How to not be robbed?

We have with us more and more electronical equipment’s, as have smaller sizes but bigger prices. From the price of a good smartphone and a camera you could travel for weeks in most of the countries and being robbed can really destroy even the best holiday.

Most of the burglar are really good psychologists, in a few moments they will know what kind of person you are just by looking at your face. Don’t underestimate the young guy standing on the corner of the street, while apparently is doing nothing, looking at his nails, he is watching and once he got your wallet pretty visible in your pocket, there is no Usain Bolt to catch him. He knows all the streets and will disappear in seconds, no chance to catch him.

How to protect ourselves? There are no 100% burglarproof ways, but respecting a few simple rules we can minimize the chance to become victim of thief. First of all decide if you need all you want to take with you. Before packing everything in your bag, put each piece on a table or anywhere where you can see all to have a clear idea of how many things you need, what you going to take with you. Once you are done, you can start packing. There are a lot of really nice bags designed for cameras, but using such a bag is like informing everyone around you what you have. I recommend a backpack without any big logo on it, inside the camera wrapped in a t-shirt. Like this you keep your camera shockproof while you have an extra t-shirt of during the day you might need to change due to heavy sweating. Anything you keep in your hip-pocket is really protected against a rain. Sir Isaac Newton would know for sure the right mathematical formula why nothing gets wet what we keep there. Yes my dear ladies, nowadays having this trend of the tight jeans, the guys will watch anyway your butt, no need to accentuate with a smartphone or wallet in your hip-pocket.

Don’t keep all your money in one pocket and if possible use smaller notes. Trick I learned in one of the Caribbean countries, when going out in the city to have in a pocket easy reachable 5-10 USD and if you get attacked just give fast the money, the burglar will not look for more as he will try to run away before being cached. Like this, the attacker will not try to get our wallet and we escape with a small loss.

Have the number of your bank saved not only in your phone. If the burglar got not only your card but your phone too, till you find out the number and call your bank to block your card might be too late. Set a daily limit on your card, so in the worst case, you will still have some loss but at least not all your savings.

You can have insurance on your belongings, however this will not protect you against being robbed, but at least you can have some money from the insurance company. Don’t forget, the insurance companies are living from money too, so no one will hurry to pay us any money. The process till you get your money might take long time and you might invest a lot of energy by mailing and calling the company till they going to pay.

Less visible means les endangered is valid for your jewelry as well. You can have the most interesting trip through several countries without being covered from head till toes by jewelry. Every time you have to deal about the price, as more jewelry you have as higher the price will be. Yes I know, you are strong, full of tattoos and lot of muscles, no one is playing with you but believe me, burglars have a lot of experience dealing with guys like you.

Most of the time, these guys are not working alone. Even if we saw who did and we call the closest cop who might be only a few meter away, till he is catching the burglar he already give all he had stolen to his buddy. What if still happened? Once you observed something is missing, don’t panic! Try to remember where you have been in the previous minutes. Still possible to just forget in the coffee shop you left for few minutes; the staffs found it and are waiting for you to return.  If still stolen, do not try to play the local Rambo and start fighting anyone you might suspect for committing the crime. There is no value worth of fighting for it and ending under police arrest or in emergency room of a hospital in a foreign country! Unfortunately saw too many negative examples when the end of the whole story would be a grabbed and broken necklace, but the victims wanted to fight.  There was not only the end of their holiday…Yes, is annoying, it hurts, makes us angry, is destroyed our holiday if we get robbed, but we are still alive and the priority should be to protect our life.

Your life is always more precious than your belongings but most of the robbers are ready to take everything! Let them take the first thing they can grab. You better search for a policeman, no need to search a police station, and make a declaration of what happened. Really important, that we have an official paper about the whole incident for the insurance. Learn from what happened, but don’t forget, could be worse. Don’t let ruin your trip or holiday, move on, you are alive, enjoy the life.