Contrasts

Crowded tram on Sunday.

A blue-eyed blond girl is playing with a thin pink scarf. She wraps it around her head and puts it over her face, leaving only her eyes – as if she is wearing hijab. Her father, sitting on the opposite seat, waves to her: “can you see me?” Both laugh.

Next to them, on the other side of the tram, there are sitting a black couple with their children. Despite the heat, all of them are dressed in formal black, the man is even wearing a sweater behind his dress jacket. Perhaps, they are returning from their church, even though I have no idea, if in France people dress for the church as formally as they do in America. The lady is changing the diaper to one of the children. The baby’s bare bottom looks comic among their official attire.