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I almost got killed last night. Really. I am so bloody lucky I live to see today. It was the mother of all near-misses.

What Happened?

Well, the eight of us were out for the Roger Waters concert last night. And a post concert dinner at PG’s apartment on the fifth floor of a building in Santa Cruz. And when it was time to go, the eight of us got into one elevator. And yeah, the elevator got stuck at what would be the equivalent of 1 point 5^th floor. Ironically, it stopped the moment I started telling a story about how I had got stuck in an elevator a few days ago. So once stuck for more than a perfunctory amount of time, it was time for panic to build up. The alarm button was resorted to in all earnest. Which bought the night-watch-guard to attention. And that’s when things started to go really bad. The guard as expected had no frigging idea what to do, but unlike how most people in his situation would react, he turned out to be one helluva cowboy-sans-the-boots-and-the-hat dude. Trigger happy to the bottom of his heart. Mr. Watch-Guard did not have the keys to open the outer elevator doors, which would have immediately bought us to safety. So he decided, without telling us, that the elevator needs to be brought to terra firma. Off goes Mr. Cowboy to the elevator controls at the top of the building, and does godknoeswhat. The result is, the mother of all horrors. It releases the elevator into a free fall, (yes, an absolute free fall!!!) and the elevator we are in, crashes onto the ground floor landing with a resounding crash and flying cement ash. All of us almost die of shock. I mean, FUCK! And then it sinks in, we were in a free falling elevator, and to make things look more the ‘Hollywood gory teen flick’ type, the emergency brakes that all elevators are supposed to have do not engage!!! Now what are the chances of that?

Full Scale Panic.

Nobody is hurt. Nobody thinks she/he is going to be sick. So far, so good, not dead. But the ordeal does not end there. In-fact it gets worse. Frantic mobile phone calls later, we have a couple of PG’s flat-mates down at the ground floor, trying to get help. But then, Mr. Cowboy-watch-guard hasn’t given up yet. Mr Cowboy wants to raise the elevator again, and take it back to the first floor where he apparently has managed to open the outer doors. The Panic gets worse. Communication starts breaking down. The frigging elevator is gonna fall again. We all know it. Don’t let it move from where it already is. Much shouting ensues. Frigging flat-mate of PG, the one who had come out to help us, starts trusting Mr. Cowboy. Much shouting and phone calls happen. Probably the tensest moments of all our lives. Where we went from commanding Mr. Cowboy, to screaming at him, to begging, to screaming, to commanding, to begging.

Thankfully, that particular piece of misfortune does not happen. But then, there are more idiots outside now. People who know nothing about elevators, but who’ve seen too many Hollywood flicks. So weird and scary suggestions start flowing in. Stuff like escaping from the ventilator hole (the one with the fan) on the roof of the elevator. We scream, beg people to call professionals. People think we must be crazy, of from some other planet. Finally we manage to get a dude on the outside try and call the fire brigade. The number does not exist!!! Or so the female at the other end of the line says.

Panic starts to worsen, there are people on the outside, the one’s who are expected to help us out, and these people are idiots. Dumb dorks, who have no clue about the seriousness of the situation. A cowboy of a watch-guard who’s panicked to a state of no wit. A friend, outside, who’s panicked more than us. Somebody asks us from the outside whether we are drunk. I wanted to kill that guy right there.

A phone call then, where it is explained in no uncertain terms that the elevator is not to be moved. And people are only coming out the conventional way.

An hour and a half later, a sleepy dude turns up, a magical lever is pressed somewhere in the elevator shaft, the doors open, and we are out. Alive.