Nigeria has to do something drastic to curb the crime rate. Sharing with you a harrowing experience faced by my friend Sudha and her hubby Ram as told by her:
I left Amsterdam on Feb.1 and reached Lagos at 8.30pm. Ram had come to pick me up to Ota. At 10.30pm, we were blocked by a car...we were attacked by six robbers who had guns.
They snatched my hand bag and pushed me off the car.
Ram and driver Moses were kidnapped at gun point. They were speeded away. I was in the middle of a creepy lane in Nigeria....Dalemo.
It was a dark lane. I walked in a hysterical state and saw a Nigerian boy. I cried and asked him if he had a mobile. The place was desolate and village houses and shops shut a Sunday nite.The boy was helpless, another came. They stood by me.I saw one car whizzing by, it had all Nigerians. Then another car came by. I saw some young men and women holding babies in arms. I stopped them and pleaded for help.
The man gave me his phone. Fortunately I had Ram's colleague's number by heart. Called him. Lakshminarayan asked me where I was. I explained.
The car guys took me to a nearby hotel. I ran to the security staff and explained. Soon Lakshmi called again.
The robbers had taken Ram and driver. While stealing their purses, gold rings, laptop they asked our driver if he knew how to handle a gun. He said no. They dint believe. Moses took out the Bible and put his hand on it and swore on it.
Ram asked the robbers..Where is my wife? They replied, “Do you want us to shoot you. Run.”
Ram and Moses held onto each other's hands and ran for five kms.....then they took an okhada...which is a motor cycle..like the autorickshaw in India and came back to Dalemo, where I was dropped off, searching for me.
Anyway, he later found out and returned to where I was. We lost all my suitcases, hand luggage with my laptop and all the data that had my one year's work on the book that I am working on. I lost my passport and my Schengan visa stamped for one year.
I am disoriented and confused and scared still.....
This is horrifying! Thank God they were not killed. I know many people are avoiding Nigeria, which is such a shame because their economy is in need, but it just isn't safe there. I am praying for your friend's peace of mind and praying for thanks that she and her husband and driver are all safe now. Peace to you too.
ReplyDeleteA real scarry experience....hope they are both safe and sound now....must have been quite a night mare and i hope they both recover soon from this..... and we say India is unsafe???? anti socials are every where....its only the laws that makes the difference.
ReplyDeletePS: I could not log in to ur blog for quite sometime. was wondering what happened???
thankfully today it worked.
And yes ramesh don't worry we spoke all the good things about you .....so am sure the hiccups were not all that bad. Hehehehe!!!!
Dear Ramesh Bhai,
ReplyDeleteBe it in Nigeria or any other place, robberies hurt people and personal security is one of the important factors in the society.
Armed robbery in homes, at workplace, on the streets, in restaurants, in vehicles, etc. will force people to live in fear and they will even find it difficult to sleep with their eyes closed.
Sad to hear about the hardship faced by your friends Mrs.Sudha and Mr.Ram. It’s even disturbing to hear that they lost everything they had, especially the important documents.
Well, it does take time to recover from the shock of such a ghastly incident. May peace be with them and I hope that they will come out of all this quickly.
I think of what to say and I remember the time I was watching this movie Good Morning Vietnam. They start playing this lovely old song by Louis B Armstrong - What a wonderful world. I had a smile on my face until the picturization showed 3 Vietnamese terrorists being taken to a corner and shot in the head.
ReplyDeleteI was shocked at that. This incident made me just go back to that memory.
It makes me sad and I feel helpless. Violence, wherever it happens, sickens me. Nigeria is one of the worst right now, but there are so many other places in our ‘wonderful world’ with similar problems. What’s wrong with us people! I hope your friends will recover soon from that horrific experience.
ReplyDeleteThis is real shocking incident.
ReplyDeleteReally shocking incident ...God saved them. It is due to poor economic condition of Nigeria that law and order condition is very poor there.
ReplyDeleteGood Lord! This is traumatizing! Hope your friend and her husband are doing fine now.
ReplyDeleteHey Pal! Good to have you back! I kept going to globalmadrasi.blogspot.com...missed an 'a' in madarasi. But this url is saved to my favourites...so no chance to miss. Happy blogging!
ReplyDeleteSo scary! I hope and pray that they atleast get their passports back.
ReplyDeletenightmarish
ReplyDeleteYes. Thank you yaar for your comment on my post.
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Jayashree
Awful. Nigeria is one of the worst countries in the world where the crime rate is extremely high.
ReplyDeletethis sounds like a nightmare...
ReplyDeletethe worst part was that the lady lost the book she had been working on. I hope the couple recuperate from the incident soon.
Best wishes to them
No one should go through this type of bad experience. This will affect them for a long time. Hope they get back their documents fast and come out of that country, if possible.
ReplyDeleteI too have got some relatives over there and they too give us stories of that country. Their families are always worried about them.
We will pray for Sudha and Ram.
Im sure you would have been and still are, that is such a scary situtiona and things like that will always be in the head..I hope safety for both..
ReplyDeleteHaiku Poems