I know this was a little while ago now and I also haven't updated my blog in while. Sorry! Especially as I did go back to Sydney for 7 weeks over Christmas. I have a few things to talk about over there so I will do it step by step.

First thing I want to talk about though (as I was there for it and it's now, I guess, a part of history) is the Sydney terrorist attack. This is my account of the event.

So I remember it was on a Monday. Monday 15th December. I was staying in Bondi beach with my friends Ronnie and Laurie. I had planned to go with my friends Jesse, Joanna and Vee to Manly beach. It was the perfect day; hot hot heat and clear blue sky, brilliant sunshine, plus we had the whole day. I waited for the bus and when it finally arrived the driver announced that this bus, nor any of the buses were going to the city today. Neither were the trains. I asked why, but actually I knew. My friend had already text me in the morning from the UK asking me not to go out as an IS group were holding people hostage in a cafe in the city. In fact according to the driver the CBD was being effectively shut down and no one was allowed to go in there as there was a terrorist IS group holding people at gunpoint and had planted bombs around the city. This was the rumors going around anyway.
I'll be honest, I did dismiss my friends concerns a little before and not take it that seriously as I mean c'mon... It's Australia! It's the safest place to be! (Minus the poisonous snakes/spiders/jellyfish etc. but ignore them). And even now I feel this is still fair to say.

Let's explain what actually happened that day:

18 people were in the Lindt store cafe in Martin place on the Monday morning when a Sunni Muslim by the name of Man Haron Monis wonders in wearing a backpack and wielding a gun. He then decides to hold them at gunpoint and makes them all hold black flags with (apparently) Islamic writing in the windows. Understandably they are scared, but then as we could see, the rest of Sydney jumps on the band wagon and proceeds to shut the entire city centre, and transport to it, down. Nice work Sydney. This is because of the rumors flying around that bombs have been planted around the city, even though there is only one man with a gun in a coffee shop, and he has not mentioned that he has planted bombs. Actually he hasn't mentioned bombs whatsoever. Nothing has really happened yet at this point.

The only thing now on the news in Australia is the "Sydney Terror Siege" and news of or any other events around the world have become obsolete.

So now basically nothing happens for hours. At one point 5 hostages manage to run out and escape. No shots get fired. Seems like if he was a serious terrorist someone would've been shot among the 5 running out. But anyway...

Few more hours go by and again, more people run out and no one gets fired at. Finally, at around 2am, the cafe manager who is one of the hostages decides to take the opportune moment to wrestle the gun from the terrorist as he sees him begin to drift off to sleep. At this point a shot gets fired. This is simply my opinion but given the fact that no other shots had been fired at anyone before, I feel that this shot was mostly by accident. Anyway, unfortunately the police spot a "man down" through the window. They then storm in firing left, right and centre in the hopes of hitting this one guy. They do indeed manage to kill the terrorist...along with one other hostage and injuring a few in the process. Woops.

So in the end three people are dead. Two pretty much by accident.

Australian news is a bit of a funny one. As I said before there was nothing else going on in the rest of the world at the time of Sydney's own terror. They manage to skip over a lot of the fact that in actuality the police had killed the woman, not the terrorist. In fact most casualties were caused by the police. But that gets mentioned then brushed under the carpet. There was a lot about the cafe manager, Tori Johnson, being a hero and trying to rescue the other hostages. And yes, in the moment of terror for them he was indeed a hero. Anyone who risks their own life for the help of others is definitely a hero, and I am not in anyway challenging that.

However! Maybe I'm too much of a pessimist. Maybe it's because I'm English and therefore view everything with a hint of irony. But I very much doubt that this was the day that entire world changed because two people got accidentally shot in a coffee shop in Sydney.

The biggest part of the story was the sheer volume of tears and sadness of the Sydneyites. I got the chance to walk through Martin place the next day and just couldn't believe just how many people had come to put flowers down and see the site of the event. The resident flower stall never had such good business.

News reporters interviewed random people in the crowds and they would immediately switch on the tears, crying "I didn't know them, I never met them. Be it's just so sad!"

One news reporter herself put on her own crocodile tears as she claimed she'd even met the woman who'd been killed before, or at least had friends who knew her. She managed to crinkle her face up very well to show how distraught she was to have lost a dear dear acquaintance.

I think some people will think I am a real b**** to say this. Yes it is sad. Yes I know people died, and that is always sad. It was a huge response from the people of Sydney and others would say that that is a wonderful thing and I should have a bit more respect/appreciation/whatever for those that died. Believe me I do. But regardless of how many people came to show their respects, come and see where it all happened; the whole thing lacked real sincerity.
To me it seemed as if this event was turned into a publicity/war mongering campaign. If this man wanted to instill fear then he clearly did a good job.

Maybe I am wrong. Maybe people really will think of me as being incredibly cynical. But if eight children are stabbed to death by their own mother in Queensland just a few days later and that is less newsworthy than this, then how can it be wrong?