A friday night in September

It has been seven years and 23 days to be precise, it gives me jitters even now thinking about it.

It was a Friday night. Not any Friday, a special one..Hubby and I were looking forward  to fly out to Fiji to celebrate our 5^th wedding anniversary. I had a mini performance (I used to learn classical Vocal) for a small group that evening after work. So our plan was to come back home after the performance and change before we drive to airport. Since our flight was at late night, it was no pressure. We had plenty of time to catch the flight after the performance.

Living in this City/home for past 4 years, we never once felt unsafe or need for safety measures like alarm system in the house.  Once before this Friday, I remember our garage was open for whole day and never once it striked me that an intruder could get in to the house.  

<Mistake no #1> The good experiences from past made us take safety for granted 

Coming back to the Friday night, we were all ready to leave to airport after quickly changed in to something comfortable for the flight. I usually travel lite, so my mobile and the jewellery I worn it to the performance/everyday ones were left at home.

 <Mistake no.#2> Do you keep your everyday jewellery in your master bedroom draw or cupboard? 

Hubby took the car out of the garage to load our suitcases. 

<Mistake no.#3> Never once it occurred to me that someone could be watching us loading suitcases in to the car. Apparently, there were 4 eyes watching it all.

We started driving towards the airport, it's an easy one hour drive from home. We were relaxed and excited. When we were just 10mins away from the airport, hubby gets a call from my mobile. I picked it up since he was driving and I was puzzled to see the caller name . We were debating between network error and supernatural activity.. It felt creepy but we were still making jokes on it. 

Hubby asked me to call my mobile again, just in-case.. I called, it rang thrice and my call got disconnected. And I tried again and again every time it would ring few times before it got disconnected, after fourth time it went straight to voice message.  Still I didn’t think once that it could be an intruder in the house.

Hubby called his friends to check on the house, by this time we parked our car at the airport. While we were queuing up for check-in, his friend called us and told us to come back home since they couldn't see anything abnormal from outside and to check with police as home residents we got to be there to open the door. We thought best case (if it was just a supernatural activity) we could take next flight tomorrow. Yeah right!

   

We requested police assistance before we entered the house and guess what!!!  our house was ROBBED. Since the time we left to airport and I made that call to my mobile, the intruder had only 30 to 45 mins..So all he did was to "check" in other words ROB only master bedroom.

Next day while police were investigating our house, our neighbour comes back home after a night stay at her friends place. Within few minutes, she comes out panicked/crying that her house was robbed too. And the worst part was she had a dog and it didn't do anything. 

Looks like those thieves came that night to rob my neighbour house first and seeing us loading things in to our car, BINGO!!! they hit a Jackpot!!

Our holiday went like this,

1. Cancelled all the holiday bookings.. Fortunately people behind those customer service showed their humanity when we explained our situation . We got our credits back for the flights and accommodation.

2. Spent at least half a day with insurance provider, but I must say it wasn't bad experience, People were very helpful. 

3. Handyman to fix the windows, finally paying a reasonable contents insurance paid off. 

4. Installed security alarm system. We zoned our house, so for first few months I had the alarm on for the other zones even when I was in the house.  

5. Our contents insurance providers were  pretty good, they replaced our laptop, mobile and all other things that was specified in the police report. 

It took me months to sleep properly, the thought that a stranger walked into my room and he actually knows my house plan was a nightmare.

I would definitely pass on my wisdom out of this experience,

• Don’t ever keep your valuables in the master bedroom. Think clever like a bad guy J
• Invest on a proper contents insurance who can listen and respond like humans.
• Invest on a proper alarm system and no matter how short the distance/time you go out, make sure to switch on the alarm.
• Signup for a safe deposit.

Thank god the house was robbed while we were away and no harm to us and Thank god it was NOT a supernatural activity. Otherwise I wouldn’t have entered the house EVER. As for the trip to Fiji, we did go.  After 5 yrs to celebrate our 10th anniversary.. :) 

PS:  #1 Our neighbour complained that their budget insurance refused to pay much for the repairs/things they lost and after this incident their insurance didn't want to cover their property anymore

#2  The thief was caught, you know how?? he was using my mobile all the time with differrent SIM and tried to sell it at Cash Converters. Police caught him with the IMEI no. After I got my old phone, I could see all the messages he was sending while robbing other places.. He robbed 42 houses in total within 3 months.. Shocking!!!!