The Price of Life

by Nigel Brennan

  ‘Okay, thanks,’ I reply, trying not to betray my nerves. I watch as he walks back down the hall.

  Amanda is right, today is the day and time is of the essence. I am pulled between excitement and fear. I know deep down we have to do this, but my brain is telling me not to be so fucking stupid.

  Before Amanda knocks for the bathroom, we talk one last time, going through the plan.

  ‘Amanda, you realise today we could die? Are you sure you want to do this?’ Her reply is a firm ‘Yes’.

  My body is tight like a spring. Now, ready, I survey the room, hoping it will be the last I see of these dirty walls.

  I hear Amanda ask if she can go for a shower and seconds later the slapping of her thongs on the tiled floor as she makes her way to the bathroom. There’s no turning back now.

  I perform the same routine as last night, slipping along the wall and around the corner to the bathroom. Pulling back the curtain, I see Amanda staring back at me; her face says it all. This is it.

  We have to be quiet. I’ll pass everything down to you, okay? Pour water into the shower recess so it sounds like you’re having a shower,’ I whisper. Amanda nods. I get to work up on the ledge.

  I hoist Amanda up, and watch anxiously as she manoeuvres her body. She puts one leg through the space then struggles to get her torso out.

  It’s impossible to tell how noisy we’re being. Amanda now has three quarters of her body outside. She grabs the top bar for stability and finally pulls her other leg out. Amanda balances awkwardly on the ledge outside then slowly lowers herself down until she disappears from my sight. I give her a few seconds then throw our bags out followed by my shoes.

  Tipping a few cups of water into the recess before moving towards the window, I stand up on the bowl and realise I still have the cup in my hand. I throw it at the bucket; it hits the rim and crashes into the recess. Fuck, fuck, fuck, that was so loud, Nigel.

  I pull myself up onto the ledge, and get my leg outside, almost crushing my balls in the process, but I can’t pull my torso out past the blocks. Frantically, I twist and push, but it’s useless.

  I have no choice but to go headfirst. Squeezing my torso through, I grab onto next door’s roof guttering; it almost gives way before I let go. The thought of a spinal injury at this point doesn’t excite me. Grabbing at anything I can, I finally take hold of a solid piece of timber that takes my weight.

  Finally I’m through. I slide down the wall and hit terra firma. The feeling of sand between my toes has never felt so good. I can’t believe that we are free; the rush is intense.

  But short-lived.

  ‘We’ve been spotted by the boy next door,’ Amanda says. It will only take a matter of seconds before the bush telegraph gets going. I reef my shoes on and try to cover my head with my sarong, not that it will make much difference now.

  We sprint down the alleyway between the houses, stopping momentarily at the end. Going left isn’t an option – that will take us back to our front gate. Directly in front is a mass of thorn bushes. We turn right.

  Amanda is out in front with me two paces behind. We make it down the side of the neighbour’s house. From the corner of my eye I see someone standing at the neighbour’s front gate.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I think I hear someone say but I can’t be sure as my brain won’t compute anything now. My feet move without my thinking, pounding the loose sand. I cry for help. ‘I caawin, I caawin, I caawin’ pushes up my throat and projects out my mouth as I race down the street with no direction in mind. My eyes take in the sandy street, thorn bushes, trees, goats and houses, but none of it really registers. It’s as if I’m floating. It’s like the seconds before an anaesthetic fully kicks in: I’m lucid but completely out of control.

  We are both now sprinting down the road, screaming. We come to a woman walking in our direction. Her eyes widen as if she has just seen two ghosts; she runs away in sheer terror.

  I am now in front of Amanda as we come to a T-intersection. Glancing right and then left, I see a bitumen road about 200 metres away.

  Before I can even think, my legs are off. I have no idea where Amanda is. Hysteria has taken over and my brain feels like it’s about to shut down. As I’m sprinting down towards the main road my body suddenly stops and does a U-turn.

  Amanda is now just in front of me. Behind her I see a minaret stretching into the vast blue sky. My brain doesn’t compute it as quickly as my body; I begin running back in the direction we’ve just come.

