Gunshots in the night

Never would I have imagined myself waking up in the middle of the night to the sounds of gunshots. I thought it only happens in the movies. Or at least, in a more dangerous part of town.

Last night I couldn't sleep. I had too much coffee and was struggling to calm my over-active brain activities so that I could get some shut eye. The bedroom window was open to let some cool air into our warm room. It was quiet outside. Then I heard some shouting in the distance followed by 3 popping noises. It sounded like firecrackers but my mind kept saying that it could possibly be gunshots. "Did you hear that?" I asked hubby. Then we heard two more popping sounds. "Were those gunshots?!". Hubby got out of bed and looked out the window. Not like he would get such a great view anyway. Our window overlooks the driving range and then another apartment complex. Behind the apartment complex are all the shops, restaurants and cinema in the area. He swore it was firecrackers and he got back into bed. But as soon as he did that I heard sirens. "It was gunshots! Can you hear the sirens?". Oh yeah, it was quite obvious they were sirens. But it sounded like it went past the general area where we live. So we ignored it. But then came more sirens and we strained to listen if it would also pass where we were or if it would get louder. Then hubby heard an ambulance siren. We scrambled back out of bed to take a look outside. Sometimes if you're lucky you can see the main street that people take to go to the shops that are hidden behind the neighboring apartment complex. And sure enough, we saw two glowing red lights flashing from the right side of the main road. And then we saw another from the other side of the road. If it weren't for the flashing lights we wouldn't have been able to see anything. The road is about 5 minutes drive from where we live. So it wasn't all that close. But we saw the flashing lights getting closer to us, as if the cars were entering the inner roads that lead to the neighboring apartment complex. And the flashing lights came from different directions. Hubby was sure that they were either chasing someone or trying to surround the people they were trying to catch.

First thought that went in my mind was woah... that's really close. I hope no one's hurt. And then the second thought was "That's an amazing response time!!". It must've been only 2 minutes since I heard the first shot and already the police and ambulance were close to the scene. I wanted to go back to sleep coz I was pretty confident that whatever drama that was going on would be over soon. But hubby coaxed me into taking a drive to see what the incident was about. Never will the 'menyibuk' characteristic of a true blood melayu be thrown away.

So we rushed downstairs, got in the car and drove out of the apartment complex towards the shops. As soon as we passed the neighboring apartment complex, we saw 5 police cars surrounding a normal looking green colored car - blocking off the road. A policeman was talking to someone in the driver seat of the car. And all the police cars had their headlights shining on the green car.There was a junction just before the group of police cars, so we turned into that junction only to find another group of police cars surrounding two other normal cars. This time I saw two black guys face down on the ground with their hands behind their heads. It didn't look like anyone was injured. And again all the lights of the police car and the ambulance was shining on the cars and the guys on the ground. We drove by pretty slowly to take a good look and hubby actually asked if I had brought my camera so that we could take pictures. (Ok, menyibuk giler!!!). But no, I didn't have my camera coz we left in such a rush. We went around the block to take a look again at the scene and then drove back home.

The weird thing about the whole incident though, is that I don't feel worried or scared at all that such an incident happened pretty close to where we live. The fact is that this is a safe area. The most a police had to do was pull someone over for speeding in a residence area. The speed limit is 70kph. Anyone going 80kph on the stretch of main road would surely be pulled over by the police. Most kids who hang out by the cinema and go to the retail stores around the area come from pretty well to do families. We hardly see any gathering of young people that look like they're up to no good. Hardly ever hear of burglaries nor cars getting broken into. Not unlike the downtown area where I went to university. I'd hear about muggings almost everyday and I had friends whose house were broken into and I had a friend whose car window was smashed for no apparent reason. The area we're in is very safe and so hubby and I have deduced that the people who were involved in the incident yesterday were not from this area. And the police response was amazing that if anything similar were to happen, the people involved would be caught right away.

So that's my interesting thing to blog about this week. Other than that, things have been pretty boring. Work is getting more realistic and people are starting to talk about the 'bad side' of working there. Unlike when I was interviewing when everything that I was told is only good. I do think though, that the things people are complaining about are normal everyday things other people in other work environments complain about - you know, the management, lazy co-workers and the like. So nothing new there.