Adrenaline rushed within me as I stepped my foot into the newly-renovated shopping mall. I was with my friends to celebrate my twelfth birthday. We were chatting nineteen to the dozen as we sauntered down along the rows of shops, having a whale of a time looking at the window displays. Just then, we passed by a toy shop. Suddenly, an unpleasant incident that happened many years back triggered off my mind.
On that dreadful day, my seventh birthday was around the corner. I was with my parents going to the shopping centre. Cool air greeted us as we entered the shopping mall that was packed like sardines. Shoppers were bustling among the racks and shelves, browsing through item by item to decide what to buy. Just then, I set my eyes on the latest toy. I pleaded with my parents to buy it as a birthday present for me and my mother agreed without any consideration. “Wife, we already couldn’t afford to pay our electricity and water supply bills due to me losing a construction job because of recession and you want to buy such an expensive toy?” Father protested. “Husband, can’t you just part with that small amount of thirty nine dollars for our dear son?” Mother replied in annoyance. Soon, this escalated into a non-stop argument. I was shocked at what had happened and stood in a corner tugging at the hem of my mother’s shirt. Soon, more and more onlookers gathered around my parents to find out what the commotion was about. “What an audacity for a married couple to argue in the public!” one of the onlookers commented and started giggling rudely. Just then, more and more onlookers chided my parents for arguing in the public. “Shut up!” My father shouted in fury to those onlookers. There was a pin-drop silence afterwards.
Suddenly, a bomb exploded and a cruel explosion pierced through the air and a powerful blast ripped through the food centre. The concrete floor gave way, causing people to fall on top of one another. My parents and I, just like other patrons, hung precariously onto the jagged edges of the torn concrete floor that had cut deeply into their hands and legs.
Pandemonium broke out. Screams could be heard, and patrons on the first level ran helter-skelter for their precious lives, fearing the building might collapse any time. Unfortunately, the whole shopping mall shook and slowly collapsed down to the ground. Just then, a huge piece of flaming wood almost fell on me. Seeing this, my mother used one of her bare hands to push it away to shield me while she used one of her hands to hang herself precariously onto the jagged edges of the torn concrete floor.
Just then, the building slowly collapsed and my mother immediately came to shield Father and me. “Wife, no......... it is too dangerous!” my father cried in sorrow. The whole building came crashing to the ground, and my mother was crushed to death by a piece of falling debris. Tears gushed out from my father and my eyes as my mother had sacrificed her life for us. After the explosion, some patrons huddled along the roadside, trying to regain their composure as the others trudged through the streets, searching for their loved ones. A grisly scene of bodies that were charred beyond recognition and bloodstained corpses made some of the patrons nauseous. Dazed and confused, injured patrons staggered groggily along the roads, waiting desperately for medical attention.
At that moment, the sound of a siren wailed down the street. Ambulance and police cars rushed to the gruesome scene. The civil defence officers rushed the victims who had suffered terrible lacerations and burns to the hospital and administered first aid to the lightly wounded victims at the scene. The firefighters and civil defence officers spent hours sifting the smouldering rubble to look for survivors while policemen spent hours looking for evidence of the bomb planted and kept a lookout for suspicious characters at the scene. It was chaotic at the hospital as the maimed and injured streamed in. Medical personnel was then summoned back. Family members cried as their loved ones were lost. My father and I were at the hospital seeking for medical treatment and luckily we were lightly wounded because Mother shielded us when the building slowly collapsed. The evening, of the next day, when we got back home, I switched on the television and the news reported the explosion on television on the next day of the incident. “The blast took away many lives and left many injured. The police have been deployed to deal with the situation. We are sorry, but this is the first terrorist attack in one of the shopping malls in Singapore... ” the news reporter said. Tears flowed down my cheeks as I watched the news reporting about the explosion and it reminded me continuously about the scenario of how my mother died. My father comforted me in complete sorrow not to cry, but he was crying too.
“Tom! Tom! Are you okay? Tom!” a familiar voice called out to my name continuously with worry. I opened my eyes and found myself lying on the concrete floor with many people staring at me with an awkward look on their faces. My friends then carried me up and asked me whether am I alright as they said they saw tears flowing down my cheeks while I was lying on the concrete floor. “Nothing. You need not worry. Now let’s celebrate my birthday!” I said with a grin, using my bare hands to wipe away my stained tears. Then, we then went gleefully to celebrate my birthday.
But there’s something I must say, “Mum, I will never forget you. Love, Tom.”
The terrorist attack in the shopping mall that happened many years back seemed to be a reminiscent of the 11 September attack in United States though on a vastly smaller scale. The explosion had rocked the whole nation and was brought to the attention of the whole world, bringing the governments of other countries to take measures to prevent such terrorist attacks. Until today, the perpetrators of the blast have not been caught yet. I strongly believe that the terrorists would not be able to escape the long arm of the law. We must remain vigilant and not let crime prevail. I believe if every single person remains vigilant, Singapore can be a more safer place to live in.
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