Sydney Under Siege: As It Happened 15 December 2014

I work in the building next to the Lindt Café. Shortly after news of the Siege broke, I found myself locked out. Gradually, I realised my usual day had been pulled out from under me. For the first time, I had become a witness to history. This is my account of the day terrorism returned to Sydney. It is based partly on contemporaneous notes I scribbled on the day.

I thought about writing this as ‘gonzo journalism’, the form pioneered by Hunter S Thompson where events and thoughts are supposedly written down as they happen with no revision. But it’s too artificial: there is always revision. Simply typing out my notes wasn’t enough. They left out a lot, especially what I felt and things I remembered later.

So this is part-recollection and part-reconstruction. I’ve included some afterthoughts in parentheses, but kept them to a minimum.