As all of you have heard or read by now, the saddening news of the Mumbai attacks. In times like this, you would never ever want to hear a loved one, a friend or an acquaintance being held hostage in such cruel terrorist attacks.
I remembered last Thursday when I met up with my church mate, Ernest for dinner. He looked distraught and he was like, "Yew Ping, our church mate and my cell group friend is being held hostage at Oberoi Hotel as we speak right now and the church leaders and everyone who knows him are praying for him as as well. I was shocked because even though I do not know him personally but I seen him around in church before and was in the same team as him during one of the young adults' bonding events. Prayers was the only way I can help him and we just prayed for his safety. God delivered him from danger after being held hostage in the hotel room for almost 2 days. He just stayed one floor above the Singaporean lady who was being killed. It was that close.
After his ordeal, he sent out a thank you email and testimony recounting his experience to all the church leaders and cell group leaders. The following testimony might be long but, it is a story of how God never ever fails to deliver us from harm's way. A story when the fear of the unknown threatens to overpower all senses, the peace of GOD will and can transcend all fears.
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Dear all,
It is sobering to read on the newspaper what happened in Mumbai the last few days. Many lives were lost and it was indeed a tragedy of colossal proportion. I was staying in one of the hotels attacked and held by the terrorists and it is a great blessing to be brought back unharmed. Thanks to all of you for your support throughout these very dramatic days. Glad to be back seeing all of you again. Stirred but not shaken (haha as James Bond would say) but all is well now. Looking back, there were many junctions throughout this ordeal that if things had gone the other way, would lead to outcomes very different from my present state. But God is in control all the time and his perfect timing and protection brought me home safely. Just a brief account here to share what happened and how your prayers and support had strengthened and encouraged me, providing me with comfort, hope and peace (yes, peace even when bomb blasts shook the building every now and then and gun fire were exchanged, quite unreservedly at times); and of course how God had lovingly moved to protect and keep me out of harm's way. Amidst the mayhem, divine intervention was clearly at work though the prayers of the faithful people of Christ. Praise be to the Lord!
Wed 1000pm: everything seems normal before bomb blasts were heard. I had just finished dinner with my colleague - TJ (boss actually) and returning to the hotel room on the 20th floor for rest. I took a shower and was lying down on my bed reading, rounding off the end of a hard day at work. Certainly seemed like any other days I had during the past two weeks in Mumbai. Everything was normal, just normal, until at around 1020pm a loud booming noise was heard across the hotel. So loud it didn't seem like anything usual at all. My first thoughts were that there could have been an accidental explosion at maybe one of the kitchens on the ground floor, certainly not a bomb blast? Oberoi Hotel was after all quite a posh hotel with reasonably good security: recalling that each time I walk into the building, a tall, imposing-looking Punjabi doormen (with his characteristic turban no less) would greet me and unfailingly direct me to go through a metal detector; a terrorist attack seems quite distant in my mind. And of course Mumbai has been stable for quite sometime.
But this initial confidence evaporated instantaneously when in quick succession more explosions followed. Boom, boom and many more to come! That lasted for the next 10 minutes or so. Looking through the peephole of my door, there was absolutely no indication as to what was going on, caution kept within my room and I remained as clueless. I would later find out that these would be the early minutes of a bloody siege by the heavily armed terrorists. Had we been just a little slower in getting back into our rooms (30 minutes or so), what was to come would without doubt be much more grave.
