Some people tell me that I had an interesting life. I have never thought of it that way but thinking back there were some occurrences that proved to be a bit odd to the normal person but you can be the judge. Some of these incidents are unforgettable.

In 1995 we moved to Alberta, Canada to be near out daughter and our grandchildren. We had been there approximately 2 months when I saw an ad in the local paper wanting managers for an apartment building downtown. We were supposed to be retired but we were also a little bored so I applied not really thinking we would get the job. The same week the owner showed up at our apartment and we were hired on the spot. He owned 5 buildings in town and wanted a manager for the five of them. We were to live in one while we would have one couple caretaking in the other.

It was a whirl wind move but soon we were settled in and things progressed nicely once I got the buildings the way I wanted it. Hubby did the maintenance and I did the rest. Now manager is not all that people think it is. Manager is jumping in and cleaning when your cleaner doesn’t show up and fill in for many other things. Anyway we came across some very funny situations as the years passed. One of them I remember distinctly only this one was not so funny.

It was right after 911 and of course Canada as well as the United States and the rest of the world were on edge. Christmas had just passed and we were busy with the buildings, I found myself out in the stairwell scrubbing the stairs when a man walked through the door in a dress that anyone would notice. He was dressed in a long dress of Kaki material with a red and white scarf wrapped around his head. Now, in our building we had all kinds of cultures living their but I took notice of this due to the fact that even though it was a dress, it wasn’t hard to tell it was a military dress.

I said hello as he passed and continued with my work. That evening I had some visitors, it was the FBI, CSIS and Canadian Immigration, there were a few more all dressed in suit and tie. Now, this certainly spiked my interest. They wanted to know if I had a tenant in my building that they were looking for. Disregarding confidentiality (hey, it was the FBI). I told him yes. He proceeded to tell me that they would be there in the morning to make an arrest on this person and I was to keep it confidential. “No problem here”, I thought. Who was I to argue with the FBI?

I never slept very much that night and neither did hubby. We got up around 5pm and waited for the onslaught on the building. We had no idea what to expect. Approximately 5:30 it began but it was so different than what I had imagined. The local police was there plus all the men from the night before and one very big German Sheppard dog. Even with all of this going on, I said to hubby “would you mind going down and telling them pets are not allowed in our building”, hubby looked at me and laughed. “No” says hubby “I think we’ll pass on this one”.

I had given the men the pass key the night before mostly due to the fact that I didn’t want any doors broken or any tenants disturbed unnecessarily. We heard them as they ascended the stairs to the third floor and then watched as they piled three men into the cars that waited outside and then they were gone. It took less than an half an hour and being the type of manager I was I was very grateful there hadn’t been a lot of noise. We still didn’t know what kind of trouble these men were in until the news broke that same night. They were arrested on suspicion of being terrorism! Hubby and I were in shock. I’m sure there were approximately 200 apartment buildings in this city and they ended up in ours. No wonder they had been such good tenants!

The next morning we woke up to the onslaught of media. We were not in the mood to be doing interviews about this incident and I did not want our buildings name seen on TV and they couldn’t have gotten it from the outside as it was just a number.  When it got to be too much I phoned the police and they told me to ask them to leave and if they didn’t, they would come and remove them. I asked and they left but only to move across the street. When tenants were leaving for work they attempted to interview them but this “Raid” had taken place so quietly that nobody knew it had even happened.

The men were extradited to the United States on fraud charges or at least that was what the police told me and eventually some of them were deported. Some stayed guest of the FBI in the United States. But I ask you what the chances of something like this happening, are? They were checked out before they became tenants. All their papers were checked out which was something that every tenant had to have done before moving in, all their papers were in order so where did I go wrong?  I’ll never know but we lived with terrorist for at least four months without even knowing it.