Bombing out in the popularity stakes

Gaston de Rosayro

Now it can be revealed: I have taken the law into my own hands. Meaning that I devised my own method of ridding a community of a public annoyance in a half legal way. Like other courts of law are supposed to do, I have tried to temper justice with mercy - in a vigilante sort of way.

As in the Gilbert and Sullivan operetta, ‘The Mikado,’ I have tried to make the “punishment fit the crime.”Everyone knows that journalists are not creatures of habit. Unlike civil servants, journalists begin work when others are about to say good night and tuck their kids into bed.

They get home around the time those same are waking up. Maybe this is why I find my entire social and biological life undergoing a complete change. Sipping an after-work cocktail at 3 in the morning may be considered a bit excessive in some social circles, but there’s little choice when your working day doesn’t end until 2 am.

Needless to say one’s entire family life becomes a total disaster prompting a good many marriages to head for the rocks. A former colleague once sacked the job simply because he wanted to protect his wife’s good character. Said he: “This is the last straw. My children call me uncle!”

So you will have realised by now that a journalist’s shifts are by no means usual. Any journalist veterans of my vintage will tell you that they are dragooned into nocturnal shifts enjoyed by certain other professionals such as cat-burglars, twilight ladies and body snatching ghouls to name but a few. That is why it is often referred to as the (expletive deleted) the ‘Graveyard Shift.’ Such hours also demand unusual sleeping arrangements. For example, noon is hardly too late to be sleeping when you’ve barely been able to get to bed at what others would consider to be the dawn.

I need my sleep; and I need it when others are up and about. This is easier said than done, particularly in light of the fact that my apartment in Mei Foo in Hong Kong faced the podium and my usual time for a nap coincided with the lunch break of hordes of adolescent schoolchildren.

The podium, it turned out, had been selected as their habitual haven for lunch, as well as a convenient hideaway to satisfy tobacco cravings and amuse their friends. All this would have had absolutely nothing to do with me, expect for the fact that every one of these acts was generally accompanied by a cacophony of shrieks, banshee wails and bellows.

It all took place directly beneath my bedroom window. A logical, law-abiding and unimaginative response would have been to call the cops. Normally that’s what I would have done. But calling security would have had negative results because rowdy kids have scant respect for people in uniforms.

Anyway, I wanted revenge, not just sleep. Half asleep, my mind goes through the usual extreme methods: guns, knives, artillery, before I give up on them as impractical and somewhat risky - to me, not my targets. Times such as these call for ingenuity where one has to fashion weaponry with a minimum of sweat, patience and anguish.

But the simplest ideas are often the greatest and with prevailing sanity came the thought of the most humble and effective ballistic ever invented: the water bomb.

The formula for fashioning one is no big deal either. Simply fill a plastic bag with tap water and tie a knot at its mouth. And presto! You are ready for battle. Ok, but I made sure I only used clean tap water to fill the plastic bag. The conventions even in a war with scallywags must not be too extreme. After all, mine was a vigilante war based on a campaign that smacked decidedly of guerilla strategy. That is why I did not use turmeric and vinegar as part of the formula to give the water blaster a more colourful splash.

The plastic bag has to be filled until it is stretched a decent amount. Filling too little might result in the bomb not breaking on contact. Filling too much and it might rupture, drenching one’s feet at the filling station. Holding the pretty heavy bomb I scurried to my battle station. Approaching my bedroom window, I drew the drapes slightly with the stealth of a battle-hardened commando and coolly surveyed my target.

There they were, right beneath my window, chain-smoking, bawling their heads off and behaving like a lot of hobbledehoys, which as you will agree is not a very nice way to behave. I watched with delight as two of the more vociferous of the gang, an obese bellower and a pimply-faced, gangly lout, were locked in combat.

It seemed all too easy because I did not have to calculate precisely trajectory and motion. All I had to do was drop the bomb directly below me.

Opening the window ever so slightly, making just enough room to get the bomb through, I let it go. I just had time to watch, through the air-con slit in the drapes, my missile score a perfect bull’s-eye on one of my victims, getting him right on the head. That is what you would have described as a whopping sopping right on the victim’s noggin.

There was a moment’s astonished silence as the water bomb burst on impact, showering its contents in an extravagant silvery cascade on both of them. It was truly an awesome aquatic explosion .Surreptitiously I watched the wet, bedraggled young yahoos slouch away, flinging their sodden cigarettes. They never did fritter away their time below my bedroom window any more.

It was magnificently restorative to my jaded senses, one of my life’s sweetest moments. However, although I was able to sleep like a cherub thereafter I must admit to being slightly disappointed, in a perverse sort of way. My friend George, who lived in the block opposite, hinted that water-filled balloons made even better water bombs.

I did buy myself a few packets but I did have the feeling I would not have the opportunity to test their efficacy.

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