River rats?

First off, a shout out to my (unfortunately now former) colleagues--thanks for the book and the pen holder and the tag and the cards! (and and and).

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I'd found the perfect bench, on the corner of the Dreisam behind a dam, away from the unceasing traffic of kamikazee rollerbladers, hobby joggers, hell-bent-for-leather bike riders, and the apparently suicidal woman and baby stroller dodging traffic like a duckling on the Autobahn. The sound of water rushing over the dam cut the happy but noisy sounds of the vollyball pits and the sport arena, leaving me in a peaceful utopia, like sitting in a watery bubble amid all the rushing, vivid action. I'd taken a book on research methods along in the desperate attempt to make progress on my as-yet-unstarted project and was peacefully reading.

Out of the corner of my eye I notice something red and black hurtling by. The squeal of breaks and the clatter of a bicycle disturbs my calm as a Holland bike crashes to the ground behind me. In mere seconds a small band of what my grandmother's generation would probably call hooligans has conquered my oasis, spreading a blanket, distributing bottles of alcohol, and breaking out the cigarettes, completely disregarding my presence. The two girls and a boy, perhaps in their mid- to late teens, hair dyed black and artistically striped with red, conduct their business in a perpetual, almost hectic flurry. These youngsters (as I in my infinate age and wisdom thus term them) are the smaller and more harmless version of the punkers with the dogs whose demonstrations occasionally stop the tram lines; their dissent and disrespect of "normality" (normalcy?) is, in my opinion, more artistic than ideological.

In a demonstration of affection making me heartily wish for a bucket of cold water or, better yet, a firehose, the scrawny young lad climbs atop the black-haired girl with the lip ring in what I would term a PDA on methamphetamine--while the remaining girl begins to draw figures on all available body parts of the involved couple with a marker, poke and prod them, and implement all manner of ingenious and irritating means of distracting and disturbing; all the while ignoring my existence.

As I sat reading, fending off the flies and studiously ignoring the co-inhabiters of my space (I was assuming they were attempting to drive me off; or else completely indifferent to my presence), I can't help but wonder: who *are* these people? How far do they go to be "different"? And aren't they, in some respects, all the same? You can label them at 100 yards, you can guess the contents of the bottles they carry and the cigarettes they smoke.

Deciding I'd had enough of the flies I gathered my things. "Bye!" the girl calls to me as I wheel my bike away. "Bye!" I reply. "Have fun!"