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Last night the power went off at 8.11 pm in the region I live and by 8.30 pm the common noise of firearms was echoing through the valley. It was earlier than normal though and about 20 minutes after the power went out. The first round of volleys must have been 8 or 9 gunshots and I hope who was being robbed was doing the shooting. When you are sitting with candles and everything is quiet you tend to hear a lot more things than normal. There was more gunshots later on and my guess is that it was a follow up to the earlier shooting by one of the private security firms sweeping the golf course.
I know of one house overlooking the course that is owned by a businessman that has some serious security. The kind of security you see in the films with drug lords. They have a guard house at the main gate and another guard patrolling with an automatic weapon and there was always 3 guards present all the time. I know this as they lived on the opposite side of the fairway and we could see the comings and going of the guards. This must cost him a small fortune and you just wonder why doesn't he just move as he can obviously afford to.
This is one reason I hate the power outages being advertised as it not only alerts the people affected, but also the criminals. Last night they had to be waiting for the power to go before making their move. Criminals are opportunists and must have their targets lined up. Not every target is a soft target though as most people in this country over 50 have some fire arm experience from military service.
I am grateful for making the move into the gated secure area as it has given me the opportunity to relax more. You still need to be vigilant outside during the day as a second gunpoint robbery happened this week at the same coffee shop centre that I visit with another person that I know. No one was injured but it isn't a pleasant experience having a gun pointed at you and having all your belongings plus your car taken. I will be finding a new coffee shop from now on as my thinking that it should be safer after the first robbery the week before was wrong. I imagined that it would be under surveillance and just maybe the centre would up their security.
I know overseas if a serious crime has happened the local police would up their patrols and show the public the confidence that they have everything under control. This is obviously not the case here and you are on your own.
