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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 June 2000 Issue No. 485 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 June 2000 Issue No. 485
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Features Travel Living Sports Profile People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Lost and found
By Fayza Hassan
A number of years ago, my daughter's best friend came to stay with us for a short holiday. She had lived in Cairo sporadically and, when she announced that she was going to take the metro downtown, I did not feel inordinately concerned. In fact, I should have been, since a few minutes later she returned in tears. The unthinkable had happened. As she was walking towards the station, a motorcycle had come hurtling down the street; the driver had slowed down slightly, just long enough for his companion to grab the young woman's bag. She had lost her papers, money and a few gold trinkets.
At the time, I had heard similar stories from our cleaning ladies, but since they had invariably been followed by a demand for a hefty loan, I had stopped paying them any attention and assigned bag-snatching to the inexhaustible repertoire of servants' fables, to be dealt with in the same way as the transparent excuses regularly fabricated to explain unscheduled absences and elicit quick forgiveness.
I had to accept now that the fiction was at least partly rooted in fact and, while our guest's bag was never retrieved, I made sure that similar misfortune did not befall me. While walking the streets I began to watch out for possible felons, a thing I had never thought of doing in the past. I also became more mindful as to the way I carried valuables around.
In restaurants, for instance, I did more than keep an eye on my handbag. I wrapped its strap my around my ankle under the table and placed my mobile phone in my lap, covered with my serviette. I believe this to be a thief-proof setup, offering only a minor disadvantage -- that of hampering one's attempt to depart with elegance at the end of the meal. The same precautions did not work if riding in a taxi, however. The only time I tried it I forgot the temporary shackle and almost fell on my face as I disembarked hurriedly at a busy intersection. When travelling or shopping extensively, I usually select a special bag with a long strap that can be carried across the chest, postman fashion. This method does not enhance one's silhouette, nor does it encourage brisk walking, but it does act as a potent deterrent to prospective bag snatchers.
I recently had reason to congratulate myself on my prudence as the following story was recounted to me. A friend of a friend needed to use the bathroom in a large department store. Once in the spacious cubicle, she hung her bag on the hook provided for this purpose behind the door, which she duly locked. As she went about doing what she had come to do, she suddenly saw a hand appear over the top of the partition and swiftly lift her bag out. Unable to move, she watched in horrified silence.
Without a hope in the world to catch up with the thief, the woman went to report the incident to the store manager, who vaguely promised to look into it, but gave her little hope. He actually mumbled something about her lack of foresight in hanging her bag so far from her reach, hastily retreating when she barked that they were the ones who had determined the location of the hook.
The following day, someone called her from the store: a man told her that, against all expectations, they had found her handbag; he proceeded to read her the list of its contents over the phone. Even the credit cards and the cash she had been carrying at the time were accounted for. She was told to come at once and bring some identity papers in order to claim her erstwhile lost property from the manager's office. Less than an hour later, she was sitting with the more senior members of the store's staff, who all denied having any knowledge of the lost-and-found incident, or the fact that anyone had telephoned her, for that matter. It actually transpired that the manager had forgotten all about the theft the moment she had left his office. It happened so often, he said almost defiantly, that he could certainly not follow up on every complaint. Besides, how could he be sure that people were actually telling the truth? After all, there was no proof that she could provide to substantiate her story.
Furious at the thought that she had not only lost her precious possessions, but been suspected of fraud as well, the woman returned home -- to find that she had been thoroughly burglarised in the meantime. Having sent her on a wild goose chase, the thief had had all the time in the world to go through her apartment, picking and choosing anything of value. She found her empty handbag on the floor, near the bedroom door.
