On Monday 12 August, I underwent a whole
new experience: I was robbed in broad daylight at an ATM in the old town centre
of Setúbal. It all happened so fast, I almost
let my brain trick me into denying it. Luckily the people who saw it insisted
on taking it to the next level.
In the morning, I went to the supermarket
to buy food. Bonny Bee was working hard today, so I needed to do the heavy
lifting with the children. After dinner, we were going to go into town for a
cake or ice cream and then have another attempt at Dainoris’s surfboard in
slightly calmer waters.
After a meal of pasta with meatballs in a
cheesy cream sauce, I took Livia and Dainoris out for the afternoon. Milda
stayed at home because she dithered and procrastinated, expecting us to wait
for her while she fiddled with something on the floor. She was still without
shoes.
I parked the car on 5 October Avenue in the
north of the centre and we took a walk around looking for the place we had gone
to last time, but my Google Maps timeline had decided to completely disappear.
I like to keep a record of places visited and now it was telling me it had all
been wiped while Google updates on a global basis “to provide you with the best
client care”. Yeah, right…
So I got a bit frustrated and after turning
around several times on the same streets, with two moaning kids in tow, I
landed on a café with ice creams with juice for them and cakes with coffee for
me. I took out my card to pay and the jolly proprietor apologised saying he
didn’t have a card reader but there was an ATM about 40 metres down the street.
The kids were happily chomping on their ice
creams so I quickly went to the cash machine. When I put my card inside, it
asked the usual questions – PIN and how much cash. I asked for 70, because if
you ask for 50, often one note will come out, and many shops like these don’t
have the change for that. The card was released first and then the teller
machine counted out a 20 and a 50 for me.
At the very moment it emerged from the
machine, a hand abruptly reached out and tried to grab the notes. The first
attempt didn’t succeed, but the second one did. And then he ran away down one
of the many alleyways in the centre of this city. It all happened in
slow-motion. You hear this a lot from people who have been robbed, but now I
know it’s actually true – I can replay the thing over and over again, and the
scenario really does develop that way. Before you can even think, it’s all over
with.
The woman from the accessories shop
opposite the ATM came running out in indignant disgust, as did two women with a
pram who were waiting just at the entrance to the shop next door. Two builders
gave me advice never to stand too far from the ATM, and don’t let the money
linger in the slot. The woman from the accessories shop told me to call the
police, but in my state of denial, I said it wasn’t worth it and I had to go
back to my kids. She said it was, in fact she insisted, so she called the
police herself.
By this time, the café owner had come down
the street and also told me it was best to call the police, and I followed him
back to the table where my cake and coffee were waiting.
To their credit, the police showed up more
or less just as I had finished my coffee. They were two really friendly and
patient officers. One was near retirement and the other was in his prime, and
they asked me for a description of the guy. The ladies around me concurred with
the account. The police knew exactly who it was – obviously a known offender.
Before they had finished asking me the arbitrary questions, they had picked him
up and were taking him to the station.
The younger one asked me if I would accept
to come and identify him, meaning we would have to take a ride in the police
car. Then the radio came through asking how my Portuguese was. I said it was
pretty sketchy but I can handle myself in such a situation. But their superior
officer insisted that I needed a friend or contact there to interpret for me.
In the eyes of the law, everything had to be as clear-cut as possible. If I
knew someone here in Setúbal he would
appear in court in the morning. If not, it would take a while longer. As I
didn’t, it was decided that it was best to just let justice take its course.
I lost 70 euro, but I also lost any remaining warmth I had for Portugal. Now, I am just counting the days until we head back to Spain. After that incident, I drove us all to a small stony beach just along the coast where they played for a while before we went back to the apartment for food. They took a long time to settle, but fortunately they had had no idea what had happened to me.
No real sense of normality returned to me
that day, and as I write these lines it’s the day after. I’m still feeling
quite low, but I have to occupy the children.
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