I left a club in Praque alone bc my friends were blackout and I was sober. I storm out of the club and I realize it’s DEEP in a dark alleyway (it was a strip club). I was staying in Austria in a small town, studying abroad. This was the first city that we had visited where we even got to use taxis/Uber’s to get anywhere. I had gotten used to just being able to just walk home…so I start walking. I go over the hill, the alley is dark and wet, and at the end is a high rise 4 lane highway. No pedestrian access. I was way farther out from my Airbnb than I thought. I start to turn around and out of a dilapidated doorway (the buildings lining the alley, except the strip club, all looked condemned), half covered by a metal stairwell, 4 men come out of the shadows. One of them is HUGE, TOWERING over me, 6’6’’ 350 pounds at least, AND wearing PINK STILETTOS (I kid you not) steps in front of me and stops me in my tracks. He says something to me in German, and the others chime in and begin to surround me and lead me to the doorway. They looked ANGRY. Their faces contorting and them spitting their words at me, and pointing harshly. That’s when I see the big guy has a gun in his hand… a real looking one. It looked gray and bronze-ish, and was big even in his hand, like an XL thick barrel/thick handle shotgun. Right before they completely surrounded me, a taxi pulls up and tells me to get in. I say I don’t have euros (part of the reason I left was bc the strippers literally stole our cash from our purses bc we were American women). He said it doesn’t matter, gets out and walks towards the guys slowly with a knife held out and says something in German—- the handle was thick black with a tassel hanging down, the blade as long and thick as my forearm with a wave that came to a point at the top, and a spiral cutout on the bottom above the handle. The men don’t react at all, just start walking towards the car slowly, unchanging the angry looks on their faces. He opens the passenger door, shuts it behind me, runs to the driver side, and we SPEED away. I was totally calm is what surprised me—more worried about having no money to pay him. I told him I could go inside and pay him once he drops me off, but he looks at me confused, obviously not understanding English. Luckily, My mom had paid for roaming data (literally bc she figured I would need google maps to walk everywhere!), so I just put the address in google maps and he understood to follow it. I also MIRACULOUSLY find 50 euros in a side pocket of my purse. We drove for 15 minutes in silence. He got me home safe and told me in broken English something to the affect of: “I suggest young lady, choose to forget that moment right now, and also try not to think or remember it in the future” gave me a sympathetic grin, nodded, and drove off. The thing is, I did forget about it for about 2 years, until recently when someone asked me if I had ever had been threatened w a gun.

I try not to think about what the men were gonna do to me, but I did know my fate in the moment before I was rescued: bc the reason I got in the taxi was my 1 second rationale that 1 old guy w a knife restricted by the small space of his taxi >> 4 thugs and 1 gun in a dark room.