Jacinta's Burning!

Yesterday I posted a snippet about firemen watching a horse-race while the fire raged on unattended ... and said it was such an "Only in Hong Kong" thing, but then I remembered it wasn't.


Many years ago, when I lived in Australia, Old Kevin across the road did much the same thing.

It was about two on a sleepy and humid Sunday afternoon and I was on the veranda at our place in Townsville, in North Queensland, trying to catch a breeze, when I heard a very strange "pop" coming from across the road.  It was followed by a "pop! pop! pop! pop! pop!" like a series of small explosions.  It was a sound I'd never heard before so I went to look.

Across the road, soft white smoke was billowing from Jacinta's bedroom window!  "Ring the fire brigade." I yelled to Keith. "Jacinta's house is on fire."

I noticed her car wasn't there, so decided maybe I should be a good neighbour and train a hose into her second floor bedroom window on the off-chance that would help.  I mean, if it were the other way around, I hope she'd do the same for me.

So there I am, across the road, trying to douse the unseen flame with her garden hose, but it had really lousy water pressure that wouldn't make a decent arc to reach through the window so I climbed the wall to throw the hose into the house ... but slipped and hit the ground below ... just as BANG!!!  Massive, massive explosion.  The windows blew out and there was this wall of flame and black smoke ... whoosh! ... right past where my face would have been if I hadn't fallen.

Thank you, good angels!

No way that house could be saved!  The fire brigade hadn't yet arrived and the flames were so fierce and the heat so ferocious I retreated over the fence to Old Kevin's next door, and am standing there, still holding Jacinta's hose, feeling exceptionally useless as Jacinta's beautifully restored old house raged and burned. I couldn't do anything to help ... until I noticed, underneath the house, in the breezeway, a shelf lined with the most beautiful white orchids and also the sweetest sets of lace-and-silk underwear on the washing line, so I made it my mission to save those for her.  I mean, losing your orchids and prettiest undies!  That would be the last straw, yes?

And, as it turned out, it wasn't such a stupid decision because, as I hosed, the floorboards above burned through and globs of viscous plastic - turned out it was her beanbag - started dripping through the hole onto the bags of fertiliser right next to the orchids and underwear.

I have no idea how to make a bomb, but vaguely knew it was something to do with plastic and fertiliser and this stack consisted of about twenty large bags which surely would have made a massive bomb, if that's indeed how you make a bomb, so I kept the hose trained on those instead, just in case.

But then the flames began leaping across and caught Old Kevin's roof and that began burning too.  It was difficult doing both Kevin's roof AND the bomb, especially with a hose with such lousy water pressure, so I started getting very cross.  Like, where was the fire brigade?  Where was Old Kevin? Why was I doing this alone?

Kevin's front door was open, so I left my bomb and stormed inside.  He was in his kitchen listening to the horse-racing.  "Kevin!" I said.

"Shhhhh!" Kevin said crossly, leaning in closer to the radio.

And, can you believe it, I shhhh-ed!  It was about five seconds later I realised I had priority so said softly "Kevin, your house is on fire!"

"Shhhhh! Give me a minute!"  said Kevin.

But then the slow dawning realisation on his face ... and the horse-race was forgotten and he's racing outside to check.

Old Kevin's hose had decent water pressure so we put out his fire pronto, and then he too agreed that, although he didn't know how to make a bomb either, but knew too it had something to do with fertiliser, that it had priority so he handed me his hose and I finally got to douse properly ... while he slunk off to listen to the next horse-race.

And where was the fire brigade in all this?  Trapped down the road!  Turned out, the explosion attracted every goon and thug from every street for miles around and the roads were packed with cars parked all willy-nilly with hideous oafs sitting atop roofs and bonnets, drinking Four-ex, yahooing and watching the show!  Unbelievable!

And when the fire brigade did eventually arrive, after squads of police got these dicks to move their cars so it could get through, long after the house was well gone, I finally put down my hose and left ... and these awful people sitting on their cars kept stopping me with cheerful shouts of "Hey, heard three kids were burned to death?  Is that true?",  "Heard five kids were burned to death?"  "Heard that five kids and two dogs were burned to death?"  I was too cross to answer.

And then, right outside our front gate, a gaggle of ghastly kids I'd never seen before, definitely not from the neighbourhood, were telling the cops "They burned the house down themselves.  We saw them do it!"  and that's when I exploded in rage and gave them a mouthful of vicious abuse.

Jacinta didn't arrive home till just before sunset.  Apparently the police tracked her down at the local shopping center and told her the news.  Poor honey!  The most sensitive soul, and a very talented musician and composer, she couldn't handle it and collapsed.  The police kindly rang her parents down south to fly up to come get her, but she'd obviously decided she was stronger than she thought and so wanted to see. Our lovely neighbours, Ling Ling and Daniel were with her, and I saw her slowly get out of their car. But then she saw her orchids and undies unharmed and that was the last straw and she collapsed again!  Didn't I feel mean.

But I did notice, later that night, Ling Ling and Daniel returned to collect the orchids and undies, about the only things apart from the fertiliser that survived the blaze. Jacinta decided she did want to keep them so I guess I wasn't totally Evil Incarnate.

There was a final lick to this story.  A few days later, Old Kevin came to get me - as the first person on scene - to talk to the fire investigation team.  And what a horrid bunch of dicks they were!  I should have been impressed with them, all these big and chunky men in great uniforms, all with these harsh rasping voices and all speaking in gruff whispers. Smoke inhalation, was my guess, but whenever I suggested it to someone, I'd always get "Yeah, smoke inhalation from all the cigarettes they smoke waiting for fires."

But I regret to say, my initial admiration quickly evaporated and I ended up thinking they were all unbelievably stupid dicks!  Guess the police believed the kids' story and these fellows were investigating only to prove it was indeed the case; Jacinta burned down her own house.

I tried to tell them about the pops, and about the soft billowing white smoke coming through her bedroom window, and how she wasn't home when it happened, but one rasped at me "You know her, don't you!" and that was it!  Nothing I said had any weight or worth and they simply glared at me, minds closed, whenever I tried to protest their findings. And when I mentioned my own theory and told them that Jacinta had bought some of the century-old ceiling fans left over from Singapore's Raffles Hotel recent refurbishment and had just had them installed, I got loud derisive snorting and lots of rasping "There's no such thing as an electrical fire.  That's a myth."

Dicks, right?  I mean, we've all seen electrical fires, right?  I know I have.  Yet here are these guys who supposedly know fires, saying they don't exist!

And it just got worse and worse from there.  It was arson, they had no doubt about it, and the source of the fire was the stack of fertiliser bags.  Clearly, they said, Jacinta had set alight that red plastic you could see atop these bags and that small fire was what burned the house down.  I tried to set them right but ... I knew her and was obviously just colluding and protecting her, and I could see them wondering if maybe I too was in on it!

Dicks!!

So, that's the story of the afternoon Jacinta's house burned down while Old Kevin listened to the horse-racing and so, no, it's not an "Only In Hong Kong" thing at all.  I take it back.