Friday, 24 July 2015

The Case of the Hungarian Highwayman.

24 July
The day started like any other day. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping and I was contemplating having a shower, shave and even brushing my teeth. I ambled to the shower block and had only just figured out the water pressure and temperature and hadn’t even lathered up when Dee called out that I should come out as we were bogged. I actually heard that incorrectly as we seemed to have been robbed during the night.
The security guards found my day pack and vest of a thousand pockets at the front of the locked camping site. I quickly checked and accounted for all of my gear, including my coin purse full of euro coins. I guess it goes to show that having many pockets in a vest foils a thief. I was relieved and a bit miffed that they didn’t think any of my stuff was cool enough to steal.

The guard also said they found a red bag and we realised it was Dee’s handbag. Dee’s purse and mobile were gone but everything else was there. The mobile isn’t of a huge concern as there wasn’t much credit on it and it’s a bugger to use for those people who can actually read English.

The purse is another concern but not critical. The 2 credit cards have to be cancelled and we’ve lost $70 Australian, 100 Euro and 50 Pounds and Dee’s driver’s licence. It’s a bugger but it’s not as bad as it could’ve been. The police officer has been here for the last 7 years and has never seen this happen before. Lucky us!

Dee and I had a look around the nearby streets to see if the purse had been ditched to avail.

Because of the heat last night, we had the driver and passenger side windows wound down about 7-10cm and I still had my little triangular window open. They seemed to have reached in through those narrow openings to grab the 3 items. We had the large side windows opened but they had the mossie screens down which stopped entry.

We found out another car at the site the previous day had been attempted to be opened and another visitor had his salary stolen last night. When the police arrived, we had the fun of translating what had happen. Luckily, the other family spoke a bit of English and we were able to communicate through them.

Dee has been doing wonderfully for the whole event. She is currently giving her statement at the Polgar police station as the school teacher arrived to be the official translator.

Anyway, it’s time to pack up and get ready for Dee to come back and onwards to Romania where you really have to take care of your stuff….

With Dee back with a Hungarian Police document, we tried to find some sort of internet connection in the town. After giving up on asking local as they didn’t speak English or any language we knew the word ‘library’ in, we gave up and asked the GPS who sent us to the local school.

I was able to find a teacher who could speak English and he gave me the password for the school’s internet. I was finally able to report one of Dee’s credit cards as stolen, let another bank know her linked card to my account was stolen, and leave a vague FB message.

As we left the town of Polgar, one of the ladies we were attempting to communicate with to find a library came out to us and gave us a book about the town of Polgar. In Hungarian. Obviously, our miming of ‘We are looking for the library to use the internet’ needs some working on.

Having enough of Hungarian hospitality, we made our way to Romania. The crossing was a bit longer than normal as we weren’t locals. The police officer had a great sense of humour and made the official bit fun.

We found the only camping site in Oradea and enjoyed their pool as today was about 35 degrees. Now with a traditional meal of salty food, it’s time to relax.

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