On my vacation in August 2005, I had the
opportunity to go with my sister and my mother to Mexico. We went because my
mother was visiting her best friend, who is from Mexico City. We would get to
the city and she invited us to see Acapulco. When we were in Acapulco, we went
one morning to a beach called Condesa, which is on the Pacific Ocean. The water
that day was very turbid. My mother’s fiend was trying to touch the water with
her feet but the tide was so strong. She fell in the water with all her
clothing because of the rip current.
My
sister and I were sunbathing and waiting for the tide to
calm down. I decided to go in first I did not care that the
water was so wavy. When I was inside the water, I
realized that the tide was rising and the waves were
getting bigger. I thought about
leaving the water. I made some gestures to my sister. I was telling
her to not to come into the water but she did not understand.
When we
were together I told her I was tired. I
had been trying to get out the water for a few minutes, but the tide would not
let me. My mom hadn't worried because we had taken swim lessons when we were
children. She was sunbathing with her friend. I tried to swim back to shore but
I couldn't do it because the water current took me back to inside the ocean. My
sister saw a rope and she went to take it. She was waiting for a wave to take
her out the water. She swam to shore and she put one foot on the shore while
was walking fast with the rip current. Meanwhile I was still clutching the
rope, waiting to be strong again and do what my sister
did.
I was
waiting to take a wave and swim fast to the shore but the tide was so strong
that I couldn't get out of the
water on my first attempt. I gestured to my sister because I was tired. I did
the same again without force. I took the wave and with the current water, I put
one foot on the shore and my sister took my hand and took me out of the water. I
spent more than ten minutes trying to get out the water. I was tired and couldn't
believe that the beach didn’t have lifeguards.
I told my
mother that I almost died by the strong tide and was struggling to get out the
water. She was surprised; she had been talking with her friend while I was
inside the beach. When he returned to Venezuela and saw my dad, I told him what
had happened to me. I said, "Acapulco is a place that I will not visit
again."
by Sthefany Urdaneta