While
driving to work yesterday, in a positive mood (which is generally pretty
unusual for me), I had my window open and was smiling at the street kid at the
traffic light. I have developed quite a soft spot for him. He is always
smiling and waving, to spite his lot in life. He is there at six every
morning, come rain or shine. And I've seen him sitting with some old
markers, "sprucing up" his little beggars board
(ie. tale of woe) that most beggars in our country are seen with. He
decorates it with his personal brand of art, which made me think that I would
probably do the same, if I was ever in his position :) On this particular
morning, he had some sort of wig or weave on, that I hadn't seen before.
It was an Albert Einstein-type of style....
but black with purple tips (my favourite colour) at the end of each wild
tendril - it made me smile. As he was approaching down the line of
motorists, I was getting ready to greet him and tell him that I don't have
anything for him today, when I heard a ruckus close-by. I looked around
and some wild movements caught my eye. At the petrol station across the
road, the one I frequent most often on my way home, there were several men
assaulting a motorist in his vehicle at one of the petrol pumps. From what I could gather, a group of between
6 – 10 men got out of a minibus taxi and were trying to pull a single motorist
out of the driver’s side of his car. They
were literally rocking the car from side to side, via the arm of the driver,
who was gripping desperately at his steering wheel, trying to free himself of
the mob of assailants. I was in immediate shock at the event unfolding in
front of my eyes. So much so that I found myself waiving at the young
beggar passing by my window, mimicking his movements, smile and all, to spite
my shock. I blinked and flushed at my reaction and when I looked back,
the man had somehow managed to free himself and with a leap managed to get his
car away from them, slamming his door shut (and I imagine locking it) all in
one motion. He had gotten away, to my
relief. The traffic light I was waiting
at changed and I had to go, wanted to go.
Although going home would have been more welcome after my shock. I imagine the man had said something to the
minibus driver, which he and his passengers (or perhaps they were fellow
drivers parked at the station at that time) had taken great offence to. Now, don’t get me wrong, I don’t condone the
man doing or saying whatever had set off the mob, but was it really necessary
to go to such extremes? To assault
someone for a fleeting thought that had escaped his mouth before he had time to
think about it? And I can’t help but
wonder, what would they have done, had they managed to free him from his
vehicle? And while I understand the
petrol attendant standing idly by while this was happening (shock or fear or
both) it scared me even more to think that should I ever be in such a
situation, no one would come to my aid.
We really are all we have most of the time. There are no hero’s like you see in Hollywood
movies. No brave men or women coming to
rescue you in the nick of time. Strange
how naïve my views are (…where?), considering I have lived all 31 years of my
life in one of the most violent and crime-ridden countries in the World, I’ve
heard the stats, yet I had never been the direct victim of a crime and still hope
that by some miracle, never will be.
Friends of mine, family, have experienced some of the most violent acts,
not once, but some of them 2, 3, 4 times.
Yet here am I, shocked, nauseous, sickened, by an act only seen in the
distance. What I should probably also
mention is this is not a neighbourhood one would consider shady. I sometimes wonder if
one is not more alert or to some extent expect
these types of events to take place
in less well-to-do locations… yet I
guess it’s true what they say about suburbs lulling us into a false sense of
security. Also, the neighbourhood police
station is perhaps 1.5kms down the road.
Which makes that false sense of security even stronger and clearly more false.
All
the way to work and throughout the day, the images haunted me. I am not someone who keeps up to date with
current events. I do no watch the
news. I’m a dreamer, a believer and have
an unusually vivid imagination. I live
myself into each situation to the point where it feels like it happened to
me. So I’ve found it a way of
self-preservation. As with being an
introvert, shy and manic depressive, it is widely misunderstood and most
individuals do not understand the way my mind works. People often think I’m just being a naïve baby and that I need to know these things whatever they
are and however bad they may be. Why, I
cannot tell you. Others will offer a
reason, but in my opinion none of these can be considered valid reasons, for a
reason needs to be some sort of means to an end to be considered valid.
Immediately
after the incident, the only thing I could think of was immigrating. But where does one “escape” to? America, where the government shuts down and
your children are sent to bogus wars?
London, where my SAD will kick in, likely to the point of suicide? This made me so despondent to the entire
state of the world. It made me think, as
I often do, why? Why do we need to be
here?
No comments:
Post a Comment