Dramatic Sunday

 

Can't think of an appropriate image to illustrate the story below, so I'm just choosing a recent photo of a kind of dramatic evening sky. 

Above me since many years lives a rather large Muslim family. Somehow, ever since they first moved in, they have always seemed to me to have around the same number of children, ranging from babies or toddlers to upper teens. (I can only suppose that every now and then the oldest must have kept moving out while new babies were added...) Anyway, for a large family they have always made surprisingly little noise. And if once in a blue moon they had a party to celebrate something - like for example yet another high school graduation - they have usually even warned neighbours about it beforehand (even if it only turned out to mean having a few extra people over for a few hours in the afternoon). 

Lately, something has changed. Every now and then there have been unusual outbursts of shouting and quarrelling and stomping of feet. Sometimes sounding quite worrying; but I've interpreted it as probably some kind of teenage rebellion phase going on. After all, not too surprising if one in the long row of usually well-behaved teens finally happens to disagree with some family rules... 

The last few days there seems to have been an increased frequency of noise like that though. And today I woke up to to more of the same.

After a while, some family members went outside. Looking out of my window, it seemed to me that most of the noise came from just one young man though. Actually he seemed totally out of control, even running out barefoot (and it's no longer that kind of weather at all). Then he disappeared from my view (must have gone back in) but a woman remained outside making a phone call. I opened my window a tiny bit but could only make out that she seemed to be speaking Swedish rather than some other language. After a while, a car arrived - a "private" car, but out of it stepped two police officers in full uniform, one man and one woman. They talked for a while to the woman with the phone and one of the others; and then they all went in and back up to the flat. The police were there for a good while. It seems they must have managed to deal with the situation for now by talking, as in the end they left without taking the young man with them; and it has remained quiet the rest of the day.

From what I saw today, I think I have to re-evaluate my earlier impressions of the situation. While at first I thought it may be about a teen behaving "too Swedish", I'm now thinking more along the lines of either religious radicalism or psychosis. (In the first case, the family is not likely to have contacted Swedish authorities themselves, which they obviously did.)

Still feeling a little bit "jumpy" myself from the morning chaos; but I did venture out for a walk after lunch. (Then all was very quiet, and it still is.)