H&M customers line up for a gift-card giveaway during the grand opening.  Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

"It felt weird [camping on the street] but it was fun -- it was an awesome experience. I'd totally do it again if I had to."
"I got second place -- I won $200. My brother got first place. I was quite jealous, but I'm happy for him."
"I want to buy some sweaters and shirts, a pair of pants or two, maybe a hat."
Zishon Nurani, Ottawa

"We thought it would be fun just to camp out and see what it was like. It's in the middle of downtown, in the middle of the night, and we've never actually done that, so it was fun."
"They played card games and all sorts of games all night, and there were so many other kids there. They had boom boxes -- it was like a party."
Sabene Nurani

"My feet are aching. I've done an all-nighter before but nothing like this."
"Sweatshirts, jeans, dress shirts, a leather jacket. My aunt helped load it up."
Shamir Nurani

Staff of H&M entertain large lines of people waiting to get int the store during the grand opening of the Rideau Centre expansion ahead of the 10:15am opening. Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

Shallow values? Self-absorption? Fun? A social gathering in the middle of the street of a large city in the middle of the night? Generational priorities and values, passed on from an adult to children? From a generation for whom shopping has become a passion to a generation whose unquestioned acceptance of that passion for themselves wallows in the great opportunity to have fun, taking part in an overnight vigil awaiting the opening of a new store.

The store offering a first prize of $300 to the determined, 'value-conscious' shopper who manages to be the first to gain entry to the store on its grand opening day, and a second prize of $200 to the next person who follows into the store for the privilege of shopping there. All in the name of public relations, advertising success on the cheap. Even the local newspaper picks up the story to make much of it; not critically, but adding admiring acclaim for the perseverance of young teens and adults.

As though they have accomplished something of note, hanging out for almost a full day --19 hours, from four in the afternoon of the day before, to the store-opening hour of 11:00 am the following day -- to be able to enter the confines of a new shopping emporium selling the casual clothing they prefer, much of it reflective of the very same kinds of clothing worn by celebrity figures in entertainment that the nascent shoppers passionately admire.

Depend on crotchety old people like me to find fault and cluck disapprovingly. Reproving young people for having fun, being excited in a social gathering whose purpose is to 'shop until they drop' (or break their personal bank, whichever comes first). Declaring the values of youth disappointingly shallow with their preoccupation, whether salivating over celebrity personalities and peccadilloes or investing their time in irrelevant petty nonsense.

Large lines of people wait to get into H&M on Thursday, Aug. 11, 2016. Wayne Cuddington / Postmedia

All the while investing themselves, their attention and their hopes and dreams of the future with the latest fads emanating from and percolating through the online social media platforms that give meaning to their lives. The rarity among them the young iconoclasts who avoid Facebook, social nonenities whose failure to absorb themselves into the general clatter and cluster identifies them as failures.