A lesson very very hard learned
Chinese: “小心，凡事提高警覺”
Mandarin pinyin transliteration: “xiao xin, fan shi ti gao jing jue”
English translation: “Be careful, Always be attentive (and keep your senses alert)”
– My dad
After hugging, bidding farwell and saying “have a great time in europe” – the quote above were his parting words to me. I always try to take it to heart. He has told this to me many times growing up. He’s always said that whatever my messages he tells me, it goes in one ear and out the other – perhaps it really did this time. He’s also always said that one of my biggest character flaws are that I am too trusting, too naïve, not attentive, not careful enough and that I lack the small details. So I dedicate this post to my parents, especially my father.
His criticisms about me were glaring in my face today.
Especially that I am nearing the end of my university career, I always think I am now grown up, worldly, smart, independent, and aware. I’m almost done getting a university education, doesn’t that account to something? None of that could be further from the truth today. Replace those five adjectives with immature, small city mentality, foolish, naïve, and ‘not street smart enough’. Reflecting back on a speech by Steve jobs, he’s stated that “you can never connect the dots forward, only backwards”. This caused me to reflect on a saying my dad always says: “Half a bucket of water always shakes the loudest”. This is an allusion to the knowledge and ego. Those who have the least talent always think they are awesome/great often vocalize or think that they’re always great. Those who have the most wisdom on the other hand are the least vocal about their abilities.
BAM, another small saying smacked in my face.
I was out at the London Waterloo station today after wandering around. I was pretty tired. I meant to catch another show in town, but they were too expensive and out of my price range. I opted out to just people watch for the rest of the night, and take some really nice pictures. There’s no better place to do one of my favourite past times of walking around the city at night, with some headphones on listening to music and taking some pictures. I left my big dslr at home last time I went to Japan for fear it was going to get stolen. Japan is one of THE safest countries in the world in regards to theft, if you were going to bring anything anywhere, make it Japan. Their rate of petty crime is amongst the lowest in the world. That being said, I made sure my camera will see some action this time around. Apparently I led myself to believe I am really capable of taking care of myself now.
I walk into the McDonalds by the Waterloo station and grab a really nasty McChicken meal. It really wasn’t that great. It didn’t even taste like the McChickens I am accustomed too. Anyway, I go out to the patio by the London Eye and see a great view of the sun setting behind the House of Parliament/Big Ben. I set my bag in a chair in to the right of me, and my camera on the table on top out in the open in full public view. The camera was also on my right side facing the throngs of people walking about. I’m very accustomed to doing this in Victoria since if I have something interesting to shoot, I can grab it right away with my dominant hand. I really should’ve set everything on the left side where it was facing the tables were everything isn’t easily accessible.
This is fantastic. I’m watching people, and reading the paper. It was getting cold, so I grab my jacket from my bag and start putting it on facing the left. This Italian dude from my left interrupts me and asks if he’s at the Waterloo Station. I turn around and answer him that he is, he asked again, and I reaffirmed him.
That was weird, some alarms start going off in my head. Of course he’s at the waterloo station, why would he be sitting at the station if he wasn’t? I turn around, and notice something was missing. MY FUCKING CAMERA WAS GONE. My look must’ve been incredulous. A classic case of organized petty crime. The partner distracts you, and buys his partner enough time to do whatever he needs to do. I’ve read and watched about it, and have been warned many times. And I fucking fell for it.
Thinking about it, I was THE best target. If I was myself, I would’ve done the same too. Stupid tourist distracted tourist, reading a paper, putting on a jacket with a big honking camera in the middle of the table unattended screaming ‘steal me, I’m worth a lot of money!’.
It was gone.
What annoys me even more was that this arab guy tells me that he saw the guy sitting in front of me take it, and told me he the way of the McDonalds. I grabbed my stuff and ran in that direction, and of course, now nobody was there. He didn’t say anything while it was happening – I suppose that was for the sake of self perseverance should anything really bad happen. I meet the arab guy again who’s waiting with his toddler daughter and said he was totally gone. He said sorry, and went on with his day. The Italian guy beside me on the left was gone too.
Fuck my life.
I was incredibly mad and flustered at myself for the next 5-10 minutes. I got fucking tooled. Textbook tooled. Fuck man. Fucking fuck, FUCK! I was completely drained after that, and just tried to navigate home by bus (the tubes were on strike today) which I successfully did. I had a lot of time to reflect since the entire journey home searching around for a bus, waiting for it, and commuting back home took a good 1.5 hours to 2 hours.
My dad always has said to my sisters and I that we grew up in a greenhouse environment of a city. Victoria is safe, it’s small, it’s for the most part trusting. It’s nurturing and shielded being isolated on an island. People for the most part are kind and nice, and very low crime. We grew up in a bubble. Compare and contrast him with his rough childhood upbringing in developing Asia and living in the biggest cities of the USA for a good portion of his life. He’d always say “just wait until you go to a city like New York and see what it means, you probably wouldn’t last”. Well, I know I’m going to New York sometime I know for sure, but I sure as hell didn’t expect that my biggest big city life lesson would come within five days in my exchange, in London.
I signed up for exchange knowing that I would create unforgettable memories, and learn more about myself, discover new things. But damn… this was a really really really hard pill to swallow. A $1700pill, and lesson I have heard all throughout my life. I just didn’t take it to heart. All I needed to do was be more careful.
I am thankful though. I am thankful I was not mugged, or harmed in any sort of way. I still have funds in my account. My wallet and IDs are still here. My ipod and ebook reader is still here. I still have my old dslr at home. I still have another camera with me, albeit being a point and shoot. It could’ve been worse, it could’ve been much worse.
It’s only money that I loss. A moderate amount of value, but nothing I cannot make back in the future. I haven’t taken a lot of pictures yet, so I didn’t lose a lot of memories so far. It’s only stuff – and stuff I can gain back with a newer and more advanced model. I always been taught “money/objects are just items”. And items could be replaced anytime. No big deal. I think that helped me calm down much faster after putting that into perspective. Also, since it’s gone, the emotional weight of fearing it will be stolen (ironic) is gone too. I don’t have to worry about it anymore. Plus it frees up space in my pack and not as heavy anymore. My only gripe is that my tripod attachment was on it, and that was gone too. I’m stuck with a useless tripod now. My lenses are now defuct without its’ camera friend, so is the charger, and memory card.
There’s another Chinese saying that goes “lose fortune, shield disaster”. I always think that was super corny, but it is consoling to think the loss of a big ticket item is the price to pay to avert a future disaster. It’s better to think that that to keep fretting about it. It’s done, it’s gone. You can’t do anything about it anymore.
Good crossfit lesson – no matter how hard it is, don’t give up and keep going. Stick it through. I’m choosing to stick it through right now. Embrace the suck. Failure is an opportunity to learn about yourself. It’s not all loss if you learn something from it.
I’m slowly coming to terms with this incident and my stupidity. I perhaps gained more than I loss. I am definitely much more attentive now, or will be. I have a more elevated sense of surroundings and I gained a good lesson in being street smart which will serve me for the rest of my life. I can honestly say I am now more hardened and definitely shedding the small town Victoria mentality behind, ready to tackle on the rest of my exchange.
I phoned the police, I hope it comes back, but I really doubt it. On the somewhat brighter side, my ex-D300 and Tokina 12-24mm f/4 lens will probably see way more interesting shots with its new owner than with me.
I wonder who buys stuff from the black market and how it works. I’m sure the new owner will treat it better and actually give it a case/home to live in.
Lesson learned.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010 1 Comment | in exchange, photography, travel 