Some days are better than others. This week, though, has been something else and made me long for a different life, a different time.
Life back in the olden days which my grandparents told me stories about. The good days I read about in novels growing up. The days when people who came from the same community were brothers. As good as blood brothers.
I live in Philippi and woke up on Monday morning to go to work in the Cape Town CBD.
I travel by train from Philippi, but when I arrived there I saw that the trains were overloaded and immediately knew that there were long delays on the Central Line.
I decided to run and catch a taxi and made the short walk from the train station to the main road.
As I walked I saw a small group of boys approaching from the opposite direction. To either side of me were yards, built up high, which formed a narrow passageway of sorts leading out on the main road which would take me to the taxi rank, or if I was lucky, straight into the doors of a passing minibus taxi.
Suddenly the two boys, who looked like they should still be in school uniform or maybe first year varsity, stopped and stood still against one side of the wall. In that moment I knew something would happen to someone. I just didn’t think it would be me.
I still don’t know why I thought it couldn’ t be me. Maybe it was a misplaced sense that I knew they would have to fight me for whatever they wanted to take from me. Either way, I ignored them and carried on walking.
I did not look at them and held tightly onto my work bag.
Suddenly I felt my bag being tugged hard from behind and my instant reaction was that today I was going to teach someone a lesson. Fighting has always been a last resort for me but this was about me protecting what belonged to me.
A furious scrap broke out.
Suddenly I heard a woman start screaming and raising the alarm and my attackers knew that their game was up. Around these parts, criminals who are caught face the terrifying prospect of public beatings and even death by being torched.
My attackers fled without taking anything. I was left with a headache from blows to the head and a raging fury at what had just taken place.
I phoned in to report the incident to work and requested to be allowed to stay at home Monday and Tuesday.
On Tuesday, I was lying alone in my room just after 1pm when I heard noises coming from outside and I jumped up to see what was happening. Maybe it was those guys who came around and scratched in the rubbish bins for items to recycle.
But suddenly I saw the young man who lives in a structure at the back of our yard running past my door, like a dog escaping a whipping. Before my mind could make sense of what was happening, I saw a second man following him with, gun in hand.
Before the tenant could make it to safety, he was tripped from behind, sending him sprawling painfully on the ground.
Within seconds he was pleading for his life, his voice betrayed by the gun pointed at his head.
I stood in the doorway, caught between trying to process the unfolding scene and stepping in to stop the situation escalating further.
The gunman was not aware that I was behind him as started to move forward slowly.
Suddenly an angry voice behind me barked: “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
I turned to face the voice and looked into the eyes of a man who was aiming a pistol at my head. The shadow of the darkness of death hung over me.
I could not do anything except fold my arms. This could not be happening.
Behind him, emerged three more men who proceeded to pass him and move onto the first gunman who still had the victim held captive in the sights of his weapon.
By this stage the victim’s wife had emerged from their home and was screaming and begging the men to spare the life of her husband.
The men took his bag, wallet and cellphones and fled in a vehicle which had pulled up outside in the street. The husband had earlier drawn a large some of money at a bank in Mitchells Plain.
The three of us could only stand in disbelief at what had just happened, what we had been forced to endure.
I am back at work but my mind is replaying the events of earlier this week over and over.
Perhaps writing this all down will help me come to terms with it all.
But will it help me make sense of this world we now live in? A world where every day one is going about one’s day-to-day business, but walking in constant fear. What will happen? What will that person do to me? Will I be okay?
What has become of our society when previously a young man would protect a young girl living close by, but now young men threaten the girl next door?
Young children see people being robbed in the street, residents have watched through rusty openings and holes of their shacks at innocent people being stabbed, shot or held down at gunpoint.
Growing up, I had lived for a while in my own dreamland of thinking things would turn for the better. But reality is a cold embrace and lets us hang from the edge, fearing that things are only becoming worse.