Editor's Note: A friend of mine got stuck in traffic in a rough but frequently traversed Port of Spain neighbourhood when the following happened. It's written in his hand but not in his name, and I changed the name of his wife as well. This occurred on July 23rd, 2014.
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Hey all, Natalie and I encountered a noteworthy incident in the commute today and I wanted to take a few moments to remind everyone to be careful on the roads.
We were proceeding out of POS around 5:45 pm and our trusty neighbourhood traffic app Waze suggested that the Piccadilly route was the shortest in traffic time. This isn't peculiar and has almost become a default route for us in heading east. So we're just exiting Park St and coming around the second corner on the East Dry River. We're in the right lane with no one ahead of us and there are a number of cars in the left lane. Waze is just instructing us that in 800 metres we need to turn right. I'm looking ahead and seeing a line of cars beyond the light, and thinking that's a lot of cars for this time.
Natalie and I are talking and then we saw the brake lights come on for a car about sixcars ahead on the left and the door swings open. A medium height man alights from the driver's side of the vehicle clad in a white t-shirt and a dark coloured pants. I didn't notice his shoes nor whether he was wearing a watch, however I did see the gun in his hand. Even Natalie who is more fashion aware than myself seems not to recollect what type or colour were his shoes or if he had any other accessories, save the gun in his right hand. Stopping the car seemed a good idea at this point.
We went on to notice that he was facing the line of cars behind him, with us on the right lane by our lonesome. Then we saw and heard as he fired three gun shots in quick succession whilewalking towards the line of cars but tending into the right lane. You can imagine for us at this point, that whilewe were not previously aware that this man existed as more than the driver in the vehicle "way up" ahead of us, he had managed to capture our attention.
The seconds seemed to be moving in molasses after he fired the shots. We knew we had seen the sparks from the gun and heard the shots so this was not a dream; this was actually happening. He was walking in the street with some intent but we were still clueless as to what had prompted such action. Then out of the corner of our eyes we noticed a few boys–I'll take a gander that it was three–running along the pavement/drain area between the cars and the buildings on the left side of the road.
Whilethis was happening the man seemed to have moved closer to where we were with his focus beyond us, I imagine to where the boys were running. Just around this point Natalie opted notto continue observing the scene through the windshield and took cover, as it wasn't too clear what would happen next.
I faced a dilemma of sorts. I was the driver and not a passenger in the car. I am the husband of said passenger in the car. The man hadn't stopped walking with gun in his hand.
A real-time review of the situation seemed appropriate, with a decision to be made pending the review. It struck me that he had fired in the air and not at the cars. He was keeping the gun out but not facing us whilewalking. The boys clearly were his focus and not random passers-by.
The steps were like:
�Plain clothes police or gangster?
�Processing...
�Place car in reverse pending conclusion...
�Man is now nearer and he cries out to someone behind and points...
�Look in rearview quickly...
�Hmmm police van a few vehicles back
�Is he a cop?
�Don't let man out of sight...
�He's on the pavement alongside car
�Neutral, drive...
�He's walking...
�Drive slowly past other cars...
�Observe Police with non-miniature guns approaching...
�Encouraged to drive by passenger...
�Drive less slowly ...
�Comfort wife...
�Pass soldiers with more non-miniature guns approaching...
�Keep driving...
�Comfort wife...
�Thank God for safety...He is always in control
We don't know conclusively who the man is/was. We have no clue what the boys did or didn't do as we never observed them prior to them running near to the car. We have no idea what the conclusion of the situation was and probably never will know.
Even in reflecting upon it now I'm reminded of how quickly things can occur with little to no warning. The stark reality strikes me today with great force that there really are two worlds co-existing in Trinidad at this time. In one world there are normal people going to work, paying taxes and contributing positively to society. In the other there's a more unstructured and unprincipled approach to things where regularly there are eruptions in violence. And sometimes these co-existing worlds have some overlap and the serenity of the first is interrupted by the chaos of the latter.
Five minutes before we would not be relating this incident. Fiveminutes later we may have been in unexplained traffic on Piccadilly. Or we could have had a complete different scenario occurring. I'm thankful that no one including ourselves washurt, and I'll just encourage everyone to be vigilant and take great care in traversing the roads.
#BeStrongandofGoodCourage #LifeisReal