mar 1, 1990 - Keizo Funastu gets lost in a blizzard

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"I went outside to feed the dogs. It wasn't bad at first, only negative twenty-five degrees Fahrenheit. When I left the tent, I was happy. Happy about just how close we were to our destination. After three thousand seven hundred twenty-five miles, we were just sixteen miles from the Soviet base. But the dogs needed my utmost attention now. I needed to keep my attention on the present. When I finished feeding the dogs, I turned back for the camp. But it wasn't there. The dogs behind me disappeared, too. A blizzard had arrived, and I was blinded by white from all sides. I couldn't walk straight ahead. The wind was so strong, but eventually I was knocked down. I crawled on my stomach to where the camp should've been. I crawled and crawled, but nothing came closer. I carried pliers to help unfreeze the dog collars and fix broken ones. So I used them to dig a hole in the ice. The ground was so hard, almost impossible to dent. But I dug for hours and managed to put myself in a little ditch. It barely kept the wind away. The wind and snow kept my clothes tight to my skin. There was no room for warmth. I thought to myself, 'Very few people have this experience: lost in the blizzard. Settle down. Try to enjoy this.' I felt Antarctica. Her snow covered me like a mother's womb. I could hear my heartbeat. Boom, boom, boom. My life seemed very small compared to nature, to Antarctica. But I couldn't die. My death would be a real shame. A big, deep shame. I simply could not die. I was in a ditch when I thought I heard somebody yelling my name. The storm hadn't let up at all. But I heard this: 'Keizo. Keizo.' I yelled back, 'I am here! I am here!' I heard it reply, 'I see you, Keizo.' I yelled, 'Yes! Yes! Over here!' And slowly... a man stepped out from the white. But not any man. Not any of my team members. He was... just human. That's the best I can describe him. I ran as fast as I could away from him. And then I saw Will, our team leader, almost immediately. If Will had been my imagination, I would have been lost again. Then I would have surely died. It made me very happy to see my friends looking for me in the blizzard. I felt their love. Everybody was crying. Yes, I cried, too."
-Keizo Futashu, read by Hugo Futashu

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