The Hijacking

For the first time in my life, I experienced the feeling of pure helplessness in a situation.  Last week while traveling by bus from Foz do Iguaçu to São Paulo, we were overtaken by hijackers.  Each time I recount this event, I feel like I’m talking about a cheap action film with Keanu Reeves, but this is real.  I thought about not posting about it here, but then I realized how much this goes to show how God is in control and I’m not.

I bought a ticket for my first real Brazilian travel experience other than on a plane, a 17 hour bus ride across the state of São Paulo.  These bus rides typically stop at several bus stations en route and also stop for meals along the way.  (In Brazil, there are places that would be similar to truck stops in the States, but are set up especially for busses to stop and eat.)  So I jumped on the bus one evening and settled in for what I expected to be a long, uneventful trip through the night.  We left at 7:15 PM and were set to arrive in São Paulo at Noon the next day.  At about 10 PM we finished up dinner and got back on the road.  We were in the middle of nowhere and so I got comfortable and was planning to get some shut-eye for a few hours, or at least attempt to sleep.

About 30 minutes into my nap, I awoke to the sound of a man yelling.  I was a bit ticked, thinking what in the world is this guy doing yelling like this on the bus in the middle of the night.  After all, any normal person would be trying to sleep right now.  I came to I realize that this wasn’t just some dude with a gripe because all the people in front of me had their hands on their heads.  I thought, is this some kind of joke?  What is somebody hijacking us?

Well, as it turned out, yes was the right answer to that question.  Now I could hear a man from the front of the bus yelling for everybody to put their seats up and put their hands on their heads if they didn’t want to get shot!  Whoa!  Get shot?  Who wanted to get shot?  Take my money, but don’t shoot me!

Immediately, I was in prayer mode.  There were women and babies on this bus.  Old ladies and old men.  There were young boisterous men up front too.  I was petitioning the Lord for safety.  I was asking for strength and courage in case I was confronted by the bandits.  I was praying for my stuff to not get stolen (my passport and wallet and some cash were in my backpack under the seat, but looking back I was definitely selfish in this area, praying mostly for myself and not for the belongings of the others)  I was claiming joy in the Sovereignty of my creator.  I was praying for God to get some glory out of this.

I never actually saw the bandit, but I knew he was there because he kept yelling.  Later on that night one of the men on the bus who was awake as we were being hijacked told us how it happened.  Apparently, a car pulled up beside the bus and waved the driver to pull over with a gun pointed at him out the window of the car.  Then the man got on the bus with the gun.

After driving for about 5 minutes down the road, a car passed us and pulled off the side of the road and the bus followed.  Soon after stopping, another man got on the bus.  Now is when it began to get interesting.  One man stayed in the front with the driver keeping him in line in his driving with a gun pointed at him, while the other man came back with the passengers and began the pilfering.

Now the bandit was waving his pistol around in the air, screaming about how crazy he was and not scared of anything.  He demanded now that we all put our heads down, still keeping our hands behind our heads.  He began going person to person starting at the back of the bus, feeling necks and hands for necklaces and rings as well as demanding cell phones and cash.  Each person he yelled at, but I couldn’t understand anything at this point.  At first this made me a bit more fearful, but then I thought, well, this should be easy if I can’t understand what he’s saying to me!

He got to me and felt my neck and then yelled at me.  I think it was something about a cell phone, but I’m not sure.  My cell and cash were in my backpack under the seat where he couldn’t see them.  I had pushed them back as far as possible with my feet before he got to me.  I looked at the man, not really knowing what to do, holding my hands up in the air…I said in English that I spoke English, which he wasn’t really impressed with at the moment.  So I got a gun to my face.  At the time there was not much to think about, but looking back, this is one of the most intrusive feelings I have ever experienced.  It is not often that we have times when we know that our life is completely out of our hands or that someone could that easily end it.  The bandit grabbed my ring while still on my hand, which is titanium, so not shiny at all and doesn’t look fancy either and apparently decided that he wasn’t interested in wasting his time trying to communicate with a gringo.  Praise God for this and he moved on.  Instantly I had relief.

When the bandit got to the front of the bus it was all over.  They had gotten what they wanted and so the bus stopped and they got off.  The bus driver kept driving then until we got to the next toll station where we stopped and called the federal police.  They showed up and an hour later we were on our way again, São Paulo bound…

The rest of the trip was uneventful as I had initially planned.  I spent it meditating on the recent event.  I spend much time in Psalm 91, praise God for his protection, on not only me, but on everybody on the bus, that nobody got hurt.  And God was glorified.  As we recounted the events amongst each other the rest of the trip, I took every opportunity I had to tell the other passengers that God had protected us and of my prayers for such.  And I thanked God with them for this.

JAE