One of my colleagues asked me this question when I told her the following story. We were working in Switzerland together and shared the same room. Probably that is the only one lap dancing club in Geneva, not the cabaret type where basically all the prostitutes work. But our club was recently visited by Albanians.
Once I worked in Salzburg. My last night I met two Albanian guys in the club, they were nice and polite and they just mentioned that the next day they travel to Vienna by car. The next day I needed to take the train to Vienna too so we agreed to meet at the train station. The deal was if they come there, they can take me by car, if they don’t, I buy the ticket. They didn’t show up so I was queuing and ready to pay for the trip myself. Suddenly one of them arrived saying sorry a thousand times for the delay but something was wrong with the car. We had a coffee at the station and they said they are waiting for one more guy. He arrived, they helped me with my suitcase, it was pretty heavy and we sat in the car. I was innocent and naïve, and absolutely happy that I don’t need to lift up heavy bags. We even had a good laugh.
After 20 minutes drive, I looked out the window. Something was strange. We should have been on the highway already, but we were still in a suburb area. I started to feel uncomfortable. The red light went on. What if these guys were lying? Am I really in trouble? Calm down, calm down… I looked every possible way to escape and that was a moment when I was even ready to jump out of the moving car if it’s necessary. My heart was beating so fast and I was sweaty.The car slowed down and stood up in a driveway. My hand was on the handle. I was thinking to leave my bag with my passport and all my documents behind and just run. They got off the car and the third guy we were waiting for at the station, lean against my door. He was quite big and strong, I had no chance to open that door. They were talking in Albanian. In my mind, they already negotiated what price they are going to ask for me. I slowly moved toward the other door on the back seat. I was just about to reach the handle when I saw them from the corner of my eyes moving… AND shaking hands! The big guy suddenly turned and looked at me through the window, and said “Bye and good luck in Vienna!” and to the others said thank you for taking him home.
A stone fell from my heart and I could breathe again. I was laughing inside and I was ashamed at the same time. But I learned 2 lessons for a lifetime:
1. Not to judge somebody according to ethnicity, religion or skin colour.
2. I trust my instincts. But it’s more important to use my brain in certain situations.
The two guys took me to the place I needed to go, they even apologised that they couldn’t take me to the door because it was a one-way road and they had no more time to go around. And they didn’t even ask my number or anything. My story ended up in a better way than in the movie. Luckily, because my dad wouldn’t come to rescue me and kill half of the Balkan!