The difference between a snout and the barrel of an AK-47.
We call it ‘bang-bang’ journalism. Bang-bang applies when we get to attend riots or any other violent incident and are lucky enough to get a piece of the action. I love bang-bang, but this past Thursday it had a bit of an embarrassing ending.
Thursday evening all hell broke loose in the Plot 8 informal settlement on Progress Road in Lindhaven as a bunch of armed zama zamas went on the rampage, causing most of the residents to evacuate. Already in my PJs I got a call from a source to come to the Sasol garage just up from the settlement where police, Metro Police, West Suburbs Roodepoort Neighbourhood Watch, security companies and the residents have gathered. And off yours truly and his camera went.
After taking some pictures, getting names and the basic info, I moved onto bigger things. I wanted to go into the settlement but the police won’t take me. Apparently I am a “liability”. The kind folks of DMS Security though, offered that I could go with their K9 Unit on foot. Adrenaline City here we come! So the waiting started. (Mmm? Everyone who was going in were wearing bullet-proof vests. What a novel idea? Wish I thought of that.) But then at about 10.30pm the police officer in charge announced that the Nyala was going to stand guard only at the edge of the settlement as it was too dark to hunt down the suspects. He also informed the security company that there would be no need for them to go in.
Darn. Disappointment. No bang-bang.
I’ll be damned, I thought, if I had waited the whole night for nothing. So I decided that I was going to enter the settlement on my own via another side. I drove around, locked my car and started walking into the veld. Not far in my nerves started getting to me. So I ran short distances in a hunched position. Nope. Maybe I should leopard-crawl short distances alternated by running short distances. During one of the crawling stretches I suddenly heard something behind me. I froze. My heart stopped. I cursed myself for this harebrained scheme. And then. Something strange and pointy was stuck up my butt!
The barrel of an AK-47! So that was how it would end!
Then suddenly it’s next to my face!
A mangy dog.
I guess the only difference between a dog’s snout and an AK-47 is one’s imagination.
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