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Asked by u11yatesm to Debbie, Glyn, Jon, Kat, Nicola on 11 Mar 2013.
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Debbie Crockard answered on 11 Mar 2013:
I recently found myself stuck in the middle of Germany, with no phone, very little money and I can’t speak a word of German!
I was taking part in a charity bike ride from London to Hamburg and had hurt my knee so was in the van with our support – however – one of the other cyclist had a really bad fall and broke her leg so I got out to let her in so she could be taken to the hospital. I then had to try and figure out how to get to the next meeting stop to find the other cyclists, this led to me having to do a Thomas the tank engine like mime to get directions to the train station – the lovely German lady looked at me like I was a bit crazy but I found my friends and finished the ride, so it worked out alright in the end.
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Nicola Fletcher answered on 11 Mar 2013:
This is the best one I can think of (I’m sure there must be better ones so I’ll let you know if I think of one!)
I was brushing one of the horses I sometimes work with, one evening in his stable. His tail was quite tangled so I was getting all of the tangles out. He must have been feeling very nice and relaxed (he had just had his dinner) as he suddenly stretched his leg out and trapped me between his foot and the wall. He was making lots of grunting noises – he must have been enjoying his stretch very much – and I was squealing at him to get his foot off me. Some people who were working in the stables heard me squealing and came over to see what was the matter. When they saw me and the horse they all fell about laughing and I felt like a right idiot. See, I told you it was a silly story!
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Kathryn McMahon answered on 11 Mar 2013:
It depends what you mean by a tricky situation. I started a PhD working on plant science and decided after one year that I didn’t want to do it anymore (it didn’t interest me as much as I hoped, and I realised I wanted to work on human disease). It was really scary telling my boss and the people I worked with that I wanted to leave, and then also quite scary finding a new PhD at a different university and leaving all my friends behind. It all turned out for the best in the end though, as the second PhD I started, I absolutely loved.
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Jonathan Stone answered on 11 Mar 2013:
I was doing my first ever night shift at the Montserrat Volcano Observatory. I had to watch the instruments and if necessary pick up a phone and recommend that the police sound a siren for people to evacuate their homes. It was raining heavily and I couldn’t see the volcano very well. Suddenly there was a pyroclastic flow which thankfully didn’t get that close to where people live, but it did set fire to a lot of trees near the volcano. It was pretty scary, and I felt a lot of responsibility, but I had to make a decision on whether or not to sound the siren. Thankfully I had a great team of other volcanologists who I could call and we all helped each other out.
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Glyn Barrett answered on 11 Mar 2013:
I was in Thailand with my sister once and we were staying on this little remote island in the middle of the ocean. We went for a long hike across the island right to the other side and thought it would be a good idea to come back by walking back another way, by following the coast. We ended up having to climb across cliffs which were made of very sharp and steep rocks. It took much longer than we expected and it began to get dark so we were in a really dangerous place on an exposed cliff face at night!
We quickly turned around and got out just in time with some cuts and bruises.
It was my idea and I don’t think my sister has forgiven me yet :OP
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