The day I got robbed at gunpoint

I always thought that would be a harder sentence to write. I always thought it would be more shocking, more dramatic when it happened.  But here I am at Lake Atitlan, giving myself a weekend off, looking out over the serene waters encapsulated by three Central American volcanoes, thinking how strange it was that I was robbed at gunpoint three days ago.

I was carrying my phone in my hand, I knew better. The funny part is that these things always seem to happen on my best days – those sunny afternoons where I’m imbibing in the juxtaposing grunge and glory of my Guatemalan life. I finished lunch with a good girlfriend on my rooftop terrace, munching on fresh greens from my garden and soaking up the mountainous view.

A few minutes after bidding Mellissa goodbye on the corner, I heard footsteps. Running footsteps. These footsteps have come to be an omen to me – they usually mean some little teenage shit running up behind me ready for a hit and run ass grab incident. I swung my ass towards the wall, thinking I was going to beat this one at his own game today. Then, there it was, a cold, heavy silver metal in my face. I remember the gun glistening in the strong sun shining down that day, the same sun I was basking in only a few minutes before.Then, a click-clack. What do they call it? Cocking your gun? Although he never touched me with it, I could feel the cold gleaning off the metal of that heavy contraption, sinking into my skin.

“Give me your fucking phone!” In English, perfect English, in the middle of Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. I threw it.  I’ve learned after the fact that this was actually quite a smart tactic, the throwing, unfortunately I can’t say I did it out of strategic premeditation but rather out of complete fear.  “Why did you fucking throw it!” Again, the perfect English. Who was this guy? Then came the cold again, breezing its way onto my face, my hands, my insides. Why was there so much screaming? Where was the gun? Was he pointing it at me? Did I just piss this guy off even more?

“I’ll fucking shoot your ass!” And there he went, running off around the corner, off to god knows where probably to never cross paths with this gringa again. I dropped my keys. I dropped my purse – the purse that was in my hand, that he failed to notice in the adrenaline of all his rage, his cold. A couple walking behind me kindly picked up my things, slowly, carefully, like if they touched me I might explode. “I’m fine,” I said, gulping down any vulnerability trying to seep out. Then I noticed a hand on my shoulder, and I noticed it shaking. I was shaking. “I don’t think your fine,” he said. He walked me to my office. I did not want to be in the street any longer.

I cried. I shook. I hyperventilated. This is fear. This is what real fear feels like.

In the aftermath, I couldn’t ask for more support. It has never felt better to have a hug, to snuggle in bed with a friend, to receive love. The Australian accounting volunteer was a life-saver – buying me a shot of tequila to put the lump the size of texas forming in my stomach to rest, and then walking me to the police station to try to find some solace in at least declaring something official. My friends brought me sushi and wine, my parents told me I was a “tough girl”, and lots of love in the form of phone calls from everyone. As a radical introvert who was stripped of her joy of solitude, I haven’t had to be alone once since it happened – which has been surprisingly nice.

The police station experience was nothing to write home about – a half hour wait in line before being “attended” by a blasé female cop, more interested in flirting with her toned co-worker leaning through the window than asking me what my assailant looked like. She didn’t even record in the official report where the incident happened. Desensitized. Oh, another armed robbery at 2 in the afternoon on a busy street? Sorry, I’ve got a football score to check. Even the bartender that provided the tequila – whose job by the way IS to shoot the shit with customers and console their clients – didn’t blink when we told him our special occasion for daydrinking, didn’t even say the words ‘sorry to hear that’.

Its funny what happens in my brain when this stuff occurs. There is no anger, no want for revenge or justice. It’s a contemplative sadness, its some existential question of the root cause. Who is this guy, what is his story, and what would drive him to be so violent with some innocent girl on the street at 2 in the afternoon. The yelling, that was the worst. The coldness seeping not only off his gun but his soul – the desperation one must feel to treat someone like that. Did he see me? DId he see my face? Did he like seeing me shake like that, in fear?

In retrospect, I know this was miniscule, my first bout with real violence. A man screamed at me and shoved a gun in my face, 30 seconds and it was over. But something happened in the aftermath of those 30 seconds. Its like seeing that fear, I begin to feel the fear of all the victims of fear, of all of humanity. I know it’s a grandiose statement, but its what I felt. When I was hyperventaliting, crying, shaking, wanting to vomit out the ball of evil building in my body, this is what I was feeling. Humanity’s fear. The Palestinian children going to sleep to the serenade of Israeli bombs outside their window. The Central American children falling in line behind the Coyote on their way to climb through the tunnel to the other side of the US border. The millions of women around the world afraid to say No to their husband, hiding the abuse under raincoats and sweaters. I feel a pain that is universal. I feel a pain that is not mine, but collective. And I hate it. I hate that violence and I hate that fear and I hate that pain.

Empathy is an incredible human emotion. Its somehow motivating. You know I keep thinking I see this guy around town – in the bank, on the street corner in front of the bakery. I think about what I would do if I had the chance to confront him. I don’t want to kick his ass. I want to ask him what his circumstances were. I want to find out why there are guys like that running around and change the situations that drive them to that desperation and anger in the first place. I want to stop the pain that humans face from unnecessary violence and fear.

The day I got robbed at gunpoint could have been a much worse day. I am privileged, protected, loved, supported, and extremely lucky in so many ways. The day I got robbed at gunpoint was an experience. As my dad told me, I survived, and now its something I can learn from. My friend told me this beautiful thing the other day, how your memories in life, your experiences go through a cycle with you. They happen, its shocking or painful or intense, then the emotions around the experience lesson and it becomes a scar, and then slowly that scar fades away and the experience actually becomes part of the fabric of your self. Its not a mark on your emotional body that always reminds you of some fateful day, it’s a piece of you, it is you, it becomes part of who you are. The day I got robbed at gunpoint is a day that hasn’t had time yet to turn into a scar, but its already part of me, its already forming its way into the fabric of my self, teaching me something.