I took the children to market this morning. We wanted to get another pair of turkeys because our tom died inexplicably last weekend.
I also wanted to check for any bulls for sale. I debated taking all the cash we had in the house, but I settled on about half of it because I didn’t want that much money on me.
We walked down to the turkeys first. As we were walking up and down the aisles of animals, a man crashed into me from behind, nearly knocking me over. I apologized for being in his way, and he hurried off the way he had come.
We stopped a moment later to make our purchase. Pulling my backpack off, I found all the zippers open on all five separate compartments. My wallet had been in one pocket but was now missing.
My heart sank. I told the children what I’d found–or not found. Anne said, “That man who crashed into you grabbed your backpack before he ran off.” Thank you for letting me know now, dear child. Though I can’t imagine it would have helped much even in the moment.
We retraced our steps several times to be certain we couldn’t find the wallet dropped. I had no expectation of actually finding it. I called Percy to ask what I should do. He jumped on his motorcycle and came to market.
We asked to make an announcement that a gringo had lost his wallet and desperately needed the documents, even if the wallet came without money. The announcer explained that there would be no consequences for someone bringing the wallet forward.
Percy then walked with me through the market. Numerous people pointed me out. I was the only white man in the whole market, so it was obvious who I was. Numerous people gave sympathies. Even though there were hundreds and hundreds of people, I felt like I had a light blazing from my head that everyone noticed.
Finally, we gave up. We dropped off the children, then Percy accompanied me to the police station to report the robbery. I’ll need the declaration document reporting the robbery to help smooth the way for getting all new documents.
It took about two hours of waiting before we had our necessary paperwork. Now, I’m back home working at blocking our credit card numbers. That’s not going well because I’m calling from a Peruvian number in Peru for a US account. I have now been on hold various times over the last hour as my case is getting bumped up and up the corporate hierarchy.
The loss is not small. I had about two months’ worth of income in my wallet because I was hoping to buy a couple of young bulls. I don’t have an exact count, but it was a few thousand soles, over a thousand dollars.
Losing the money is unfortunate, but I’m probably more anxious about the documents. I cannot drive now because all my identification is gone. Also, we cannot withdraw more money from here or the States until we get stuff sorted.
But we’re grateful to have all we need here at home, and I’m so grateful I chose not to take more cash. That feels led of the Lord.
We don’t have bulls or turkeys, but it looks like we have an adventure ahead.
Juan David 