Armed with a water gun, a 14-year-old boy known as Hamza F. went viral on social media during the heatwave in France with videos of him shooting at municipal police, pushing people into the water, and committing all sorts of mischief in the Saint-Martin Canal, taking advantage of the chaos created by the hordes of Parisians who came daily to combat the stifling heat.
Hamza F., also known as La Douane (customs), for the "toll" he charged cyclists and motorists by pointing his water gun at them, quickly earned the nickname "The terror of the Saint-Martin Canal" and was arrested several times by the police, something he thanked for being able to enjoy the privilege of air conditioning in the police station.
Born in Spain and of Algerian origin, his fame has transcended borders, becoming a symbol of "anti-social behavior" or as a "symptom of the country's decline." "People say I'm a bully, but they are racists: all I do is throw water at people and sometimes at the police," Hamza himself responded to CNews cameras before being arrested for the last time this week, allegedly for stealing a mobile phone.
Amid the heatwave, the debate over adults' passivity towards lack of civility and minor delinquency has made headlines in newspapers, with Le Figaro columnist Alexandre Devecchio leading the charge: "France offers the lamentable spectacle of a country that claims to be able to lecture Donald Trump but is unable to punish a teenager armed with a water gun."
Residents of the Saint-Martin Canal, which runs through the northeast of Paris for 4.5 kilometers, had been warning for months about the presence of teenage gangs since the first heatwave at the end of May. Mayor Emmanuel Grégoire visited on June 16 to announce the authorization of swimming in a 100-meter area supervised by lifeguards, and there was Hamza F. himself that day, personally asking the mayor to cancel a fine for swimming in a prohibited area.
On June 26, a 21-year-old construction worker drowned in the Saint-Martin Canal precisely for swimming under the sign "No swimming, danger of death" at 9:30 pm. The young man left his phone and wallet with friends while taking a dip. The friends went for a coffee and never saw him again. They reported his disappearance and shortly after learned that he had been rescued from the water lifeless.
During the heatwave, there were a total of 90 drownings in rivers and unsupervised bathing areas, mostly young people like 21-year-old footballer Kenzo Kies from the second division team Avant Guingamp, who died near Lyon. "It is a worrying figure that is correlated with a heat peak where people seek cooler temperatures," acknowledged Sports Minister Marina Ferrari.
The French public health agency has doubled its initial estimates of the heatwave and has estimated 2,025 "additional" deaths during the critical week of June 22 to 28, when two consecutive days recorded the hottest temperatures of up to 43 degrees and three-quarters of the country was on red alert.
The respite was short-lived as temperatures rise again this weekend in France, coinciding with the opening of three bathing areas on the Seine and the Villette basin, with all eyes still on the Saint-Martin Canal. More than a sequel to The Adventures of Hamza F., what the Paris city council truly fears is another influx of people like the one that temporarily forced the canal to close to the public at the peak of the heatwave.
"We feel completely overwhelmed," confesses a lifeguard, Thierry, who claims to have never seen anything like it. "The maximum capacity is 300 people, but there were days when more than a thousand arrived and jumped from the bridges, despite the police's efforts to stop them. Hopefully, now that other bathing areas are opening, we won't find ourselves in the same situation because it can be really dangerous."
With the drop in temperatures, a relative calm has returned to the Saint-Martin Canal, with just about twenty bathers taking a dip in water that, according to Deputy Mayor Pierre Lombard, "is completely safe and monitored" with weekly tests conducted by Eau de Paris.
However, Le Figaro once again leads the campaign against the opening of Paris rivers and canals for swimming, questioning municipal measurements while still acknowledging that the water of the bucolic Saint-Martin Canal - where Amélie used to wander long before Hamza F. arrived - is of "excellent quality" for a refreshing swim when the sun beats down again.