| dave 的个人资料Thoughts照片日志列表 |  工具  帮助 |
|
6月28日 drugged and muggedPreface: I'm starting a competition (of which I'd be the perennial winner) for Most Tenaciously Naive Traveler.
Last night I caught the afternoon bus from Busia, Kenya, to Kampala, Uganda. The plan was to arrive in Kampala in the evening, relax, then catch an early flight on to London (and then home). The bus was spacious and comfortable, as far as buses go: wide, soft seats and not enough people to fill them. Hence my surprise when a gentleman came to sit next to me. (With so many open seats, why sit next to me?) We rode in peace for a few hours, he kindly warned me when the bus was stopping for a short call, and soon after offered me a soft drink. WARNING: DO NOT ACCEPT FOOD OR BEVERAGES FROM OTHER PASSENGERS! Yes, but it was a
can of soda, and the can was sealed. So I took the can of orange fanta, accepted his proffered straw, took a few sips. Ay! It taste like the aluminum had soaked into the drink; pretty gross. I took a few more sips to be polite and set the drink down.
It had occurred to me that maybe this was a trick to drug me, but given the sealed can, I limited self-treatment to ingesting a significant amount of water. Anyway, I felt fine. Fine, until the words became a bit blurrier on the page.
[NO MEMORY] Brief memory: it's dark outside, I get up from my seat and my backpack (with laptop and camera) is not where it should be. People are disembarking. [NO MEMORY] I wake up, lying in a bed, I have no idea what time it is, and it feels like my hand is cuffed to something. Within a few seconds, I see that I'm in a small hospital, hooked to some kind of IV. A few minutes later, I am released. Apparently, in my brief mid-wakefulness, I was able to name the hotel I'm staying at, so the driver contacted it, and the hotel performed been marvelously: they sent a young man to watch me during the night and kept my bags safe. And so, the lessons I've learned to avoid being mugged in Africa:
1. Don't walk around in sketchy parts of town at night (Arusha, Tanzania, 2000)
2. Even if there is light outside, make sure there is significant traffic before wandering the city streets. (Nairobi, Kenya, 2002)
3. Never EVER accept a drink from a stranger. (No time like the present.)
At least I now have less carry-on luggage.. 评论 (2)
引用通告引用此项的网络日志
|
|
|
