scuttle into the lounge room. Then I stop short again. There are two men from India fighting wildly in the centre of the room. The Cambodians huddle in one corner trying to look invisible, while the old lady on the couch waves her gnarled hands wildly at them and the boy from Somalia still just stares blankly. Things are going just a little bit too far, I think, wishing for a UN peacekeeper or two to appear. But they are more than likely all sitting on their hands or doing media interviews somewhere. It is still two hours or more until midnight, and I wonder how safe it would be to leave the house for that time. I watch the two Indians circling carefully and lunging at one another with knives, and decide that if blood is going to be spilled in my house, I don't want to see it happen. I back carefully out through the kitchen and let myself out the back door. There are a family of Kurds under the Hill's hoist, taking plastic off the tomato patch to make a cover over their heads. I couldn't believe it. You should never disturb tomatoes, even this late in the season! I'm on the point of yelling, “Not in my back yard!” when I see a gaunt-looking African with a Kalashnikov walking up the driveway. So I slip quietly into the toilet and lock the door behind me. Just for a moment, I am about to lift my feet up onto the bowl, but then I remember that you can't see under the door. It must have been something I saw on television somewhere. I don't have my watch on, and realise that it is going to be a long, long wait. At times I long to put my head out and peek about, but just listening to the growing cacophony quickly dissuades me. There are angry voices in German, followed some time later by what sounds like Chinese shouting, and then crying and screaming that could have been in any language at all. Faced with all the turmoil of the world outside the toilet door, I do the only practicable thing: try to ignore it and go to sleep. It is...
