”As a sailor I learned to know many counties with different cultures and political systems. The year 1965, in the port of Valparaiso I had my first confrontation with an authority. It all started with a horrible experience!
I was jailed by the Carabineers (Chilean military police), under charge of the Senator Allende. This happened when I was passing the border control in the port and was accused of smuggling “high tec” private goods, like photo equipment, transistor radios and digital watches, all with origin of Japan.
I told them that it was all for personal use, but they were not listening! The only answer I got was that I had a long jail sentence waiting if I did not pay a “fine” of 3000.USD and all my personal belonging confiscated. First this came as a shock to me as I had planned my trip to Argentina over the mountains of Los Andes.
But my fear changed into anger and I demanded the officer in charge to call the Swedish embassy in Santiago de Chile. At first, he was laughing at me, but a few days later he made the call. I had to stay 5 days and nights before I was released and later escorted to the Argentine border. I was finally free to travel across Los Andes!”
I had made the mistake to not declare that I had all these personal belonging in my luggage’s!
But I had courage to let my fear off, if not I would had lost all of it.
Mistakes give you experience. If you are afraid of failure you will only make more mistakes! Learning by mistakes can be expensive, but it can also be worth it. I still make mistakes, but I will never stop learning.
Life is like a ladder; you must go up and down many times to reach your goals. It is not a shame to be afraid, but you must control the situations to overcome your fears. Examine why you were afraid, and you will overcome it.
Have a good day,
Windmush, Curt
