I was in Nepal, at the turning point of a very long trip
Me, my wife, and my (by then) 2 year old son had driven there in a bus, and were about to drive home. We were having dinner in a big, open-sided restaurant in Pokhara with two Dutch couples, and some very nice Swedish guys we'd been hanging out with. My son had finished with his dinner, and was playing with his cars around our feet. Suddenly, we realised we couldn't see him, so we started hunting around the restaurant; he was an adventurous and friendly kid, and we weren't really worried.

We couldn't see him though, so we went back to the table, and 3 of the Dutchies pitched in to help looking. The other, and the Swedish guys, were very stoned and deep in conversation. We searched the restaurant again, asked the staff, checked the kitchen, went out into the street (a dirt track) outside, checked in the shops over the road. There was no doubt about it, he was gone. The most likely explanation was that he had been kidnapped; Madelaine McCann was not yet born, and we were parodying her story. We figured we needed to go to the police station, but it seemed horribly likely that we'd never see him again. I've never known such a feeling of fear; my little blue-eyed boy gone, never to be seen again. We went back to the table to tell the Swedes what had happened, and that we needed to go to the Police station. They looked blearily at us, and about half way through the explanation one of them said "Wait, Sammy? But he's asleep here on the bench next to me......". He had got tired, scrambled up on to the bench, and dozed off, and somehow, the guys had been too stoned to notice us hunting for him in blind panic. I tell you what, you never take your kids for granted after something like that.
(Sammyhaswoefullyneglectedyou, Sun 8 Apr 2012, 17:33, Reply)