This was in South Africa, a couple of years before the end of Apartheid. White South Africans (as we are) were very much on edge and there was a general sense of unease and almost hysteria about home invasions by disenfranchised blacks. This was not without basis in fact, as many home invasions occurred, some of these in our neighbourhood. They could be very violent and often included killing everyone in the house, killing the animals (especially dogs for obvious reasons), gang raping of the females in the house with the male members of the home being forced to watch, etc. So, not a good time and white people were (understandably) on edge.
Anyway, my parents had gone to a shopping hypercentre (wholesalers) about an hour from our house and I was left home alone as I didn't want to go and I was given the usual lecture about locking up and I remember my dad saying to me, keep this security gate locked AT ALL TIMES. The security gate was on a door that led to a passage that went into their bedroom. Once in the bedroom, there was no other exit.
Anyway, I (female, about 13), went out to play with my dogs in the garden and then I came in to read a book. I neglected to lock the security gate. So, I go into my parent's room, the one adjoining the passage that leads from the security gate, and I lay diagonally across the bed reading, flat on my stomach, with my back to the door. They had a huge vanity thing with a mirror and over my shoulder I caught a glimpse of movement and jumped off the bed. There's a black man standing in the doorway.
All I could think was - 'You left the security gate open. Mom and Dad are going to KILL you.' He's blocking the door, I'm standing on the opposite side of the bed. To say that I was shit scared is understating it. He starts wringing his hands, and says to me - 'Please, I'm looking for work. Any work.' I stammered out - 'Ngiyaxolisa baba, awhuko umsebenzi.' In Zulu that means - 'I'm sorry sir, we have no work/jobs.' In my family we could all speak reasonably fluent Zulu. He turned around, and walked out the way he came. He just left. I was physically shaking and I've never locked a security gate so fast in my life.
It only occurred to me later that he would've had to jump the walls or gates surrounding the property because we had chains on the two gates and reasonably high walls. I never told my parents because they would've taken the skin off my hide. My dad asked me when they got home, 'did anyone pop by while we were out?' Me - 'No.'
I was completely at his mercy, he must have known that. He could've taken everything in the house, I couldn't have stopped him. He just left. Maybe he was shocked by me speaking his own language to him, I'll never know. Very scary experience and I am not denigrating black South Africans in any respect. Those times were what they were. If he was a bad man or just decided to go through with what might have been his original plan, I shudder to think.