January 13, 2008

The story of two purses

My sister in law had her purse snatched a few days ago by a passing pair of guys on a motorcycle. It happened in the morning on her way to her workplace. She said the motorcycle came up from behind, and in an instant one of the guy sitting on the back snatched her purse which caused her losing her balance, hitting the ground and got some bruises on her upper left hand. It took her several seconds to realize her purse has disappeared. The motorcycle has sped past her before her mind had caught up with what had happened. Her glasses lying somewhere and when she screamed for help it was too late. Her ID, ATM/credit cards, wallet, keys, phone all gone! She is lucky she is not badly injured. Still, though, she was vaguely annoyed that she had to cancel her cards, re-apply for new ID, etc.

I had the same thing happen to me a few years ago on my way to the church. Luckily someone saw that and gave me a ride home. I still couldn't believe why would someone snatch my purse. It wasn't a nice purse, and I was inside Bajaj (the three wheel vehicles). That time I was aware there's a motorcycle trailing my Bajaj, but I thought they just wanted to drive past the Bajaj. Then I felt someone grabbed my right hand from the left side of the Bajaj window (I clutched my purse on my right side), and before I could figure out what had happened...my purse has disappeared! It was an intense moment and I was stunned. I was mad with the Bajaj driver for not doing anything and the fact it was very dangerous as the snatcher grabbed my hand while the Bajaj was running on the traffic. Luckily, nothing too important had been taken. And there's no cell-phone either inside the purse as I don't like to receive calls when I am inside the church.

In a big city like Jakarta, purse snatching is a common crime and mostly the victims are women. It is already a very common thing that people take it as a daily happening. In most incidents, two men on a motorcycle speed up from behind a victim and the passenger on the back snatches a purse, handbag, or cell-phone. As usual the police is utterly ignorant unless you're someone from an affluence family. They are just not interested with petty crimes. What I can do to avoid this from happening again is to stay alert all the time and use my common sense whenever I go out.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Elyani, I'm so sorry you and your sister had to go through those unpleasant incidents. Although my bag was never snatched, I had my wallet left in Makassar airport when I was in high school. We advertised it on the newspaper, hoping that at least I'd get my ID cards back. But instead I've got lunatics calling me; one of the caller, I remember, said that he had my wallet, and he would return it to me if I'd 'give' my virginity to him... Sadly you are true, there's nothing we could do, and a very slim chance we would see our bag again...*sigh

Eka said...

Postingnya mengingatkan aku beberapa tahun lalu, saat kali ke2 ke Jakarta. Berkesempatan naik bis umum, tapi wanti-wanti yang dikasih sama temen 'n sodara sebelum naik : hati2 dengan dompet, jangan taruh uang di 1 saku ( at least kalo apes dompet ilang masih punya duit ) - he2 ... bahkan ekstemnya yang co kadang katanya taruh duit di dalem kaos kaki ...

Crime di angkutan umum di Jakarta sudah lamaaa banget aku denger mb. "Copet" dah jadi penyakit masyarakat yang mungkin susah diilangin ya ...

Eka
http://www.celoteh-c-lo.blogspot.com

Anna Rochanti Madden said...

Duh dunia ini makin serem ya. Sekarang pake tas super mini biar bisa dimasukin di bawah jok. Bisa nggak ya?

Anonymous said...

iya aku dulu zaman kul di jkt wuah sering banget denger kejadian kayak gini di kos-ku.. sampe ngeri kalo jalan mo kemana2.. kudu liat bentar2 ke belakang dan bener2 waspada...

Anonymous said...

That is so sad..same as what happened in Phil. Sometimes I don't feel bad for snatchers, instead of doing something bad why not find a decent job?

I feel for your sis inlaw that she had to cancel cards, etc.

Elyani said...

@Anita : thanks, I think the laws are too lenient for these types of criminals. But you know how the police here works.

@Eka, Anna, Fun : memang serba salah ya. Bawa tas kecil kalau mau taruh ini itu susah. Kegedean juga berabe.

@Fe : this happens everywhere. Those people only looking for quick and easy money. The hassle is you get to spend time canceling all the cards and to replace everything that was in there. I call that double badluck!

About me said...

Mbak El, once I had experienced losing 2 bag at the same time, not because of "abang tukang copet" on the bus, but simply because of my stupidity. In this case I thrust everybody that sit down on the bench waiting for their turn to play hockey @ Senayan field was an honest, sincere people. Even when most of the crowd were bules.

Its not the money or my cards that make me gloomy for 2 weeks, but because in my bag there was a camera with all last pictures of my husband's (deceased) best friend, which I borrowed from mbak Cindy van santen, he passed away exactly 5 days after I lost my that bag. Such an expensive lesson for me.

But I guess, we do need to become responsible for our own belongings, it is the window of opportunity, that we all seems giving it for free to those people who does those crime thingy to us.