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Inshallah: (from Arabic) “God willing,” sometimes (as in this case) used with just a touch of fatalism. An exclamation no less deeply felt for Maria being Catholic.
The spikes you see everywhere are to keep pigeons from roosting. Which perhaps only suggests that the cleaning bill is of more concern than the atmosphere the look creates.
↓ Transcript
Panel 1: Maida and Maria, dressed in street clothes, approach John Calvin Charity Secondary. The school is cold, concrete, and modernist, with wire fences and anti-pigeon spikes, and a low ceiling hanging overhead covered in pipes that must go somewhere. A few students leave out the gated entrance that the girls head towards. Maria: "I only went to John Calvin for one year, before getting into O.L.P.I."
Panel 2: Maria: "I actually never fought I'd see it again. Hah."
Panel 3: Maria waves at the screen that blocks the entrance. Device: "Identity confirmed. Welcome."
Panel 3: Maida: "The school still recognizes you." Maria: "Yeh."
Panel 4: Inside the school yard, they walk down one wide staircase and towards another. Maida: "Do you fink we'll run into anyone you know?" Maria: "Inshallah, I 'ope not."
Panel 5: As they walk up the stairs, Maida is surprised to see a boy in a big, patchwork jacket walk the other way.
Panel 6: Maida, continuing to look as he passes: "There are boys at this school." Maria: "Oh yeh. This is a F-class school. It's quite different from O.L.P.I."
Panel 2: Maria: "I actually never fought I'd see it again. Hah."
Panel 3: Maria waves at the screen that blocks the entrance. Device: "Identity confirmed. Welcome."
Panel 3: Maida: "The school still recognizes you." Maria: "Yeh."
Panel 4: Inside the school yard, they walk down one wide staircase and towards another. Maida: "Do you fink we'll run into anyone you know?" Maria: "Inshallah, I 'ope not."
Panel 5: As they walk up the stairs, Maida is surprised to see a boy in a big, patchwork jacket walk the other way.
Panel 6: Maida, continuing to look as he passes: "There are boys at this school." Maria: "Oh yeh. This is a F-class school. It's quite different from O.L.P.I."
“The spikes…are to keep pigeons from roosting.” Yes, that’s exactly why you see spiked walls in working and middle class neighborhoods in the 3rd world. It’s all about the pigeons and not about the roving gangs of starving murderous outlaws at all.
Or perhaps the fear of “murderous outlaws” is the only part that’s real, and the outlaws themselves, and the costly pigeon-related cleaning bills, are largely imaginary.