A harrowing tale of incarceration…

What you are about to read is a true story. I wish it was made up, I really, really do. But, no, I did get locked in my bathroom.

Now, I was going to keep this quiet at first as I’m fully aware I’ll be ridiculed for this until the day I die (and beyond, probably) but I can laugh about it now… I think. This is a blow-by-blow account – It’s quite long.

I’m all moved in to the flat now and have been adding bits to make it more homely etc. It was all going so well until Friday morning…

I got up at 8am and was really pleased with myself – I’d woken up without my alarm clock and I didn’t need to be in work until 10.30am so had bags of time to have a stress free morning and stop somewhere for some breakfast on my way to work, I got in the shower and didn’t, I repeat, DIDN’T, lock the door.

I got out of my shower and the bathroom door refused to open. It would not budge. At first, I was extremely calm about the situation, but this only lasted for about a minute, after which I began to pull frantically at the door. I put my dressing gown on went to get my mobile out of the pocket. I was still thinking rationally… I could call my boss. I’d given her the spare set of keys to my flat in case of emergencies. I’d call her and get her to come over and open the bathroom door from the outside. Excellent plan, but there was a problem… My mobile wasn’t in my pocket. I’d left it on the bed. This is when I started to panic… A lot!

I opened my bathroom window and stuck my head out. It’s the first time that I’ve actually opened the window and looked out. I’m on the 20^th floor and nobody else had a window open. I looked down and the usually bustling street below was completely dead – It was Chinese new year.

I sat down for a few minutes to evaluate my predicament.  I came to the realisation that it was bad – I was in a spot of bother or, as the great Alan Partridge would put it – I was up slack alley.

There was nothing else for it. I stood on the toilet, put my head out of the window and shouted ‘HELP!’, I interspersed this with ‘hello’ in Chinese – That’s about as far as I’ve got with the language. There was a few people walking down the street but they couldn’t hear me! I was too high up and even if they did hear me, the chances of them seeing my little head sticking out of a tiny window 20 floors up were slim.

I carried on shouting and shouting and shouting. I had no comprehension of time as I had no phone or watch and I was losing my voice due to shouting.

Somebody in one of the blocks across the road opened their window and shouted something in Chinese. I’ve no idea what they shouted but, even with my extremely limited knowledge of the language, I realised that it didn’t appear to be very nice. I’d guess it was probably something along the lines of ‘shit the fuck up’. The reason I guess this is that immediately after shouting it, they proceeded to slam their window shut AND CLOSE THEIR CURTAINS. Yes, they closed their fucking curtains!

I was absolutely frantic now and my voice was completely shot. At this point, my alarm clock started going off in the bedroom. I knew it must be 930am, which meant I had been locked in there for over an hour. I also realised my new alarm clock doesn’t stop if you ignore it. It goes on, and on, and on until you turn it off.

Eventually, a window opened three floors below me and a young Chinese boy stuck his head out. I shouted hello and waved frantically at him. My hair was now completely dry because Id been in there for so long, but I had no comb or anything. I must have looked a picture. The Chinese boy just stared at me, open-mouthed. After what seemed like an eternity, I managed to persuade him to go and get him mum and I hoped to God that she could speak English. She stuck her head out her window and nodded at what I was saying. I explained that I was locked in my bathroom and she said she’d go and tell the concierge downstairs. I explained to her that we might need the fire brigade and she nodded and left to go downstairs. She left her window open and every now and again, her son would pop his out and stare at me a bit more. Nothing happened for a while and eventually, the boy, or his mum, shut their window. This caused me to worry again… Had she really gone downstairs or was she just humouring me?

I waited and waited and nothing happened. I decided that I should go back to shouting out of the window, just in case the woman downstairs had just gone to put the kettle on and laugh and me.

I could then hear my mobile going off. I realised that it was probably work wondering where I was. This now meant I had been in there for well OVER TWO HOURS.

Eventually, my doorbell starting ringing and then loud banging on my front door! How the fuck was I supposed to answer?!? I now had my alarm clock going off, my mobile ringing, my doorbell continuously ringing and banging on my front door. I was shouting that I was locked in the bathroom, blah, blah, blah. They couldn’t hear me.

I went back to the window and carried on shouting. After a while, I heard “hey. Are you ok?” I frantically looked outside at all the other apartment blocks around me but couldn’t see anyone. I shouted to ask where she was and eventually was able to make out a girls head sticking out of a window across and down the street. I couldn’t believe it! Finally, someone to help me! I shouted across the street and explained my predicament and explained that my boss had a spare set of keys. “No problem. I’ll go and get them”, said my new friend, Olivia. I shouted my boss’s home address and explained that it was only a five minute walk. I had to repeat certain parts every time a car went past but eventually I got it over to her. I said to her “Do you know where that is?” Olivia replied that, no, she didn’t know where it was. Shit. I needed a new plan.

I shouted across the company website address and asked Olivia to call the number on there, explain the problem and ask whoever picks up for my boss’s mobile number. Olivia went inside to get the info from the internet and came back to tell me she had found the number and was going to call. Excellent! I was relieved. Finally my ordeal was coming to an end.

At this point, I heard another noise. It was a man’s voice. ‘This is the police. Please let us in”.

A million things starting going through my mind. Why had the concierge called the police and not the fire brigade? Had the woman downstairs thought I was mad and was trying to jump from my  bathroom window? Were the Chinese police going to kick my door down, arrest me and put me in a cell because they though I was trying to kill myself?

I shouted (the best I could) that I couldn’t let them in as I was locked in the bathroom. The policeman shouted back “you’re locked in your bathroom?” I told him that, yes, I was really locked in my bathroom. The policeman shouted back to me “what shall we do?” The police were asking ME what THEY should do! Jesus.

I could hear muffled voices outside between the police and the concierge but they weren’t involving me. The banging started again on the front door and the policeman again asked me what they should do. I shouted to go and see if next door were in – I can see their front room window from my bathroom window so it meant we could talk to them properly. I knew they had knocked on next door as their dog started barking (yet another noise to add in to the mix).

Olivia shouted back from he window. She had got through to my boss and she was on her way over with the keys (I’ve since found out that the person who took the call at work thought it was a prank call at first. Olivia had to convince them it was genuine!)

Next thing I know, the police have got in to next door and have opened their bathroom window – The window was next to mine so I still couldn’t see who I was speaking to. I had to explain the whole bloody saga to them again and they explained that they were going to knock down my front door so they could get me out. They said they had to inform me before they did it as there would obviously be a large cost incurred to get it fixed again. I shouted “NO!” and explained that they didn’t have to do that as someone was on their way with keys to let me out.  This really confused the policeman – “So you’re not locked in the bathroom, sir?” Jesus. I explained that yes, I was locked in the bathroom BUT someone was on the way to sort it. The policeman went quiet for a few seconds and then said “so, we’ll break down the door to get you out”. NO! Please don’t. This was crazy as I now appeared to be happy to be locked in the bathroom.

I then head a key in the door and my boss shouted they were here and not to worry. They kicked my bathroom door down and I was free from my incarceration in the bathroom… Over three hours after I first went in there.

It took me a few hours and a lot of tea to calm down. I owe my freedom to Olivia!

A final piece of information… I’ve actually realised/been reminded that this was in fact the third time I have been locked in a bathroom…

AJG

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