Donde esta mi cartera?

I will preface this by saying that I absolutely adore Barcelona… (wait for it)… But, in the two weeks that I have been here, there have been not one but two attempts at picking my pocket in the metro. I have been warned repeatedly about this by various guidebooks and by the teachers in Tenerife and Granada. In fact, one of the teachers told me that Barcelona is especially peligrosa for asians because they usually carry around expensive cameras and other fancy gadgetry. Because I have the requisite ojos, I use a money belt with my passport and credit cards if I have to carry them around and have nothing in my wallet except for 20 euro or so.

Anyway, as I stepped on the metro one day two older ladies got on and one positioned herself in front of me and the other behind. The one in front asked me where Plaza Catalunya was. I said that we were in Plaza Catalunya and they turned around to leave. The whole situation seemed a little strange so I felt my back pocket and realized that my wallet was gone! I managed to grab the one that was standing behind me before they stepped off the metro and while I was choosing between beating her or coming up with a sentence in Spanish expressing my belief that she had stolen my wallet (Thought process: “Hrm, what is the verb? Ah, robar. To rob, steal. Now, how do I conjugate it correctly? Ah shit, past tense. robaste or robabas? It’s a regular verb right? Damn those confusing Indefinido and Imperfect tenses. I think its Indefinido since it was an action not a description of the context of the situation. Or perhaps Preterito Perfecto is more appropriate here since the action occurred near the present time: has robado. Oh, maybe I should use vosotros instead of tu since there are two of them.“). Anyway, I’m guess she saw the gears turning slowly and she dropped my wallet on the ground and they both scurried off the train as I picked it up. Lessons learned: Always keep your wallet in your front pocket and continue practicing the past tenses.

For the 2nd attempt, I was going up the escalator and had nearly reached the top when the person in front of me dropped his cigarettes and stopped to pick them up. Naturally, this caused a bit of a pile up and the person behind me bumped into me. Being a little more savvy this time, my hands immediately went to my pockets when and I swear that I felt the guy behind me try to pick my pocket.

There are some pros here, I tell ya. Pero, no pasa nada. It’s all part of the experience.