Alex prefers black to purple, her father is silent most of the time and a parrot is said to have replaced her mother. Best of all is her friendship with Paul and Ratte; with them, you can wait on the future and for life to happen. Then all of a sudden, the young student teacher Johnny Spitzing comes into her life. On the school trip to Poland, Paul kisses Alex: overrun by emotion and in the most untoward place in the world, in Auschwitz. Someone takes a picture of her and it haunts the web. Everyone is talking about Alex and young people today, the parrot escapes and it dawns on her: life has arrived and it’s in full swing.