If tragedy's appealing, than disaster's an addiction.

After reading this article I decided to offer up a little of what happened to me while I was up North. I wanted to put the article into context, so after reading this post (and I realize it's a mouthful), I'd encourage you guys to go back and read the article by The Canadian Press.

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Since I've returned from Nunavut I have started a million blog posts about what it was really like to live there. I've been asked a thousand times "What's it like up there?" and my answer is usually along the lines of "Oh cold, but nice" or something like "It was pretty rough, but I got used to it."

People have asked me how cold the temperatures got (-41 was as low as I saw).

People have asked me if I saw polar bears (not ones that were alive).

People asked how hard it was adjusting to a place that didn't speak my language (more difficult than I could have fathomed).

And people question whether I learned any Inuktitut (ii, qanuippit?).

Nobody asked me how many times I witnessed domestic abuse occurring right in front of my eyes (easily a half a dozen times).

No one inquired about how many sleepless nights I suffered because the noise of my neighbour beating his girlfriend senseless kept me up (countless times).

When I first moved into my brother's apartment, he warned me about "Mr. and Mrs. Fuck You". He told me exactly what would happen, Mr. Fuck You would come home drunk around 2ish when all the bars had shut down and start banging on Mrs. Fuck You's door until she let him in. They would then proceed their rounds of "fuck you" "no, fuck you" until he would beat her into submission.

Darryl told me not to call the police, that he or his roommate had done it a number of times and the police had kindly suggested to them to stop as there was nothing they could do as long as she stayed with Mr. Fuck You.

Here's where it gets tricky.

I ended up meeting that girl and her son outside of our apartment building not realizing she was Mrs. Fuck You. I got to know her (she's only two years older than me) and we became "friends". Her son was a sweet little boy who went to my Day Care, barely three when I first met him.

When entering my apartment once we ended up riding the elevator together "I didn't realize we lived in the same building!" I exclaimed, excited at the prospect of having a "friend" whom I didn't have to dress in a parka to visit. She seemed embarrassed, something at the time I couldn't understand.

When we both stepped off the elevator and walked to doors facing one another, I had to use everything in me to keep myself from saying something I shouldn't. "See you around" I semi-whispered, shutting the door on her almost apologetic face.

After finding out she was Mrs. Fuck You, living in that apartment was almost unbearable. There was one night I will never forget for as long as I live.

I came home from work at around eleven one night, collapsing into bed literally with all my clothes still on. At the time I was battling an infection and working from eight in the morning until eleven in the evening. I needed every second of sleep I could get.

I was awoken by their screams around two o'clock. They lasted until six thirty that morning.

Through their screams and the sounds of fist meeting flesh I could hear the music from a children's show blasting. It seems they weren't the only two in the apartment that night.

It took everything that was in me that night to not barge out my apartment wielding some sort of weapon along with a slew of threats. I am a confrontational person by nature, but I knew this was not my battle to fight.

I stood at my front door with shoes on my feet (I didn't need to change as I was still wearing the clothes I had on the day before) for about a solid hour that morning. My hand on the door knob while I listened to those kid's shows play on.

I never saw her or her son for about a week after that. And even then I wish I hadn't.

Her face was still black and blue, her glasses broken on the right side. Three teeth were gone from her mouth.

I never spoke more than a passing "hello" or "how are you" to her after that.

When I moved to another apartment and the same scenario happened again, I made sure to never look the battered woman in the eye.

If I remained detached, maybe I could get some sleep.