Justice in Adaba

21 October 2013

Last week during market day there was a big commotion on the main road of Adaba. Typically that is where all the excitement happens as we only have 1 asphalt road which makes it a near constant and chaotic scene of loitering, traffic, horse taxis and young boys selling roasted barley, sugar cane, lottery tickets and shoe shines. I avoid the main road as much as possible unless I’m riding my bike which makes me faster and therefore difficult target for getting involved in nonsense which usually consists of thrown rocks, sexual harassment and awkward conversations. Never the less, I don’t need to be hanging out on the road to hear about what happens there. In a town as small as Adaba, word travels fast.

As the story goes, an Isuzu truck was parked on the side of the road, the driver was waiting in the cab. In an act of anger, a high school student threw a rock through the side window of the truck. This student was did not fit the stereotype of Adaba’s best trouble makers: a young and attractive female Muslim girl. It became aware to the local police that it wasn’t a random act, but that this young woman and the driver knew each other. At the police station authorities tried to determine who would pay for the broken window. They first asked the perpetrator to explain herself.  She elucidated that this driver had been involved with her, but recently she discovered that he had a wife and children at home. Irate at his deception and ego she took her first opportunity to seek revenge and publicly expose his shameful character. The police asked the man if her accusations against him were honest and he confessed that it was true. It was determined then that the man was at fault for the broken window and would pay for replacement as he provoked the young woman to throw the rock.

As for the young woman, I think she should get a status a-kin to that of Rosa Parks in Adaba. Hopefully the duriye (good for nothing) driver gets worse treatment from his wife at home.