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It’s been about 5 days since this happened and my head’s alot clearer now than it was when I posted on that dreaded day. I owe it to Luc & Co. to explain what happened and perhaps anybody reading this can learn from my experience.

On Monday I was happily eating a bowl of mash potatoes in the master bedroom of my summer accomodation in Rusholme, Manchester. Now visitors to my humble abode should not confuse the venue of the following events with my old residence. In my 2 years on Grandale Street nothing funky had ever happened and I guess it was just bad luck that whatever happened took place albeit it being only 2 units away.

At about quarter to 4 in the evening, a gang of yobs broke into the house’s front door. Fahmi was downstairs in his room and Rozanna at the time was in the loo. They apprehended him and told him to surrender his laptop. Fahmi could not give a clear account of how many they were exactly but from the sounds that we heard we concluded that there were at least 5 of them in the house at the time. A couple of them rushed upstairs knocking on the bathroom door as they passed by and entered the master bedroom. I was behind the door at the time.

A male entered telling me to get on the floor. Another asked me where my laptop was. I didn’t get down on the floor like they told me to and I told them that I didn’t have a laptop. They looked pretty dissapointed as they hurridly exited the room but they managed to nick Roz’s phone before leaving. All of them rushed out of the house afterwards leaving us in a dazed shock – the whole event lasted less than a minute.

After they had left, Roz came out of the loo. None of us were hurt in any way. Only Fahmi had any sort of physical encounter with them: they had frisked him to see if he had a wallet or mobile on him. Luckily both were in another pair of trousers. But he did lose a PDA, a laptop, a camera and a mobile.

We immediately called the cops and reported what we saw and experienced. It was very difficult to assist the police as we hardly had any information on whodiddit. All of them were either wearing masks or balaclavas. All of them were clad in typical yob fashion: black tracksuit with Nike Shocks with hoodies covering their heads. Suffice to say, whatever information we offered didn’t even qualify us for a patrol around the neighbourhood. We all felt pretty useless at the time. Dah la kene rompak in broad daylight. Dah la cannot help the police catch babi babi tu. Retribution was indeed so far away.

I guess we should be lucky that nothing more than what was stolen was taken. Also, I guess we should be thankful that we escaped not only with our lives but with no injuries. Moss Side gangs are reputed to have access to firearms and this excludes the carrying of any knives or blades. To some extent I guess we were partly to blame for moving our stuff in such a blatant fashion in broad daylight but we had no choice.

Did we lock the front door? Of course! The Yale lock was secure as I remember it to be when I closed it. The locksmith said that a wire + credit card was all that’s needed to open one with a swift kick to the door (the shoeprint is still there to this day). We didn’t see it coming as there were three people in the house… and in the middle of the day! The fucking nerve. But presumably neither did they. If Roz and I had gone to Alton Towers I think they would have made a clean sweep of the goods in the house and nothing would have been able to be done about it.

So what have I learnt?

For one, Yale locks make you complacent. Grandale Street made us disciplined in remembering to lock the door behind us whenever we entered/exited the house even at the expense of inconveniencing guests and ourselves. The premises were fitted with a Mortice lock but we never thought of using it – and neither did the girls who lived in the house before us.

Two, having a weapon ready isn’t as heroic as you might think it to be. What was going in my head at the time were more thoughts along the lines of, “Bugger. Of all the things to happen, a robbery. WHERE THE HELL IS ROZANNA?!” than, “Fuckers! Now where is Lucas’ katana? Somebody is going to get hurt real bad!” The three blades were starring at me in the face after they left. Why I didn’t think of chopping those bastards down is beyond me. I think I chickened out. It was the concern for the safety of others that made me sluggish I guess. Also, not knowing how many people I was up against was a big deterrent. But chicken I was that day. Was it the right thing to do I do not know.

Movie heroics and fairytale endings of good vanquishing bad are but fictitious in my mind now. I couldn’t even prevent my house from being burgled. And I just stood there like a stone not knowing what to do but pray that they didn’t harm me or the others in the house. I shudder to think what it would have been like if it was grownups who had broken into the house and what they could have done to us. Or if any of them had a gun.

One thing’s for sure though, I am relieved that my three years in UK are up and over. Feelings of me leaving this place after what has transpired is more of “good riddance” than anything else right now. I have also developed a strong hatred (strong word yes, but appropriate) for yobs. I feel like punching every single one in the face when I see them on the street – loud, brash, uncouth, uncivilized mother fucking pissheads. But at least I can safely say that I’m not a racist: the gang was multicultural :)

To quote Roz (who quoted a P. Ramlee movie): “Kecik-kecik tak nak mampos! Besar-besar menyusahkan orang!”