  Standing at the T-intersection is the neighbour. He says, ‘Do you need help?’ I register that he is speaking English so I run to him and grab his arm.

  ‘Please, you have to help us. Where is a mosque? Please, you have to take us to a mosque.’ Amanda now has his other arm.

  ‘Please, help us, do you speak English? Can you come with us to the mosque?’ she says. Before he even has a chance to reply, Amanda and I have our arms under his, almost like we are carrying him, running. Just as we begin climbing the side steps of the mosque, the sound of an AK47 rings out in the air. Too scared to look behind, we barge through the side entrance and enter a mosque for the first time.

  There in front of me are men, some standing, others prostrating, completing their midday prayers. It’s seconds before their attention turns to us. ‘I caawin, I caawin, waxaan ahay Muslim; waxaan nahay Muslim. Help me. I am Muslim; we are Muslim,’ spills out of my mouth. I continue to repeat this, a hysterical chant, before I feel the full force of a fist hit my head.

  Spinning around, I see with dread that Jamal is right beside me, AK47 in hand, screaming at me, with fury in his eyes. I feel a kick to my ribs, then to my legs, followed by punches. All I can do is try to protect my head with my arms.

  Jamal now has my arm and is trying to drag me out of the mosque. I rip it from his grip, shredding the sleeve of my shirt in the process and scoot away from the door.

  I can see Amanda. Donkey is forcing her towards the door. Pandemonium has broken out and we are soon encircled by the men who had been praying. The rush of adrenaline and fear is overpowering: my heart hammers in my chest; my brain feels completely fried.

  There’s now a short rotund man in front of me.

  ‘Asalam alaikum,’ I manage to exclaim the traditional Muslim greeting.

  ‘Walaikum assalam,’ he greets me back.

  ‘Waxaan nahay Muslim,’ I say. He then speaks to me in English.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I am Nigel Brennan; I’m a photojournalist from Australia; we have been kidnapped for five months. These people are going to kill us if you don’t help us; we are both Muslim. Please, you have to help us,’ I blurt out, all the while Jamal is yanking me away from the circle of people.

  ‘Calm down. You are Muslim?’ he asks with a hint of surprise in his voice.

  ‘Yes, we are both Muslim.’ My reply causes consternation within the ever-growing group surrounding us. I start reciting the first verse of the Qur’an in Arabic.

  As the words roll off my tongue, there is amazement and belief in the hundreds of eyes staring back at mine. Men now push past and grab Jamal, hustling both him and Donkey away from us, towards the door. Amanda is standing beside me; we hold hands in a white-knuckled grip.

  Everyone is talking at once, a mix of Arabic, Somali and English. It’s chaos. We are pushed towards the centre of the mosque. I steal a glance over my shoulder to see that our two young guards have been bundled up towards the back wall by a large group of older men.

  Everything must be happening quickly but I see it in slow motion. There is the rotund man talking with several other men, including the neighbour. Finally he speaks to both of us.

  ‘If you are Muslim, everything is okay. These people can not kill you; it is against Islam.’ I know in my heart that these people are trying to help us, but we’re a long way from being safe.

  ‘Please, don’t cry, calm down,’ he tells us. ‘Please, tell me your names and where you come from.’

  �
�I am Nigel Brennan; I am from Australia. I’m a photojournalist. She is Amanda Lindhout; she is from Canada. She is also a journalist,’ I reply as he jots this all down on a small piece of paper. He then disappears into the crowd to where a small group of men are now standing between us and the boys. It’s not long before he breaks back through the crowd.

  ‘There is not an Imam here at present. We have called one and he will be here in fifteen minutes. He will interview both of you to establish that you are Muslim. If you are Muslim, there is nothing to fear, you will be safe here.’ All I can think is that in fifteen minutes we may already be dead.

  ‘Have you prayed? Do you want to pray?’ he asks.

  ‘No, we have not prayed; we need to pray,’ I tell him.

  ‘Okay, follow me.’ We walk to the middle of the mosque. There is yelling and arguing between the groups of men. One man in particular is jostling us; he sends shivers down my spine. Something tells me that this guy is not on our side. We are finally placed in the pulpit and told to take off our shoes.