Wed 1030pm: thick smoke seeped into room, in real danger of suffocation After the initial blasts (intertwined with gunshots) ended, I went back to my bed and continued with my daily reading. Saying a quick prayer for nothing untoward to happen to TJ and me, I quickly settled back into my normal routine as no more explosions were heard and I summarily concluded that it was probably a suicide bombing attack and the worst was already over. Again, it was not to be so. The next series of blasts came at around 1030pm, 15 minutes after the first. My prayers became more fervent, asking God for his protection and help. The drama didn't end here. For before long, fire from the explosions broke out and smoke found its way into my room. Slowly creeping in, what was initially a pale grayish vapor with the unmistakably burnt smell soon filled up the room and it grew in darkness till it became suffocating and also threatening. Darker and yet darker the room became until it was impossible for me to just sit in the room and wait for help to come. I needed to take action, and fast. Calling up TJ's room, he stayed in a separate room on the 15th floor, we decided we should run out of our rooms and head for the fire exit to safety. Once the phone was down, I immediately put on my shoes and take out my passport from the safe, getting all ready for the escape. But alas, when I bolted to the door and looked through the peephole, I could see no nothing and I hesitated. So I called TJ's room again but this time he did not pick up. He executed the plan. When I finally did managed to reach him on his blackberry phone, I was immediately greeted by a panic-stricken voice yelling: "I am now out of the room, but I cannot see the fire exit, I can't see anything!!¨ "Where are you? where are you, which floor? Come to my room, I go find you? What can I do to help?¡¨ words stammered out of my mouth as I just stood there stunned, not knowing what else to do. "I CAN'T FIND MY ROOM!¡¨ he yelled, more urgently now. "I can't find my room, I am outside now but I can't see anything! I can't see anything, I cannot even see my hand in front of me. I am going back to my room but I can't find my room...Yew Ping, I dun wan to die here..¡¨ My blood froze. It was pure desperation. It was at this very moment that I awoke to the reality that we were staring at death face to face! It was no longer just the inconvenience of having to change hotel and not getting enough sleep for the night. In the very next minute or so, a life could just be snuffed out in an instance. This realization shook me hard and I was very much grieved. In my mind, I prayed for his safety. I pleaded with God to keep him safe; his wife and a newly born six-month-old daughter were waiting for him to be back in Singapore. But I hear no nothing in the next few moments. My heart was in my mouth throughout those longest of seconds in my life. After what seemed like eternity, I was choked with relief when eventually he announced that he managed to find his way back into the room. I could almost hear angels singing in the background as he slowly regained his composure! Praise the Lord!
Wed 1040pm: broken window, bleeding ankle The siren of the smoke detector screamed non-stop and using a heavy object I smashed open the sealed window in the room to let in some fresh air as smoke was fast filling up the room thick and choking. I also put wet towels below the door to keep out the smoke. Minutes earlier I had sent out a desperate prayer request sms to Ernest; wasn't expecting any immediate reply as it was quite late Singapore time. So I was pleasantly surprised when he replied not long after earnestly and prayed for me. Much comforted by his words of prayers, I soon found myself in a very deep sense of hope and peace knowing full well that God is with me would protect me. Very thankful to our beloved Cell Group Leader who happened to be awake at that very hour (was it 1am?). Thank God for Ernest. Anyway, a moment of stupidity on my own part foiled any prospect of me getting out of this ordeal unscathed. This moment of foolishness came when I attempted to kick away a piece of glass about the size of a slice of pizza which was still stuck on the window frame. Though wearing shoes, that piece of glass swiftly caught my ankle as I was kicking it and left its mark: a 3 cm wide cut at slightly above my right inner ankle. It was not exactly a big cut and was not particularly painful except that it was quite deep and the wound was pretty ugly and with flesh protruding out from the gash. I thought nothing of it at that time but as it turned out, attending to this wound came to be a major preoccupation throughout the next 16 hours until I was finally rescued from the hotel.
Thur 0000am: terrorist occupying hotel All these while, electricity was still running and I had the lights on. I turned to Psalms after settling down a little post the initial chaotic hours. Reading David's pleading to God as he fled from Absalom in Psalms 3, I felt totally connected and I was much strengthened. At about 12 plus at night, calls and sms from concerned colleague and friends in Mumbai started streaming in after they watched news of the terrorist attack on TV. And we were plunged back into action again when the TV news reported that two terrorists were holed up in Oberoi hotel and there were many other targets throughout the city. Mumbai was on fire!
