our rucksack got nicked whilst in london

While visiting London with my parents and brother Paul (more about their visit in the next post) we stopped for lunch at a pub near the Tower of London (read: tourist area). We had a large group (including an Aussie we met on the tube who spent the day with us), and as we were distracted with our feasting and pleasantries some guys walked by and swiped our bag as it was sitting at the end of the table. No one noticed a thing until we got up to leave and the bag was nowhere to be found. I was frozen in complete shock that it could be gone. Frustratingly, there were signs all over the pub saying such helpful things as: "Is your bag safe?" or "Where are your belongings?" and so on. I had even read them and thought about how they were a good idea and how I knew where my belongings were.

The scene of the crime! Please note the sign on the pole to the right. (click to enlarge)

I guess living in safe quaint little Cambridge has made me more relaxed than I once was walking through the streets of Paris with a money belt under my shirt and my backpack on the front. We had to laugh at ourselves as we felt like little country folk in the BIG CITY. "oooo this city be real purty and gots real bigs buildins!" It turns out ours was the 92nd crime committed in London in 2010, only one week into the year.

The backpack contained my nice digital SLR camera, wallet, credit cards, cash, check book and our external hard drive with all our files and pictures backed up on it. If it weren't for Flickr all my England photos would be gone! I love Flickr.

We spent nearly the entire afternoon cleaning up the mess, reporting it to the Police, calling and canceling my cards &c. It turns out that both of my credit cards were used to buy train tickets about half an hour after they were stolen. Luckily, the whole scene was captured on the pub's security camera!

This weekend we got a call from P.C. Whicby (awesomely English name, right?), the officer working our case. He told us that they had ARRESTED the guy who stole our bag, and he has been in jail since Saturday!! They had suspected him of other thefts and got his fingerprints from a beer mug at another pub. With the circulation of the video footage from our case and the fingerprints they were able to find and arrest him! None of our belongings were recovered. They also discovered that he is an illegal alien and have served him deportation papers. It's bittersweet because if he is deported they won't be able to try him for the crimes he committed in the UK.

We are just happy that he is off the streets and hope he will get his
just deserts.