Jan 1st 2010 was the scariest day of my life. We were vacationing in Goa that week, and that particular day we were playing in Baga beach. It was sometime around mid-afternoon (around 3.30 pm or so). We were enjoying the warm waters and the thinner crowds (it is all relative, thinner compared to the previous day, but still very populated compared to the beaches abroad). SK (4 yrs old) wanted to take a break from the water and just play in the sand. I sat her down in an empty area which we could see from quite a distance and joined PK and AK back in the water. We were literally checking on her every minute and she seemed content playing. After about 15 minutes, when I looked at that spot (probably for the 15th time), I did not find her there. My heart missed a beat, but I immediately found her about 10 steps to the right where she was collecting more sand. I thought may be she is getting restless and walked back to her and sat down with her to play.
Apparently the sand in her original spot was not enough for her, so she wanted to go around a few steps, collect some and bring it back to her spot. She did this one or two more times and I must have momentarily spaced out. Next thing, AK comes to me and says he needs to use the bath room (and do the big job!). This is very unusual since he, like me, has a mortal fear of public restrooms and rarely ever needs to go when we are out and about (this internal defense mechanism has gotten even stronger after we have moved here). I tell him to go back and ask PK. And then I look around for SK but cannot spot her anywhere. Since it must barely have been two minutes since I last saw her I physically got up and looked front, back, left, right and near the water but could not find her. By then PK was also coming out of the water to help AK with his need. I told him I was not able to locate SK and asked him also to look. Soon the 3 minutes turned to 5 and we couldn’t see signs of her anywhere and we started to get a bit frantic. I went and reported this to the life guard on duty. He said not to worry as it was an almost weekly occurrence there and invariably the children would be found nearby somewhere. He promised to get his tractor and go the length of the beach and announce on the loud speaker. I sat with him inside the vehicle and we must have traveled half the length and I was crying on the mic asking for her to come to the vehicle if she heard me. The loud speaker was not at all powerful, I probably could have screamed louder than that. All this while PK was going around yelling her name at the top of his lungs, he just wanted everyone to be aware that a child was missing. And AK is just trying to go behind one parent or the other crying. I don’t know if he realized the gravity of the situation.
But for me, time came to a stand still. When we didn’t find her in the first 10 minutes or so, I completely despaired. My main area of interest in searching was between our shack (where we had rented out lazy chair-beds and left our belongings there) and the spot where we were playing. This must have been a 200 or 300 meter stretch. I didn’t see any point in going beyond that in the patrol vehicle since I thought it was a waste of time. Meanwhile people were asking how long it had been since we noticed her missing, exactly when we first noticed her gone etc. It was such a bad time and place for this to happen (not that there is ever a good place or time for children to get lost). Since we expected to be a in a crowded beach and mostly in the water all day, we didn’t have our watches, cell phones, cameras or anything with us. People were asking if she knew our phone numbers, if we had a picture of her etc, and we had nothing. Our hotel was at least a 90 minute ride by taxi from this beach. I was just going crazy with all kinds of scary thoughts – you know, the usual, about kidnapping etc. Some people were suggesting we look in the water but I was confident she would not have gone in, especially if she didn’t see us. I wanted the life guard to register a complaint with the police. They were still saying we would find her but I was just dying every passing minute. Because we started this search with in 2-3 minutes of not seeing her and it was now almost close to 30 minutes or so. Who knows what could have happened. And I was also feeling major guilt since she was on my watch, but in retrospect, such a momentary lapse can happen to anyone, isn’t it? Another concerned parent was having the same terrible thoughts I guess. He was saying that we need to call the police to make sure that an eye is kept near the exits of the beach. But the long line of shacks are also scary, crowded places and who would search those, if we suspected any mishap. Man, I didn’t even want to complete those thoughts. I was pleading with the life guard to please do something and he said he would radio all the towers one last time before involving the police. I don’t know if he had a chance to do that, but the next minute he told me she had been found. I didn’t really believe him, thought it must be a mistake. Because with all of us searching for her and not having found her, how could she turn up so suddenly? Anyway, he made me sit in his patrol vehicle and took me there. Sure enough, she was in PK’s arms and he was crying profusely. The next few moments are a total blur. Obviously, we are ever indebted to the person who found her and brought her back, but I don’t know if we even expressed our sincere gratitude. We had so many questions for him, but a huge crowd had gathered, she looked so dazed and we just couldn’t stop crying. We just took down his number, and walked back to our chair-beds. Along the way, all the onlookers had lots of questions, comments and we tried to answer everyone politely, but mostly we just wanted to be alone and needed some privacy. After sitting in silence for the next ½ hr or so, AK wanted to go back in the water. But we were not in the mood. We promised him that the next day, he could spend the whole day at the pool in the resort. He was an angel and didn’t fuss. We rode back to the resort in silence.
The whole situation left us completely shaken for the next few days. How much ever you think of prevention, what we could have done differently etc, this is not something you can rehearse for. Later the whole evening we were just discussing all this and AK said “Can’t you just be happy we found her? Why do you need to keep on talking about it?” I don’t know if he understood the seriousness of the episode. And I don’t know how I can make him realize it without scaring him. We did talk to both of them again about the importance of sticking together in crowded places, not wandering off etc etc, but still it is never enough. I told SK I was so sad and scared when I couldn’t find her and she goes “But why momma? I wasn’t in any danger.” Her version of how it happened: “I went for a short walk to get more sand but after that I couldn’t find you, so I kept walking looking for you, but couldn’t find you. But on the way back, the short walk became a long walk and I also saw some goats on the way back”.
If this had happened at the beginning of the trip, we would have just headed back home right away, but this happened with only a day to spare, so we just hung out at the resort the next day and came back to Bangalore. We also called the person who had brought her back. Apparently, he found her more than one kilometer away at the next beach – Calangute beach (which is the most popular beach in Goa and hence the most crowded). He had heard that a 4 yr old girl, wearing a brown wet suit, was missing. He saw her and called out her name and she turned and he knew he had found her. We offered to buy him dinner and/or drinks but he was single and vacationing with a bunch of friends and he declined.
The first few days SK used to refer to this incident as “When I went for a short walk which became a long walk”. Now she just says “when I got lost”. I think she has talked about it in school etc, but there are only so many details a 4 yr old will recount. So not sure if they take her seriously. We are so thankful to have found her safe and sound and realize that not all families are so lucky. My heart goes out to them.
Read Full Post »
