When I was 18, I spent the summer in New Delhi, India. That experience changed who I was as a person and I absolutely left pieces of my heart there. Near the end of our summer, our team leaders took us 250 miles north to the mountains. We stayed in a city called Shimla for several days to debrief the summer prior to returning to the US.
The day we left for Shimla, our whole team divided up and piled into three cars. In my car, it was the five youngest girls of the team, one of our leaders, and our driver Raheem.By this point in the summer, we knew Raheem very well. He was kind and very protective over us-especially the girls. The five of us were extremely close. Sharing a bedroom and were nearly inseparable nearly all summer. Thirteen years later, I still have deep love for these women.
The first few hours were just like any other car ride we took. Some of us slept and some of us watched out the windows soaking in new parts of Delhi. However, none of us knew what was to come next.
I was drifting off to sleep when I felt the car slow down to an almost crawl. We had been out of the city for over an hour, so I wondered what was going on. I looked up from my seat right next to the door and saw people everywhere in front of the car. They were all looking ahead of us. I was startled, but not quite scared. The rest of the girls had taken notice of the crowd around us. When we left Delhi, our car was second in line. I looked ahead and behind and saw both of the other vehicles that carried our team. Raheem then began to tell us to lock our doors. We did without saying a word.
Within a few minutes, the crowd was fully surrounding our vehicle. Their attention started to shift from something in the distance to our car. We saw many in the crowd with knives, shovels, and pitchforks. Some of the men started to pound on our windows. The leader with us, Naomi, told us to not look at them. Raheem reminded us often to ensure our doors were locked. The crowd was trying to open our doors. I looked ahead and behind again to see the other cars carrying our friends. I couldn’t see them anymore. We had no idea if they were safe. That is when I began to panic.
No one in the car had done much talking to this point. We all knew each other pretty well by this point in the summer, so words were not always necessary. Naomi kept assuring us that everything was okay. I could feel tears welling up in my eyes. My dear friend Casey recognized that and gently put her hand in mine and didn’t let go. The crowd continued pounding on our car and trying to open our doors. They were yelling in what we assumed was Hindi and the anger in their eyes was so real. We didn’t know what they wanted or how we would get out of this. We had no idea if the rest of our team was safe or not. It was so incredibly terrifying.
The next thing I knew, Kat started singing. Kat was the oldest of us “youngest girls” and our trusty Canadian. She was our silent support all summer. She was (and still is) so full of wisdom and kindness. She spoke life into us during the hardest moments and I have so many good memories of laughing with her until late into the night. Kat’s voice was beautiful. She often led our full team worship times. Her voice was calm, yet so full of beautiful strength. At that moment, in the car, she just started singing. She was quiet yet confident.
Soon after, Naomi joined in. Then Michelle, Laura, and Casey joined. I don’t remember the song they were singing. But, they were all singing in unison while the crowd continued to pound on our windows and yell at us in a different language.
This won’t be a shocker to anyone if you know me. I was the holdout. I did not join in on the sing along. I was terrified of what was going on a few inches to my left outside of the window. A little sing along wasn’t going to make it better. I’m also incredibly stubborn. I didn’t want to focus on anything else except the scary, because hello….it was terrifying. How can you just sing while something so traumatic was happening?
A few songs in, I was in tears. Just honestly terrified. Naomi turned around in the car and gave me a big hug. I was probably the thorn in her side all summer, but we had come to be very close. She just let me cry into her shoulder. She looked at me and smiled then continued singing with the other girls. I finally gave in and joined the real life sing along with these dear friends of mine.
The very moment that I stopped crying and started singing something miraculous happened. A man in the crowd on a motorcycle started banging on the hood to get Raheem’s attention. He made motions to follow him. Raheem did. Within minutes the man got us out of the crowd and into a safe location. When Raheem pulled us to a safe place we all turned around to see both other cars were safe. The guy’s car had a broken window, but other than that we were all safe, sound, and together.
I tell you this story because I think we could all learn from it. That day, in a crowded car in India, I learned that there are scary and hard things in the world, but when we intentionally shift our focus to something good and bigger than our problems, we don’t see them as problems anymore.
I’m retelling this story for myself too. I am really good at being narrow focused. I get so bogged down on what is happening today, that I forget to take a step back and see the bigger picture. I forget to acknowledge the issues and scary things are real, but then intentionally focus on the good.
I hope you can find some encouragement in this story from one of the scariest days of my life.
Koko
