POOR DECISIONS CAN HAVE BAD CONSEQUENCES
On a vacation to Acapulco, Mexico, a friend of mine and I spent most of our time in the tourist area around the hotel. There was plenty of night-life and it swarmed with people who looked a lot like us - tourists. The police were obvious as they protected the area. One evening, my friend talked me into taking the bus out of the area so we could see where the "locals" lived and find an "authentic restaurant." The longer we were on the bus and the further away we got from the "tourist area" the more uncomfortable I got. I kept thinking, "Dorothy, we are not in Kansas anymore!" Most of the people on the bus where obviously workers at the hotels, restaurants and bars that we had left behind. They stared at us with that look of "what are you doing on this bus?" No one was speaking English, but us!
Finally, I told my friend that we needed to get off and find the bus going back to where we came from! We got off and asked around and were told what time the next bus would come by and where to wait for it. Since it was late, the time between buses was considerable so we decided to grab a bite to eat at a local "fast food" joint. I was not only worried about the area we were in, but also worried about the food we were about to eat. I thought we might be mugged by some angry "get those Americans" rough necks. I was also worried because the place where we stopped to eat did not look all that clean. We ate it anyway because we needed a safe place to wait for the next bus back to the hotel.
We got home safely that night. However, my worries were misplaced. The local people stared at us, but did not mistreat us. What I should have worried about more was the place we ate. I contracted a bad case of diarrhea from that huge burrito that I ate that night in a "rough area" of Acapulco !
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On another summer trip out to Colorado, while I was still in the seminary, I agreed to accompany my friend from the Evansville in his Volkswagen one a visit to his aunt who lived out there. There were a lot of good things about the trip, like a day's hike up a mountain and a superb Thai restaurant. However, there were also a couple of nightmare scenarios, like a floorboard with an inch of water whenever it rained!
The worst nightmare happened when we were making a side-trip to Pike's Peak. Think a Volkswagen Beetle! For some reason my friend, who was driving his Beetle, decided to turn around half-way up the mountain. There were no guardrails or shoulders to the road, just loose gravel and dirt on the side that led down to a curve in the road below with the same all the way down the mountain. Well, he drove his Beetle over the edge a bit and tried to back up. The gravel began to slide and take the Beetle, with us inside, a little more over the cliff.
As we were sliding, he applied the brakes and tried to back up, spinning rocks and gravel like cannonballs out of a cannon. I remember trying to decide whether to open my door, get out and save my own life and let him keep sliding to his death or "go down with the ship." I concluded that I would rather stay in the car and "go down with the ship" than face his family as a coward.
Well, I am happy with my decision because miraculously, the wheels got a grip and we backed out of that mess and onto the road! He not only saved our lives, but I saved my dignity. I was really angry at him for not knowing better than trying something like that, but I swallowed my anger and tried to focus on my gratitude for not dying that day at the bottom of Pike's Peak!
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On a vacation in New Orleans, a friend of mine and I went to a bar on Bourbon Street one night. We had rented two rooms in the rear of a private house not far from Bourbon Street - a short walk home. When it was getting very late, and my friend wanted to stay longer, I decided to walk back alone to where we were staying. Well, I thought I knew how to get home, but I didn't. I got turned around and kept walking until I realized that I was hopelessly lost in a very dangerous part of New Orleans.
When I asked a friendly looking man for directions to the street I was looking for, he looked at me in shock. "You shouldn't be over here this late by yourself! This is a very dangerous area!" He then told me how to find my way back, but with a very worried look on his face! I finally managed to find my way back to where we were staying, relieved that I had not been robbed or killed and left to die on the streets of New Orleans! I kept repeating to myself over the next couple of days, "Don't ever do that again, ever!" Poor decisions can have very serious consequences!
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