My 8th grade class went on a trip together after graduating from Middle School. We had just arrived in New York City, and stepped off of the bus. As my friends and I stood in awe of a place we had never been—looking around and waiting for the rest of the bus to unload—we noticed a scraggly looking man in a trench coat walking right towards us. Being in a huddle of all girls, and not having any adults off of the bus yet made us very wary of what was about to happen. We all of course, fresh out of Byron Center, Mi had on our name tags saying who we were and where we were from. As this down right scary man approached our circle, walked in the middle of us and said “Hi Lisa, hi boys!” My friend Lisa freaked out! “How did that guy know my name she said?” Of course none of us could figure it out. We all stood there basically shaking in our boots as everyone else filed off of the bus one by one. Eventually my Dad who went on the trip with my class got off of the bus and we told him what happened. He starting laughing at us, shook his head and went to help unload the luggage for over 100 kids. We stood there, still in shock and ever paranoid now as this same scraggly man now walked up to my Dad unloading bus, opened his trench coat and talked to my Father. We were all screaming in horror now as this strange and scary man was flashing my Dad right by the bus as we unloaded in New York City, NY! My Dad calmly walked away and back to us explaining the man simply was trying to sell him NYC watches and jewlery in his coat. My Dad also went on to explain that the man new our friend Lisa’s name as we were all wearing our lovely name tags! Goes to show you how naive and blind you really are to city life when you come from the sticks!
