One of the scariest moments of my life happened a few years ago when I was hiking in the hills near Kandy, in Sri Lanka. I was nineteen and had gone with two friends from university to walk to a waterfall that we'd seen on social media.
We'd started late, around two in the afternoon, which was our first mistake. The path was steep and muddy, and the waterfall was further than we'd thought. By the time we started walking back, it was getting dark, and then it started raining very heavily, as it often does there in the afternoon. Within twenty minutes, the path had turned into a stream, and we couldn't see the markers any more.
What really scared me was the moment we realised we were lost. It was almost completely dark, our phones had very little battery, and we could hear the river getting louder below us. I remember my heart pounding and my hands shaking. My friend Dilshan slipped and cut his knee, and I thought, for a moment, that we might have to spend the night there.
I dealt with the fear by trying to focus on practical things. I suggested we stop moving, because walking in the dark was more dangerous than staying put. We switched off two phones to save battery and used the third as a torch. Eventually, we heard a dog barking and followed the sound to a small tea plantation, where a worker's family let us shelter until the rain stopped. Since then, I've always checked the weather and set off early, and I've learned that staying calm is the most powerful thing you can do when you're frightened.