Mom, I’ve arrived

“Send me an e-mail when you arrive” were the last words that I heard from my mum before the horrible adventure I had those days.
It was two years ago, on March the 7th when my school trip was starting. We were supposed to go to a beautiful beach in Australia. All my family came with me to the airport: my parents, my brother and my two sisters, my grandparents and one of my uncles. My family and I were very happy about this opportunity because it was going to be the first time that I was going out of the country. And it finally happened, but not like my partners and I expected.
I said good bye to my family and I went to do the check-in. It was the first time I was going to fly in a plane so I was a little bit nervous. I sat next to one of my friends Alfredo Alejandro, who was scared too. The plane took off normally (that was what the stewardess said) and we were enjoying the trip until one of the pilots came out of their cabin and said something to the stewardess. And just then the odyssey started. The pilot wasn’t very calm so I got worried and after a few minutes the disaster on the plane occurred. All the people that were there started to shout, scared and we didn’t know what to do. The plane was making terrible noises, so loudly that we couldn’t bear it. We were in a turbulence zone.
The stewardess and one of the pilots tried to calm down the passengers but it is impossible to make people relax when they are in a dangerous situation. The plane was in the middle of nothing and the pilots didn’t know what to do. They had only one choice: land as soon as they could. We had to make an emergency landing in a desert island close to Africa.
The plane was destroyed. Luckily, we were all safe but one pilot and my French teacher were injured. In the first hours we suffered a lot, we didn’t have anything to eat or drink and it was very difficult to survive. But our teacher knew a lot about nature and started to investigate the island. She found a river where we could drink water and some trees and plants where we could get fruit or vegetables. I remember that I had to eat lots of apples and bananas.
So we were just there, on a desert island, lots of teenagers with our teachers and totally lost. The first night we all cried, missing our families and I remembered what mum said before I had gone: “Send me an e-mail when you have arrived”. And now, she would be sad, without knowing if I was ok. And that was the worst night I have ever had in my whole life.
On the next day, we discussed what we should do and what the rescue group might be doing or thinking. We thought that they might not knew where we were and we couldn’t let them know our location because all the machines of the plane where totally destroyed. But we realized that they knew the route of the plane so they would have to pass over the island even with a helicopter. So we decided to start a fire with the machines that didn’t work and to keep the fire alive along the day. To make the fire bigger we picked wooden trunks. This was a good activity because we spent time doing that.
And this worked! After a few hours, a helicopter was flying like 50 miles near the island and thanks to the smoke of the fire; the pilot got closer to the island to see what was happening and saw us. All of us were jumping and shouting of happiness.
The rescue group gave us water, food and clothes because we were cold. They called more helicopters that were near the area and they took us to a hospital in Ethiopia to give us vaccines and to cure the injured men like the pilot and my French teacher. The rescuers told us that we were in a volcanic island, which was very dangerous because it was an active area. After the next day, by dawn, I finally arrived in my country, where my family was waiting for me and instead of weeping I embraced my mum and said to her:” Mum I’ve arrived, I’m at home”

Pen-name: The Tower
Category C