To slay a beast

The world is what it was, and what it always has been. I am convinced of this now more than I was when I wrote last week’s column. Bullet-riddled ­corpses, and headless bodies pile up in morgues throughout the country.

I watched communities under armed siege as the media promote the newly discovered crime cradle, bullying. I rock back in my chair and murmur: This is it, this is it, this is it. I feel like the madman in David Rudder’s “Chant” (“Madman’s Rant”).



I wondered aloud, what has changed? The rediscovered bullies who have always been around have only managed to look uglier and fatter, fed by strict diets of fast foods and zero exercise coupled with mommy and daddy’s wealth by whatever means. The weapon of choice for these lazy buffoons is the social media network where they hound their hapless victims sadly to emotional distress and agony, and the worst case so far, suicide. Now these fellas were always there.

The ­average child at primary school in my day was no less a victim to these vagrants and vandals than today’s prey. Close to 70 years later, I see Buchoon’s fat, menacing face hovering over little eight-year-old me as he dealt—with ­precision, I might add—a flurry of kicks and cuffs in my direction. He must have been about 15 and towered over me with his beastly appearance.

To this day, too, I had no idea why Buchoon advantaged me. I would venture to say it was because I was brighter, but that’s just speculating since I was attacked from behind while walking home from the Carapichaima EC School. Few people called the Buchoons of those days “bullies”.

They were children who had no “broughtupcy”, zero social skills and, likely, poor parents who were abusive. Entire families were like that. One such family being my neighbour in Bokarro, Koonga.

He was a migrant built like a silverback gorilla and mimicking the actions of the animal, too. The entire village avoided him at all costs. We couldn’t, because we lived opposite the lady with whom he had relations.

On one such occasion, Pa was preparing to cycle to the Brechin Castle factory where he worked, while my sister Jhinaroon and I sat patiently waiting to bid him goodbye. The gorilla emerged from his overnight stay, cutlass in his right hand looking like a butter knife. He crawled towards Pa, who had not noticed him.

My sister and I stood frozen in fear as we watched him raise the cutlass and swing down. He was going to kill Pa. We screamed as he brought down the blade on Pa’s back.

Wap! Wap! Wap! By now we were crying hysterically, swearing our father was going to die. Not a neighbour dared to come to his assistance for fear they would be next. Pa had done nothing other than to live opposite this man.

That was the nature of the beast. Years later I returned as a Sandhurst-trained soldier, I slayed the beast when he attempted to ambush my father with the intention of maiming or killing him. After I humbled Koonga, I ordered him out of the village or he would face dire consequences should he disobey my order.

He readily complied. Now, Koonga and Buchoon were two examples of what we call bullies today, but who were known back then as badjohns. Such menaces used their brute strength to not just intimidate, but to terrorise the average law-abiding citizen.

Fast-forward 60 years to yes­terday’s and now today’s Trini­dad, it occurred to me that Bokarro is not the village I knew prior to the 1990s. Then, there were fewer residents and houses than there are today. Now it’s a concrete jungle with mansions and several “gated communities”.

The face of the “badjohn” is the same, but his weapon of choice is now a high-powered, multiple-rounds machine gun because, face it, that out-of-shape bully can no longer run after his victim. He’ll probably die of a heart attack or, in the case of the car thief in McBean, jump a wall to his death. Today’s bullies will likely have to hire fitter hitmen to get the job done.

Sadly, if we are serious about eradicating bullies we will have to kill or maim them, meaning to solve the issue, we, John and Jane Public, must become criminals. Understandably, nobody wants to traverse that road. Therein lies the conundrum.

To eradicate one evil, we must create another. But we should never have to compromise our moral principles and suffer the consequences silently, because criminals devoid of morals, empathy and common decency threaten our peace and happiness in our beloved T&T. —Raffique Shah.