  People are pouring into the mosque as the whole neighbourhood must have heard by now what is going on. Older men in the crowd motion with the palms of their hands for us to be calm. An ancient-looking man smiles as I recite Arabic. My eyes lock with his as he says, ‘You are Muslim; Islam is good.’ I reply, ‘Alhamdulillah, all praise to Allah,’ and watch his grin widen.

  Suddenly, Donkey and Mao are either side of the pulpit, AKs held against their chests as if trying to guard their prize. I can see the perspiration running down Mao’s face. He must have run like mad to get here. He looks at me with disgust.

  From the corner of my eye, I see a black-veiled woman staring at us through the side window of the pulpit. Amanda has also clocked this dark figure and both of us are not so much terrified by her presence as by the fact that someone with a gun could easily shoot us from this vantage point.

  One of the men in the crowd closes the metal shutters with a bang.

  Then the crowd that surrounds us dissipates. As the space in front of us clears, I see masked gunmen pouring into the mosque through every doorway. None of these men belongs to our group and I am sure that it’s all about to end in a bloodbath as these different gangs go to war over a prized possession. I’m certain that we are about to die. But then the crowd form a protective semicircle around us.

  An older woman pushes through to where we are seated on the floor; it is the same woman who was standing at the window minutes before. She is clothed completely in black and her eyes peer back at us from behind her niqab; she sits between us and looks at Amanda. We both greet her in Arabic then Amanda tries to talk to her in English, but she doesn’t understand.

  My attention swings between what’s happening in front of us and Amanda. I see Amanda motioning with her hands, using sign language to show fornication, and then pointing to Donkey.

  The old woman now looks at me for confirmation. I can see the tears well up in her eyes as I nod. She turns back and places her arms around Amanda and sobs.

  I look back at the crowd and see a man, an AK across his chest and an ammo belt over each shoulder. I have never seen him before. ‘You are Muslim?’ he asks in English.

  ‘Yes, we are both Muslim, for nearly five months we are Muslim,’ I reply completely shit-scared as he holds his gun against his leg.

  ‘If you are Muslim, you are my brother,’ he says using his finger to punctuate the point. He then bends down and kisses me on both cheeks. ‘Asalam alaikum, may peace be with you,’ he says softly next to my ear.

  ‘Walaikum assalam, and also with you,’ I reply. There is something about his presence that calms me but I’m not ready for what happens next.

  ‘The AK47 is the gun of the Muslim. You are Muslim so you can have my gun, brother.’ Then he places the gun in my lap. As I pick it up there’s a momentary manic thought of just opening fire on anyone in the place carrying a weapon. But I don’t have it in me. I know that it would end in a massacre of the innocent people trying to help. I hand back the gun.

  ‘I don’t want it. I can’t kill anyone; I am Muslim,’ I say as he takes hold of the gun with a nod.

  ‘Come with me, you will be safe,’ he says.

  ‘No, we need to wait for the Imam,’ I tell him.

  Then dread fills me as I see Skids pushing through the crowd. What felt like the possibility that we’d actually get out of here comes crashing down. Ahmed and Donald are now also on the scene. Skids walks behind us, waving his pistol like it’s some toy. We are pulled to our feet.

  I hear Ahmed shout, ‘You!’ There’s rage in his voice as he looks at Amanda. We are then dragged from the pulpit towards the back doors, but I won’t give up without a fight. Digging my heels in, I’m trying to wrench my body free.

  Donald screams in my face and I manage to glance over to see Amanda. Her hijab has been completely pulled off, there’s hair everywhere and she’s fighting like a feral cat. She still has the old woman hanging onto her for dear life, trying to protect her as Ahmed and a number of men now pull her closer to the exit.

  I continue to fight as men grab at me. I pull away from their grip while still holding my shoes in one hand and the Qur’an and my bag in the other. I look again for Amanda but she is nowhere in sight. Then the crack of an AK punctuates the air. Oh my god, they have just killed her, races around my head and I’m next quickly follows. There’s no way out of this.

