Next Door to Armed Men

I have never been emotionally attached to any of the flats or houses my family have moved into. Moving was so recurrent in our lives that reduced playmates and neighbours to nameless blurry faces that are better forgotten, because after all, to them I don’t even look familiar.

One of the bad experiences I had as a child was in a flat the whole family agreed was the ugliest and scariest. My sister named it the Pink House based on the hideous paint coating the exterior walls. The landlord was so proud of the eyesore of his creation; the super-spacious kitchen, the nice bathroom with the non-flushable toilet, the large rooftop littered with an awful lot of pigeon eggshells and poop and most importantly the balcony and the windows, so large to make the landlord proud but it was recommended that we buy thick curtains and we’d better not draw them! We had to bear with stuffy rooms for one thing, we lived next door to the notorious Intelligence Agency, who were said to have warned old residents to not venture peep into their premise, lest we’d be in big trouble. I wondered what Big Trouble meant; were they going to shoot us, or apprehend mum for questioning and then deport her, or send someone to terrorize us or evict us. I could never tell.

I was so curious but too scared to take a look. I only did it once and saw nothing but trees. But that did not stop the nightmares and sleepless nights of men in uniform breaking into our residence and huge rats nibbling at my toes, which later on, turned out to be a fixture of this house that could make a perfect set for scary movies, particularly after a neighbour saw a creepy figure trying to break her window, who according to the authorities was a prisoner break attempt, no idea if it was true or not, but it did not feel good to know that I was living next to a prison camp, where men had had enough of daily torture and wanted to escape.

Of all the houses, the Pink House came to mind not too long ago. I was taken aback by the fact that an Iraqi Army Battalion was going to be stationed next to where I live. I could not believe that the Pink House experience will be relived and my privacy will be taken away. Mum and I panicked at the thought of us sleeping inside drowning in pools of sweat, with cockroaches scrambling up our bodies. I wished we could move, leave the whole country but never live near those people, who were all over a building much higher than our residence.

Stepdad’s too relaxed reaction was so irritating. He said we will sleep on the roof no matter what, because “those men are harmless.” “Armed men are never harmless,” I argued. Nonetheless I had no other choice but make the beds and fall asleep as I used to do, only this time, it was too much huffing and puffing, but I did enjoy the breeze as usual.

I hate it when stepdad is right, but he was. As the days went by I noticed that we were making their job more difficult than they did our lives, mum noticed that in the mornings, they never faced our house until we’re all downstairs. Apparently, some of them were too bored and started to open up to stepdad, one told him that he only joined the army to save money and start a new life. They seemed to do whatever it takes to gain our trust.

What I like the most about their presence is the fact that our neighbourhood is getting cleaner. It takes an army uniform and a rifle to stop people from throwing trash in front of our house. Of course they’re only doing it to avert any IED emplacing attempts, but it was for our own good.

Their presence might entail more mortar attacks and shootouts but our house has not been searched in months, now that’s something!





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