phamton
The Other Orlando Themepark
- Joined
- Jul 20, 2002
- Messages
- 10,472
I have mentioned before on other threads that I seem to be a magnet for lost children. Maybe because I have that motherly look (I have 5 kids) or maybe because I was a first grade teacher for many years. Kids just seem to trust me.
Well, I found another child today at Universal. This adds to my collection of lost children from Disneyland (1 child), WDW (4 children), Knotts Berry Farm (1 child), Universal Hollywood (1 child), US Orlando (2 children), and IoA (1 child).
Tonight at 7:30 PM I saw a child walking from MIB all the way past Jaws. At first I thought he was just lagging behind his parents but after watching him, I realized that he was alone. I asked him if he was lost and all he said was "papa." Poor little fellow didn't speak English and I don't speak Spanish but I held up five fingers to guess at his age. He shook his head and held up 4 fingers. I then pointed to myself and said my name and pointed to him and so he said his name was David. I had a store manager call security. Luckily, the security guy they sent spoke Spanish although he couldn't get much more information out of him than I had already gotten.
We waited for a time to see if "papa" would be returning but there was not information of any lost child on the park radio. David wanted me to stay with him and didn't want to go with security so we all walked together to guest services---with David and I hand in hand. It was almost an hour before his father contacted security. I am sure most of the reason was because of the language barrier.
Please if you have a young child, especially one who doesn't speak English, put a dogtag or something on them with your name and your child's name, preferably with a cellphone number. I know many people are worried about putting their child's name on anything because of the fear of abductors calling their name, but, truthfully, you child is much more apt to get lost than abducted at a theme park. There haven't been any documented abductions at the parks but there are lost children every single day.
The good news is that Papa was found and he hugged me as thanks. Little David waved 'bye-bye" to me as he left with Papa no worse for the wear although Papa looked traumatized.
Well, I found another child today at Universal. This adds to my collection of lost children from Disneyland (1 child), WDW (4 children), Knotts Berry Farm (1 child), Universal Hollywood (1 child), US Orlando (2 children), and IoA (1 child).
Tonight at 7:30 PM I saw a child walking from MIB all the way past Jaws. At first I thought he was just lagging behind his parents but after watching him, I realized that he was alone. I asked him if he was lost and all he said was "papa." Poor little fellow didn't speak English and I don't speak Spanish but I held up five fingers to guess at his age. He shook his head and held up 4 fingers. I then pointed to myself and said my name and pointed to him and so he said his name was David. I had a store manager call security. Luckily, the security guy they sent spoke Spanish although he couldn't get much more information out of him than I had already gotten.
We waited for a time to see if "papa" would be returning but there was not information of any lost child on the park radio. David wanted me to stay with him and didn't want to go with security so we all walked together to guest services---with David and I hand in hand. It was almost an hour before his father contacted security. I am sure most of the reason was because of the language barrier.
Please if you have a young child, especially one who doesn't speak English, put a dogtag or something on them with your name and your child's name, preferably with a cellphone number. I know many people are worried about putting their child's name on anything because of the fear of abductors calling their name, but, truthfully, you child is much more apt to get lost than abducted at a theme park. There haven't been any documented abductions at the parks but there are lost children every single day.
The good news is that Papa was found and he hugged me as thanks. Little David waved 'bye-bye" to me as he left with Papa no worse for the wear although Papa looked traumatized.
