Sunday, August 13, 2006

invincible (last weekend)

Ok, many of you who know me well know that I can sometimes have a rather over-confident, careless attitude towards safety issues. Not sure if this is from Joanna or Dad or if I'm simply going through the mid-20s "nothing will ever happen to me" phase in life, but I think being in Thailand has only brought it out more. I've found myself thinking thoughts like "even though others around me are getting sick, I'm never going to get sick" or "it's not a problem for me to wander the streets of Bangkok by myself, no one will hurt me" or even "I'm invincible" (yes, I've thought even that!).

For example, the first day after Dad and I arrived in Thailand, we hopped on some motorcycle taxis to go to Central mall, which is a mile or so down the road. It was quite the ride, and Dad and I noted that the taxi drivers never once in that mile drove on the correct side of the road. Because of the way the road is laid out, the most direct way for them to go involves driving on the edge of the road facing the oncoming traffic. They were also on and off sidewalks, in and out of parking lots and several times snuck between cars on the side roads. The first time I took that route, I just laughed and said, "that was exciting!" By the second time, though (involving several close calls with cars on the street!) I decided that it was probably playing with death a little too much and that my family wouldn't appreciate me dying from a motorcycle accident a few weeks after I got here. So I decided to discontinue the motorcyles to Central (however, I'm not quite willing to give up the rides altogether! There are less dangerous routes to take. : )

Well, the Lord sobered me up a bit last weekend, both in terms of health and safety. I still have not gotten officially sick, but last weekend began feeling very tired and had a strange kind of headache all Sunday, which God used to remind me that I am human. : ) Also, I had a somewhat scary encounter with a taxi driver last Sunday night.

On Sunday night, Crystal and I went to a concert that she was invited to at a Thai church and afterwards I went back to the Henry's for dinner (their home is feeling more like home to me than my apartment!). At around 11:00, I got set to leave and Paul drove me to the edge of their neighborhood to catch a taxi back to school. It took a few minutes before we saw any taxis but one finally came. I got in and told the taxi driver directions which Paul repeated with a better Thai accent. He nodded his head like he understood. As soon as I got in the taxi, though, I felt very uncomfortable. The taxi driver was a middle-aged man and there was something about the way he looked at me and smiled that made me want to get out right then. I almost asked Paul if we could wait for another taxi (I should have) but I didn't want to make a big fuss about it and so on we went. Not far down the street, the driver turned to me and started trying to talk to me in Thai, I think asking for more specifics about where to go. It didn't take long before it was clear he didn't know how to get there (either that or he was not going the most direct way) and it felt like he was wandering around. I really started to get scared when we went down a random, out of the way street and later pulled over a bit and stopped. I motioned a certain way to tell him to keep going (the last thing I wanted him to do was stop the car!) and got on my cell phone. The whole rest of the drive (which was longer than it should have been because, again, he didn't know where he was going), I was on the phone with either Crystal or Paul. Paul got out his map and talked to the driver and then kept asking me if I recognized this or that, then Crystal was gracious enough to talk to me for 20-30 minutes to distract my mind from worrying. Plus, just being on the phone made me feel like I looked confident and in control. In reality, I felt like a very alone, single girl and very uncomfortable. In the end, the taxi driver ended up charging me 50 baht less than what the meter said because he took so long, so maybe he wasn't really trying to take advantage of me, but I've never felt so glad to get behind locked doors in my life. As soon as I got to my apartment, I plugged the Bangkok emergency number into my phone and thanked God for watching over me. Paul also said that next time if I leave their house so late at night, he'll probably just drive me the rest of the way - which I would feel bad about on the one hand because it would take so much of his time (and gas) to do, but on the other, would make me feel a lot better.

I hesitated to write this down all week because I don't want to scare any of you (especially mom and dad!). I am not sure if I was really in any danger; it's possible my mind was just making the situation more scary than it was. But, as I said, God used it to sober me up a bit and also make me so very grateful for your prayers for my safety. He is watching over all of my ways and is protecting me from every sort of harm. Praise God!

1 Comments:

At 10:27 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

WHAT?! :)

See - you made it! What's the fuss about?! :) !!!!

SO GLAD that turned out ok - and I'm getting more cautious as I'm getting older (and more children), I'll have you know.

xoxo,Joanna

p.s.- Gideon had his official 2yearoldboy trip to the ER this week! sigh. I'll email you the story soon. oh, and he's ok. other than a sore bottom ;)

 

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