Pool stories

Since my first visit to the local pool a couple of weeks ago - Water is life!  - I have been going regularly to the pools close to home or to work. It is a world apart.......

One day the computer that prints the tickets did not work wherefore entry to the pool was free. The ticket seems to play a very important role. At my local pool you have to present your card at the ticket boot, where the person in charge will then print a ticket that you hand over to the man who sits 3 metres away before you enter the changing rooms. You cannot just show your membership card and pass directly to the changing rooms.

The first visit to the pool near work brought an unexpected surprise. After having handed over my ticket I entered the swing doors and saw men and women taking off their shoes, putting on their coats, entering individual cabins, stowing their bags away in lockers and walking down the aisle in swimsuit towards some other swing doors. I must admit that I just stood their with my bag asking myself aloud "It is mixed?". So big was my surprise that I was unable to find a quick reply when a tall, good looking man replied me.

The showers? Well, washing before swimming seems to be taken more lightheartedly in France than in Denmark. First of all you put on your swimsuit before you go to the showers, and you keep it on! The showers are more or less secluded and for women only in the pool near home, but in the pool near work the showers are mixed, too. I am not a puritan or one to be ashamed of my body, as you know, but somehow it feels odd to wash next to a man, whether he is old or young, fat or thin.

The lockers are a story apart. There is no key but only a central point where you tap the three digit number of the locker and then you tap your secret four digit pin number following which you have got two minutes to close the locker. When you come back from the pool and the showers you have to remember the number of your locker and your secret pin number. So far I have managed to remember my numbers, but one day an older woman could not remember the number of her locker, and what do you do then? Without the number you cannot tap in your secret pin number, and without those numbers you cannot open the locker! Another woman assisted the older woman by tasting in one locker number after the other until a locker opened. Phouh, imagine standing there in your swimsuit not knowing when you will get your clothes!

When you like me are half-blind without your glasses on, it is rather nerve wrecking to enter a new pool. You don't distinguish clearly the steps, you cannot see the time on the clock on the wall, you don't know where to find the swim boards, and you have to memorize where the exit is. The first time that I went to the pool near work I went directly into the 25 metres pool and swam amongst pensioneers floating around in the water belly up. I could not believe how slow the swimmers were and asked myself jokingly where the real swimmers were hiding. The next time I returned to the pool, I ventured deeper into the big hall to ask for the swim boards and there I found, finally, the 33 metre long pool full of real swimmers. Heaven! Forever after I shall leave the big bellies in their own pool together with the aqua gym class whilst I mingle with the "young and beautiful"!