This is Hidden Brain.
I'm Shankar Vedanta.
In the summer of 2022, a man named Ivan went on a vacation with two friends to Cassandra, a peninsula in Greece.
During the holiday, Ivan was swimming in the ocean when a fierce riptide pulled him away from the beach.
His friends alerted the Coast Guard, but he was swept out so quickly that the search operation failed to find him.
For hour after hour, Ivan struggled to stay afloat.
The currents carried him farther and farther from land.
Eventually, he was treading water about 15 nautical miles from the beach.
It was cold.
Soon it was dark.
Ivan fought to keep his head above water.
The night wore on.
His strength began to give out.
Just as he was about to drown.
The first rays of the morning sun illuminated an object bobbing nearby.
It was a ball.
With his last ounce of strength, Ivan swam to it.
He clung to the partly deflated ball and it helped him keep his head above water.
Hours later, he was found and pulled to safety.
When news of the rescue was broadcast on the news, it caught the eye of a woman in a different part of Greece.