Always Share Your Location
A few years ago, when I was 19 and studying abroad in Europe, my friend and I decided to go to Turkey.
It was our first time really traveling on our own without a group and we decided to walk around the square outside of the Blue Mosque. We felt very safe during the day and decided to see the city at night with the lights.
As we were in the square, we were hounded by typical store owners trying to sell us something. Finally, most went away and as we were going back to our hotel, a younger guy approached us.
He said he had a shop on the corner, which he pointed to with lots of souvenirs including carpets. I grew up with a lot of handmade, woven carpets from my parents’ travels to the middle east and Asia.
I decided it would be a nice gift. So, we follow him, when we get to what we thought was his shop, we stopped. We started to walk in and he said not that one, the one around the corner.
We poke our head around and sure enough see a store, only selling carpets. I started to get a slightly strange feeling but nothing overwhelming, so we followed him as we could see the store.
When we walked in, about 13-15 other men were in the shop. They were pointing out carpets and showing us around and I started to get really uncomfortable.
My friend seemed completely at ease, so we followed the group around the bend to the other part of the store.
In Turkey, it is common to be offered tea, so that part is not particularly odd, but the men, who were now circling us, were insistent that we have tea with them in the basement.
I kept saying no but they were leading us towards steps, completely surrounding us.
We got to the steps and my friend started walking down, my body began to sweat, my heart went crazy, and I never had such an overwhelming fear.
I kept trying to think of how we could overpower these men. I grabbed my phone, stopped in my tracks, and gasped.
“Friend’s name, we need to go right now. My mom just texted me asking why we aren’t back at the hotel yet cause the map shows we’re at this store. We’re supposed to Facetime with them in 10 minutes.”
The men kind of look around and tell us we can have tea in less than that amount of time.
I keep insisting that my parents are freaking out because they can tell were in the carpet store and not the hotel and that they will likely contact the embassy if we don’t get going.
They continued blocking the staircase. I told them that we would come for tea in the morning as I still really wanted a carpet and that we needed to get out of the store and back to Facetime.
It took a little persuading but they eventually opened a path for us to go to the door. One of them followed us back to the square insisting that we return/come back and see them. Of course, we didn’t.
I have no idea if they were completely harmless or not but I had never had such an overwhelming feeling. They easily could’ve drugged us, placed us in carpets, and taken us out.
My parents didn’t actually have our location as my phone was on airplane mode. So, who actually knows, on the other hand, I might’ve been paranoid, but it wasn’t a situation I ever wanted to be in again.
Once we were back at the hotel, she told me she was really scared too but that she thought I was fine so she went with it.