Lost in New York

Monday afternoon.... I get a call from Mom.  She says she's lost in New York. 

For whatever reason... she was riding a train and got kicked off cuz she didn't have enough fair.  And in the worst case scenario, she only had 10% of battery life left on her phone.  There's no Wi-Fi.  She's waited at that train station for 2 hours without any cars stopping.  And she barely speaks English!! 

In all honesty... she's a grown woman, who's lived in the US for 30+ years.  She'll figure something out.  So I wasn't entirely worried... .but I was still worried.

Finally got a hold of big bro... and told him the situation.  His first reaction was...tell mom to stay put.  He'll go look for her.  Of course... mom did not stay put.  Of course... her phone died and I couldn't reach her.  And of course.... big bro ended up driving aimlessly for hours looking for a short, Asian lady in the state of New York. 

What do you do? Call the police? Panic? Pray?


The kicker here is... once she got to Flushing... she tried calling from a pay phone to let us know the latest status.  Some kind stranger saw her... and wanted to lend her their phone.  But mom was too paranoid and didn't want to give out my phone number, so she ended up not calling me or big bro.  Which left us in the dark for another hour or two. 

Ultimately... she made it back home.  Turns out she boarded a train that went the opposite direction of the ticket she bought.  Turns out she was walking distance to the subway which could've ultimately led her home.  Turns out she walked over an hour (mom pace) to get to Flushing Chinatown to find her way home.

But man...if someone is lost in New York.  How do you go about locating that person???