Fear!
That four letters word. Needs no introduction, everyone must have experienced it in one form or the other.
From the beginning of time, fear has always been an ever presence in the life of humans. A lot of things happens to us everyday. Some good and some bad. Many of this things leaves us feeling terrified and living in fear.
Being terrified is one experience nobody wants to go through. The process doesn't make for a good story. Unfortunately so many go through it everyday. As a matter of fact everyone must have gone through this form of emotion one time, or a couple of times in their lifetime.
Just like many, I have seen fear and I have been terrified on so many occasions that I can hardly count. However one particular experience has left me with the highest sense of being terrified.
It happened while I was in school. The events of that day has never left my mind. It was just like yesterday. I foolishly put myself in harms way and nearly paid the ultimate price.
So, One time, I had gone back to school. I got to find out our lecturers were on strike. I don't know what came over me I just decided I should go to Cameroon. My school was in calabar(south southern part of my country) and it was somehow close if you take the creeks. I only had an address of a cousin. He doesn't even know I was coming. Mind you I have never travelled before, but I was prepared to take this risk.
I had a lot of terrible and unpleasant experience on my way to that country. I also did have a really nice time while there though, but that is not the story for today.
After staying for three weeks, I decided it was time to go back. Instead of using the creeks as I came, I decided to take the high sea with a speed boat. How that journey began gave me a sign into what was to come.
For some reasons we couldn't travel the day I got to the boat jetty. We had to wait till the next day. Still we nearly could not travel the next day until some interventions were made. By 6pm, the drivers were ready to leave the shores.
We boarded the boat. I was happy we were finally leaving. Little did I know a lot was waiting for us at the sea. The nightmare of a night was just lurking. Two hours into our journey, the real story began.
Like I said earlier, it was a speed boat with two outboard engines. As we were going on high speed one of the engines developed problem. This was about 8pm. The conductor tried all he could but could not fix it. By now only one engine was running. We had to make do with our situation hoping it gets better, instead it got worse.
After about 2 hours, precisely by 8pm, the second outboard engine stopped working. Then all hell was let loose. The driver and the conductor did all they could but the engines would not start. To our disbelief, we discovered the boat was leaking seriously. We didn't notice earlier because the boat was on high speed. The more the boat was not moving, the more water was gushing into the boat. There and then I understood what the expression "between the devil and the deep blue sea" truly meant, lol.
In other for us not to capsize we had to look for a way to bail out the water coming into the boat, and we had to do that fast.
The driver and the conductor were still battling to fix at least one of the engines when another disaster struck. The torchlight that was our source of light fell from the conductors hands into the sea. Then I knew the devil was seriously working overtime. All of a sudden I started thinking of mermaids, and I remembered I had offended one girl that has always boasted she has marine powers. I just knew I was cooked, but still I had to turn to prayers. Everyman to his or her God.
In summary, we have lost the 2 outboards engines and the boat was not moving . Our boat was leaking profusely. Our only strong source of light, our torch, fell into the sea. To make it the more worse, We were in the middle of the ocean, there was no sight of land.
How terrifying can a situation get? I could see death sitting in front of me picking his teeth with two tooth picks.
Fortunately, all of a sudden, one of the engine came to life. But it couldn't move as fast as it normally would. Who cares, provided it moves the boat at all, we were all more than ok . A journey that would have taken us 2 hours took us about 6 hours. But hey, it was like a gift from heaven. The water kept coming into the boat, as speed was low, we kept bailing it out as fast as we can.
After everything, we finally got to Oron, my first destination. How we escaped certain death on that day still beats me. Till today it's still extraordinary. I think a force was at play to save us.
Since that day, travelling by water is never an option for me. I mean, I actually saw death and told him "not today".