  Moments later Ahmed is there beside Donald. He begins pistol whipping me across my shoulders and I have no option but to hit the floor and go into the foetal position. Next come kicks and punches then someone grabs my feet and begins dragging me across the carpet.

  Then I’m hovering above all this chaos, watching myself, suddenly calm as I come to terms with the fact I am about to die.

  Now at the back doors, I’m being dragged down the steps and into the courtyard, the skin on my elbows peeling off on the coarse concrete.

  I am pulled to my feet. Ahmed again whacks me with the butt of his pistol before I am picked up by five or six men and carried to the front gate. All the fear and panic has left my body and it’s just quietness. I just wish I could tell Mum and Dad that I love them and I’m so sorry f or all the pain I have caused them.

  I haven’t got the fight in me to do anything now. Just as we reach the gates, I see a four-wheel drive in the street. I gasp for air as I see Amanda in the backseat still putting up a fight. I can’t believe she is alive and the relief is mind-blowing.

  I am bundled into the car. I’m next to Amanda and I grab her hand and look at her face; one side has begun to swell from the force of the blows.

  People jam in beside us. Donkey and Skids jump into the tray behind and all the doors are slammed closed. I now recognise the man beside me as the one who had jostled us earlier; my gut instinct had been right after all.

  Ahmed, Mao, Donald and the other men get into a nearby Subaru and take off. As we pull away from the mosque, I notice a man being restrained on the ground; there are three or four men sitting on him as he struggles. It is the man who had handed me the gun only minutes before.

  Our car, now in convoy, speeds through the sandy streets, zigzagging down small laneways until we come out into open bushland. Amanda and I manage to whisper quietly to each other.

  ‘You okay?’ she asks.

  ‘Yeah, I’m okay. Fuck, that was intense. Are you all right?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m okay, took a bit of a beating, though,’ she says.

  ‘Yeah, I can see that.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Nige, for making you escape.’

  ‘You didn’t make me do anything; at least we had a shot, at least we took control finally.’ We both manage a smile at this point. ‘I thought you were dead when I heard that gunshot.’

  ‘Me too with you. The veil between this life and the next is very thin,’ she replies as we squeeze hands. Our vehicle follows the Subaru until we reach a pink two-storey building, a sign on its wall reading ‘University of Mogadishu’
. The building carries the scars of conflict; it looks as though every calibre of bullet has rained down on it over the years.

  As we come around the corner, the axle of the four-wheel drive gives way and we come to a screaming stop. The Subaru finally stops a few hundred metres ahead and reverses.

  Ahmed and the others get out and come over to our vehicle. Amanda is pulled out her side and pushed into the Subaru. I am then taken out and frogmarched to another waiting car. Just as I go to get in Ahmed again raps his pistol across my shoulders for the fun of it. Mao climbs into the backseat beside me. Donkey is beside Amanda, Skids is in the front passenger seat and Donald behind us. We take off again, leaving Ahmed and the others.

  Donald begins ranting at us. ‘Why did you escape? You have caused big problems. Many people could have been killed at the mosque. This is very stupid.’

  ‘The boys told us that our three Somali friends were killed by Al-Shabaab. We were scared so we ran,’ we both say, speaking over the top of each other.

  ‘This is not true; they have not been killed,’ he replies angrily.

  I try to say something but before the words even pass my lips I feel the force of Mao’s fist as he punches me directly in the face. I wince in pain and draw my hands up, not letting him get a second shot. I won’t allow myself to show emotion. I think, You gutless bastard, taking a cheap shot. My next thought is, Not my beautiful teeth, as I push on the back of them with my tongue to make sure they are all still there.

  We hit a bitumen road and enter a built-up area; there are many people walking along the street. In a strange way it’s beautiful to see them going about their day, a world away from what we are experiencing.

  We finally stop in front of a compound. We are driven inside to a large house that looks, by the number of shoes at the front door, to be currently occupied.

  Amanda and I are pulled out of the car and marched into a bedroom at the back of the house. In front of us, in all its glory, is a huge queen-sized bed. It’s like a mirage. Beside the bed is a dresser with a stack of cassettes at one end and bottles of perfume at the other. We are in someone’s home.