Gunshots in the Dark!

  We had a little excitement last night!  About 8 pm we were both sitting at our dining room table working on our computers when we heard what we first thought were some fire crackers.  It didn't take long to figure out that they were gunshots and there were LOTS of them! They were very close to us, some of them sounded like they were out in our parking lot. 
  We turned off all the lights and sat here in the dark for a few minutes, then started worrying about all of our missionaries.  I had talked to the Richards, who live next door to us, a couple of hours before and they were up at the Mission Office calling some of their kids in the US.  First we called them to tell them to stay there if they were still at the office, but they were home and hearing the same things we were.  Since President and Sister Adams are down in Tomatave this weekend, we called the APs and had them check on all of the missionaries to make sure that they were in a safe place.  They were all fine.
  On Thursday of last week they had announced the official results of the elections that were held a month ago; since then there has been a military 'take over' in ten of the provinces, mostly down south.  We were worried that some of the political unrest was making it's way to Tana.

  We live right by the prison here, in fact our back 'yard' wall is the wall of the prison.  Just up the street from us, between our house and the Mission Home, there is a police station and military installation where they have soldiers with machine guns standing by the gate at all times.  Also, down the street a couple of blocks is another police station.  We are pretty much surrounded by people with guns. 

  After the initial shooting right by our house, it sounded like it moved down the street a ways before it finally stopped.  I'm sure it didn't go on for more that 15 or 20 minutes, but it sure seemed like it was a long time.  Everything was quiet the rest of the night.  And I do mean quiet, no traffic on the street, no dogs barking - just quiet. 
  This morning when we went out to go to Church, I kind of half expected to see bullet holes in the back of our car.  We couldn't see anything wrong. We talked to Elder Richards early this morning and he  had been out front checking things out.  The guard, we have a guard at the entrance to our complex 24 hours a day, he was telling a bunch of the residents what he had seen going on last night, but Elder Richards doesn't understand Malagasy so didn't know what he was saying.   When we got to Church we cornered one of the members who is with the police.  He told us what had happened and then gave us his phone number so that we could call him at any time day or night.  After Church Dad took a couple of the missionaries down to our house and had them talk to our guard to see what his version was of what had happened last night.
  A group of five or six armed East Indians went into Gastro's, a Pizza place about 100 yards up the street from our house, planning to rob them.  We're not exactly sure when the shooting started, but you can imagine with all of the gun power on this street, it didn't take long until a few shots turned into LOTS of gun shots!  Two of the robbers were shot and killed and the others took off; that is when the shots started going down the street.  Apparently the others got away.
  These guys must not have checked out the situation very thoroughly or were overly optimistic, with all of the police and military right here on this street it probably wasn't the best place they could have chosen to rob.  I know of a 'List' they could go on!  "World's ________ Criminals".
  Everything is calm and quiet tonight.  We are sure glad.