home as gracefully as possible. Well, as gracefully as it is possible for a bearded man in his mid-thirties to carry a pink fairy satchel on his back during rush hour on the Berlin underground.

The article was taken from Christian's Hannes Blog Familienbetrieb.
Photo: Scout