Yesterday (Saturday) we went to a place called Wadi Mujib. We went on a hike, and the trail we were on was in a river (in it, not along it). The river really wasn't that deep. There were several "rapids" and waterfalls that we had to go through/climb up. When we were climbing one of the waterfalls, there was an accident.
I had just gotten up the waterfall and had taken a couple steps when I slipped (or something, I'm not completely sure what exactly happened) and I got caught by the current. I could feel myself being pulled down, and I tried to grab hold of rocks or anything I could. I was calling out to one of the guys nearby but he didn't hear me right away. One of the other guys, Logan, saw me and pretty much dove to try and get to me. By this time I was at the top of the waterfall. There were ropes, with a 'danger' sign across the top, I grabbed the ropes, and was trying to hold on, and yelling for help. Logan had almost reached me, he later told me that he was only a couple inches away from hands when I went over. Then, the current pulled me down and the rope from my hands. I went down the waterfall, I know that I swallowed a lot of water, but somehow I got enough air to last me through the fall. I don't remember much. I remember feeling my head hit on the rocks, and getting spun and tossed around and just hitting things. My glasses were torn from my face (I would've been shocked if they had stayed on), and when I came up, everyone was frantically looking for me. Someone, I don't remember who, grabbed me when I came up, to stop me from going any further down the river.
I was really disoriented and just hurt all over. I was wearing sandals (not flip-flops, but actual sandals), and somehow they stayed on my feet. When I said that my glasses were missing and that I couldn't see well without them, everyone that was at the bottom of the waterfall started looking for them. A couple people went almost all the way down the river looking for them. But, we couldn't find them. I stayed behind, with the TAs, Mark and Dana (they had both gone on the same hike last year) while everyone else went on ahead. Dana made sure to check my eyes every so often, to make sure I didn't have a concussion. She also checked my head to make sure I wasn't bleeding. Thankfully my hair was in a ponytail, and where I hit my head was where the ponytail was, otherwise, my head probably would've been bleeding. We just stayed there, sitting on a sand bar-thing for probably an hour.
When everyone came back, they all stopped to see how I was doing. It really scared a lot of people. Especially the guys. I've noticed that they hate seeing any of us girls get hurt. They always feel guilty when it happens too. Logan felt guilty because he saw (as he put it) a look of terror and fear on my face and he was inches away from reaching me, and he saw me, saw my face as I went down/over the waterfall. The guys I was yelling to for help felt guilty that they didn't hear me until it was too late. And the people that were at the bottom felt bad too. One of the guys, Paul, really looked out for me. He was diving down to the bottom of the waterfall looking for my glasses. He also said that if I needed to find new ones, or if I needed to go to the doctor's or anything, he'd go with me. One of my roommates told me that some people were afraid I had died, especially because everyone at the bottom had seen me go over/down the waterfall, but when I hadn't surfaced, they started freaking out; looking for me.
By now, everyone's coming back, I'm sitting in the water, just looking at some of the rocks, and one of the girls, Christina, sits down next to me and starts talking to me (she had been at the top of the waterfall when this all happened, so she hadn't seen me or anything), then, a few minutes later, our friend Marc sits down next to her. Christina and Marc begin picking up rocks and throwing them in the water just in front of each other, when Marc picks something up, pauses and says "Chelsea, I think I just found your glasses." Sure enough, I look over and he has my glasses in his hands. The arms were folded in all nice and neat like, I took them from him, and to my delighted surprise, I saw that they were unbroken and unscratched. This whole time they were only about 3 feet away from where I had been sitting. It seriously was a blessing, (since even though I have an old pair of glasses here, the prescription is from my first pair of glasses, and my eyesight has gotten worse since then, so the prescription wouldn't be strong enough).
Anyway, aside from bruises, aches/pains, a headache, and stuffy ears, there isn't much to indicate that I went through such an ordeal. Yesterday, I wasn't feeling so bad. Today, I woke up and I was sore all over. I also have found random bruises all over my body. But, it really could've been a lot worse. I was just bruised and battered. I didn't have any broken bones, no concussion, my shoes and my glasses came out perfectly fine. I was very fortunate.
I'm here in Jordan with some of the most amazing people I have ever met, and whom I am privileged to call my friends. Everyone on that trip helped me in some way. Even though I honestly wanted nothing more than to have my mom hug and baby me, my friends helped me, and I know that they honestly care about me. Really, I couldn't have asked for better people to be here with, than the people who have become like my family.
Looking back on this incident, I've come to realize something, I must have guardian angels looking out for me, and they've been working overtime.
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