I was squashed between two large men in
the back of the police car and the one
man continued to ask me how much income
my dad makes and the other man put his
hand on my leg and made a joke about how
he's always wanted to have sex with a
South African for me this was the first
kind of time I'd ever experienced any
form of feeling like I had nowhere to
move it was pure oppression let me give
you some context here being a white
South African kid living in the 21st
century
I'd never been faced with any form of
oppression being stuck in that moment
felt like wanting to fight but having no
arms to punch with it felt like as much
as I shouted no one could hear me no one
even looked at me like I was some test
patient in a lab standing isolated
facing an army of armed men running
towards me it felt so crippling that
before the tears could surface the fear
of showcasing vulnerability plugged my
tear glands
I couldn't breathe it was like having a
constant panic attack but knowing that I
had to act half normal to get home
safely at the end of the day all in one
second I appreciated each and every form
of love and respect I'd previously
experienced in my life it's time to tell
the story of an event that really took
me up a few years ago I've mentioned it
on a few different occasions on
different videos like how much time did
you spend on an Indonesian jail got into
a lot of trouble there but until today
haven't felt ready to share it with you
brace yourself for a deep one
[Music]
[Applause]
because today is the 4th of July
Independence Day in America I'm gonna
pay my respects by wearing my American
onesie
however I'll always support South Africa
but America's opened up some new doors
for me which I'm eternally grateful for
and therefore I'm going to pay my
respects I'm making this film in my
bedroom because of the fact that I don't
really feel comfortable doing it
anywhere else I'm gonna start right from
the beginning so exactly ten years ago
at the end of June I'd saved up some
money after school by doing a couple of
TV ads like McDonald's but that's a
story for another day with a group of
mates tiga Dena Mitchell AB Jase we
decided to travel to body to go surf and
have a gap year and then after parting
loads and traveling through the surf
spots and barley we decided we wanted
more we wanted to travel further so he
rented a car and decided to make our way
up to an island called Sam Bauer we went
up the east and west coast of summer I
was surfing it was amazing it was just
pure bliss just the perfect lifestyle of
no attachments to anything we spent
about two weeks there after that we
started running out of money and was
time to head back to Bali and just hang
out there so we took to the road we are
driving through a town called Impe and
it was my turn to drive so I took to the
wheel I got to a narrow road where there
was a horse cart on the other side and
three scooters pulled out and I was
looking at this guy head on let me draw
it for you quickly
he has my car moving this way this is
the horse cart and this bike it came out
and tried to get through this gap here
he heads into my windscreen going about
60 clubs is now on his side so in total
it's a it's quite a big crash my first
reaction was to get out of the car and
run to see if everything was okay but
within minutes
men speaking ba saw which is the local
language we're running around with
machine
teas and rifles for hunting and the
whole situation just got really scary
really quickly as soon as the
authorities arrived they said it's time
for us to go down to the police station
but now it's the first time that I
started feeling oppressed by a system I
was trying to explain the story from my
side and English and they were basically
saying no no no no this is what happened
and explaining that I was driving on the
wrong side of the road and that I'd
crashed into the biker which is
impossible because then I would have hit
the horse cart it's about 8:00 p.m. now
then what happened is we saw three
really new police vans and his big man
got out the car and they could all speak
English the main guy's name was Sonny he
said to us that he's part of the
tourists police so we immediately
believed him he said he would help us we
just got to take a trip with him down to
some bough of a saw I got into the back
of the police van and they said that I
should be with them in the car and that
the others should drive our broken
vehicle with the windscreen is
completely when you fly into Bali the
first thing you see in the airport is
massive signs that say drugs equal death
penalty I started getting really [ __ ]
scared to carpooled up there at about I
would say 4 a.m. at the time we arrived
the police station was in the front and
then the jail cells were at the back and
the strangest thing was is no one was
wearing uniforms there were kids walking
around that had guns they told us to
park our car and to wait there until the
morning I made the first contact with my
parents to say look what's happened they
started notifying the South African
embassy at around 5 a.m. a man rocked up
to say that he could speak fluent
English and that he was there to be our
translator
his name was Ari at 6:00 a.m. when they
opened the police station they put me in
my own room I was in this police station
the entire day
explaining the story over and over what
had happened they asked for about 20,000
ran from us in total which is about
$1,500 that would be to pay as a
donation to the family we were totally
down for this as much money as we had we
handed over at about 5:00 p.m. I went
outside and I started speaking to tiga
and he said that he may be wrong but he
heard one of the police officers
mentioning the word marijuana and in
that policeman's hand was a brown paper
bag there was there was kind of nothing
I could do about this day then said they
came out and they said look I need to
come right back inside because they need
to start taking photographs of me so
they pulled me into the room and they
were telling me to smile and to pose in
all these different ways during this he
said I could leave but I need to go and
fetch the car and bring it out front for
final inspection when I got to the car I
noticed that the rubber piece on the
passenger side of the window was missing
I'd immediately opened the cubbyhole and
when I looked inside
and the CDs that we had bought dad
removed and in the plastic sleeve they
had shoved a whole bunch of weed I can't
put it into words the way like the
overwhelming sensation of fear I I look
back and I remember seeing tiga and then
Jess was in the back just completely in
tears and we kind of all knew what was
going on but no one was saying anything
I remember picking up my cell phone and
phoning my dad and saying dad we have
just been caught in a drug scam and he
said to me Daniel grab your passport and
can run the gates to the police station
were open and there was some kind of a
parade happening outside and I slowly
walked and as soon as I got to the the
gate to the police I just turned around
and started running as fast as I could
and behind me was Dena J Stiga Mitchell
all running down the streets now in
front of us there was this massive
roadblock that they now it's all
starting to make sense
as we're anning that this roadblock was
put in place because they were gonna let
us drive out of the police station and
catch us for drug smuggling right
outside the police station which is the
death penalty we ran down the road as
far as we could then took a side road
and then where one of the Vodafone shops
are in like a shipping container put our
things beneath it and hid under the
container in the gap and then Mitchell
had a number of a lawyer and body that
he had met on the plane a man called Tim
and this man Tim got a local from Bali
to jump on a scooter get on a ferry go
through Lombard get on another fare he
come to some Bower and come and pick us
up one by one and hide us away as soon
as all of us got into this room I
remember we pushed the cupboards up
against the windows and the
heads against the doors just so freaked
out like we hadn't eaten one of these
cars from the police station how to find
us it would be game over it would take a
South African embassy two days to get
there so we had a sit in this place and
just wait in this time just waiting
there it's it's crazy how much you start
to appreciate the small things the South
African embassy flew out I remember when
they arrived that morning they knocked
on the door there was three of them
there they were armed it was like seeing
a savior you know if they said look we
have come here to rescue you you've been
caught in a drug scam we need to fly you
out immediately with a South African
embassy we had to drive about another
five hours to get to a private Airport
to finally get ourselves back to body
[Music]
I don't think that I truly faced when it
happened like right now I can ever
return to some power I was so lucky that
everything fell into place the way that
it did I guess I just want to use the
story as an S and for everyone else I
know that it's a big thing on YouTube
right now to show this like recluse
travel but certain restrictions have
been put in place for a reason
thank you for listening to this long
story it was something that I just
really needed to get off my chest
loads of love for you Bree and I'll see
you next Wednesday
[Music]