The River

October 12, 2010

Amidst the craziness of our return trip from the river I forgot to write about the robbery. So here it goes.

Friday morning we packed up the boats for our return journey home. I was so excited to be going back to 38. As everything was being loaded onto the boats I noticed that my backpack was loaded on the other boat, the one I wasn’t riding on. I thought,  “Eh, I could just leave it there. But then again, I might need something from it later and it will be a hassle to get it later.”

So, I asked the boat driver to hand me my backpack.  That was probably the best decision I made the whole trip.

With everything packed on the boats our driver pulled out of the port. We began to make our way back home. Somewhere along the way the other boat got separated from us. Later we learned that they stopped to let Rachel go to the bathroom.

I kept looking back to see where our other boat was, but never saw it. After about 10 minutes wondering what happened to the other group, I figured they would catch up with us at some point. So, I journalled, napped, river watched, and napped some more.

About an hour or two into our trip, our driver stopped at a sand bank to refuel. As he was refueling I felt the urge to go to the bathroom. I asked our driver if he could pull onto the sand bank so I could have some relief. He said he could. We started driving closer to the island and the guys in our boat asked what was happening. I explained that I had asked the driver to stop for me—they all protested.

“Jenessa, we solved that problem.” They held up a 2 liter coke bottle with half of the top sawed off.

“I am not going to use that.”

“Why not? We made it girl-friendly.”

I was not about to go to the bathroom in a boat full of guys. I told them I wasn’t going to use it and said that the driver had already agreed to pull over. As he began to pull over we saw another boat about 500-600 yards away. We thought it might be ours but we saw it pull off towards the shore and another boat with it, so we figured it wasn’t ours.

He stopped and I hopped out. The immediate bank had some scraggly bushes. In the distance I saw some thicker bushes and a log. I decided that was going to be my best choice. I took off toward it in a jog cause I didn’t want the boat to have to wait on me too long.

I finished my business and started to head off toward the boat. As I got closer to our boat I saw another boat about 300 yards away speed off; it was a lot faster than any of the other boats we had seen on the river. I then heard Lauren yell out that the boat driver wanted me to hurry up and get in the boat.

As I made my way in, our driver started to say something. He kept pointing towards the speeding boat saying something about a yacht and “de repente” (suddenly), but I couldn’t understand him. By that time the other boat was coming towards us. We realized it was our other boat. I could see Hanna, Steph, and Rachel all huddled in the front. They looked shocked. I thought maybe their boat had tipped over, but they didn’t look wet. I asked what happened but no one said anything at first. They just stared. Then Laura answered,

“We just got robbed, they took everything.” Then she made a gun signal with her hand.

“What?! You just got robbed?!” They were all too shaken up to explain what happened. We later learned that a boat came and hit the side of their boat pointing guns at them. The robbers told them to close their eyes and not to look at their faces.  They began to go through all the stuff. They pulled out clothes from everyone’s back packs and suitcases looking for valuable items.

They searched everyone’s pockets and even took 20 centimos from Rachel’s pocket. After they got onto the boat, one of the buys began interrogating Dr. Mathews. He asked him what we were doing. Dr. Mathews told him that we were doing a medical campaign and that we were helping people.

The guy then asked where the other boat was. Dr. Mathews told him that we were far away. The thief asked if there were soldiers on the other boat to which the Doctor replied.

“There are angels on the boat.”

“Yes, there are thousands of angels,” Shirley told them in agreement.

The boat driver said that we were armed. The thieves took what they wanted including Hanna’s, Steph’s and Rachel’s entire backpacks. Then they said they had to go and hopped back onto their boat and took off.

Apparently, while I was using the bathroom the boat drove close to us, slowed down and then sped off.

It really was a miracle that they didn’t stop at our boat as well. I believe it was a culmination of God doing little and big things. If Rachel hadn’t of stopped to go to the bathroom and if we had heard them calling us to stop we would have been traveling together.

If I hadn’t been going to the bathroom on the little island, we would have been out in the middle of the river more vulnerable to the robbers.

We also think that the robbers saw Caleb waving his arms at them and Jonathan and Anthony playing with the machete and Chris looking ticked off. I think they also saw our angels protecting us.

Although the other boat had a terrifying experience, no one was hurt. Things can be replaced, people can’t.

God has been tangibly working in our lives the whole time we’ve been down here. Being an SM is a life-changing experience. It’s also a Christian-strengthening experience as well. Praise the Lord for his protection.