I switched off all lights in the room and put barricade at the door; our sole survival strategy was simply to keep low and avoid being held hostage and then waiting for the rescue team to come for us, hopefully soon. With the lights out I wasn't able to continue reading, but by then God's promise to deliver me from this whole episode was already very clear to me and His peace was upon me. Such peace that I was ready to be called home. God is in control and he has perfect plans for me no matter the outcome. The rescue team would eventually come to my rescue some 16 hours after the first explosion rocked the building. And throughout these 16 hours, while there were periods of extended quietness and stillness, sporadic bomb blasts and gun shots were ever present to remind us that it was not yet over. Sms and calls from the CG and pastor Andrew lifted my spirits, sustaining me and allowed me to be calm and collected in these very uncertain times of turmoil.
Thur 3pm: Escape from the hotel. Help finally arrived at around 2.30pm the next day when a team of masked commando dressed in army uniform broke into my room and stormed in to secure the place. The sight of these commandoes brought much allayed my fears me but as the terrorists were still lurking within the building, it was rather pre-mature and presumptuous at that point for any form of celebrations. In fact it was not quite over, at least for me. That one moment of foolishness came back to haunt me when we were making our final escape to safety climbing down the fire exit and out of the hotel. See, I lost some blood from the wound. Throughout the 16 hours since I first sustained the injury, blood was continuously seeping out from the laceration, soaking through the towels which I had meticulously wrapped around as improvised bandages. By Thursday morning, every towel I could find in the room had become drenched in crimson blood and I was tearing out strips from the bed sheet for bandages. Applying direct pressure, bandaging, icing the wound and elevating my leg; I did just about everything ever written in any good first aid textbooks that I had ever read. Though the flow was contained and it would have been worst if nothing was done, the room was by the time I left quite a bloody mess with stained towel, pillows and bed sheet lying all over. I never knew that one could have so much blood to lose and through a small wound no less. By noon time Thursday, I was feeling slightly light headed. Much depleted of strength from the bleeding and with only appetite for a bar of chocolate and some fruit juice in the mini-bar, my fuel tank was near empty. We climbed down one floor and linked up with another group of escapees under the escort of the army guys. After a brief break, we were all ready to complete the remaining of the descend. But for me that exertion was too much for my body to bear and it triggered off my internal alarm. With one floor down and 19 more to go, giddiness seized me as I felt blood draining from my head and rushing down. I struggled to keep my eyes open and soon I became disorientated. Instances later, my mind went blank like a sheet of paper and I collapsed into a heap and sat there on the ground while rescuers poured water into my mouth. For a second or two I zoned out. I lost awareness of what happened and why I was there. My eyes were like flickering lights, about to go off completely anytime. The cold water helped, and I didn't just blackout. I regained consciousness after a while and getting back onto my feet I was then very much carried down the rest of the floors by the two poor rescuers. One on my left and the other on my right, they helped out of the hotel into an waiting ambulance. By the time we reached ground floor, sweat was already pouring down their faces. Haha, guess its time for me to lose weight :) Again looking back, God's perfect timing was at work. I was among the last of the first batch of people to be rescued out from the hotel. The next batch (TJ included) stepped out of the place some 24 hours later on Friday afternoon after all the terrorists have been neutralized. Had I been rescued out only by that time, and with bleeding lasting some 40 hours in all, that would have certainly complicate things quite a fair bit. All thanksto God for He is a God who saves.
Conclusion: All in all, this has been a harrowing experience for me personally. I have been much blessed to be coming out of this ordeal relatively unharmed. I'll carry with me many unforgettable memories and lessons from this and I would just like to share these three things that I learnt:
1. God is faithful and he keep his promises, all the time. He is there with me always throughout this most nerve wrecking event and he moves in powerful ways. Praise God for who God is.
2. it is so good to have you guys around, rallying behind me and supporting me in prayers and supplying me with strength and encouragement in these times of need, thank God for all of you, you have been such a blessing. And finally, for practical application: 3. Never try to kick at broken windows even if you had your shoes on!
Rejoice in the Lord always. I say again: Rejoice!
Yew Ping
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The email message brought tears to my eyes. God is a faithful God who saves.
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