My grandmother, ex-husband and I travelled to Egypt about 10 years ago. It was my grandmother's life-long dream to go, and she had the resources and time, but couldn't travel alone (or didn't feel she could), so we all went together.
The day after we arrived, we visited the Great Pyramids of Giza. It was a very hot day in October. I climbed up the pyramid a bit for a picture, and my grandmother, seeing me, decided she wanted to join me. I waved to her, "no" , trying to gesture for her to not come up (because of her fitness and health), but she ignored me. As we posed for the picture, I felt her leaning heavily on me, and as I turned, I saw that she was slumped over and unresponsive. I was scared and I didn't know what to do as I couldn't really turn safely and also catch her fall. A woman, who ended up being an Australian nurse saw what was going on and rushed over. She told me to stay put while she got her husband. Her husband was a police officer who hoisted my grandmother up and carried her off the pyramid.
Off the pyramid, I stood aside as the nurse cooled my grandmother down, and my grandmother came to. An Indian woman walked up to me and pressed a couple of WHO packets in my hand and told me to have my grandmother drink them when she was able to drink, she also stuck around to comfort me. The Australian couple escorted my mother back to the tour bus and eventually we made our way back to the hotel. One of the Egyptian bartenders who'd spent time speaking with us the day before, upon finding out what happened, handed me a bunch of lemons from behind the bar and gave me instructions to give them to my grandmother. People in our tour group from all different races, ethnicities and nationalities asked me how she was doing and when she made a reappearance, checked in on her.
It was simultaneously my worst and best travel experience. The worst because it was so scary, and I was very worried about my grandmother's well-being. The best because I really got to see humanity at its finest.
Read other related questions on Quora:
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from Quora http://ift.tt/1sNDZHs
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