A few years back, when we were in Bangalore, India, my family went for a vacation in Goa. Goa is a small state in western India famous for its beaches. I was about 6 years old at the time and had never gone to a beach before, so I was very excited. I was woken up at 1 AM by my mom, and she told me to hurry and get ready. I got ready quickly and went with my father to a local grocery store to get supplies for our long journey. When everything was set up, me my brother, Dad, and Mum got in our car and set out for the trip. I threw up a few times and fell asleep about 30 minutes into the drive.
I woke up early morning to a foggy sky and our car speeding through the highway. The next few hours were spent in boredom as we drove through empty fields and occasionally saw a cow or two. My boredom was suddenly interrupted by a bump, and the car suddenly stopped. All of us got out of the car to see that the tires were stuck in a muddy pit along the side of the ‘road’–if you could call it that. At this point in our drive, we were driving through a rural area that was occupied by small villages. All my hopes of reaching the beach before nighttime were dashed as I saw my dad struggle to free the car. Fortunately for us, the local village folk came over to see what was going on, and their combined force helped get our car out of the pit. My entire family was relieved, and we continued after thanking the villagers. We reached our hotel just as nighttime hit, and everyone went straight to sleep when we reached our room.
I got up super excited in the morning because I was going to go to the beach. After eating breakfast, we drove to the beach, and I immediately got in the water. I spent a while playing in the waves before I saw it. Towards me, a massive wave was approaching, it was around 4 times my height, and it seemed to stretch from one end of the horizon to another. I tried running, but the water slowed me down, and I was smashed by the churning water. I was pushed underwater and tried to reach the surface, but I was too weak. Eventually, the water calmed down, and I surfaced, took a deep breath, then ran ashore. I told my mom about the gargantuan wave but she, thinking it was some sort of made-up 6-year-old story, brushed it off…
Looking back on this, the wave was probably not as humongous and life-threatening as I’d imagined it to be. It didn’t give me any sort of fear of water though and I still enjoy going to beaches when I get the chance. The rest of the vacation was not as exciting, and the ride home was even more boring (though we didn’t get stuck again, which was nice).
