Bus Boy part 3 of 3

As I was in full-throttle panic mode, my wife attempted to get me to calm down, think rationally, and behave in a productive manner by getting me to retrace my steps. In doing so, she got me to realize what I had been denying for the last 20 minutes. I hadn’t left my camera on the bus.

“You took pictures of the girls last night.”

“Yes.”

“Then what?”

“I . . . I . . .”

“You what?”

“I . . . ” I slowly admitted. “I put it back in the over-night bag at the foot of my bed.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. I’m sure.”

“So . . . ?”

“Dog-gone-it.” I acknowledged the un-escapable truth. We weren’t ever going to track down my lost camera because my camera wasn’t lost. Somebody on the overnight bus had taken my camera while we slept.

I felt a complex flood of emotions that I had never experienced before. I was angry. I was frustrated. I mumbled words that my daughters aren’t allowed to say. But more than anything else, I was just really, really sad. I was sad that we had lost our pictures of the Stone Forest. I was sad that we would not have our camera for the rest of the trip. I was sad to realize that one of my fellow sojourners could have stooped so low as to victimize what was obviously a family of vacationing foreigners all for the sake of a beat up camera that probably had a re-sale value of maybe $40.

And I was also surprised to find myself sad for sentimental reasons. We had bought that little $350 camera specifically for our two years in China. It has made it through 23 of 24 months. In the past two years, I had taken over 40,000 pictures with that thing. It was constantly by my side. If I was out of the building, I had it with me. I always had that camera in hand.

But my wife pointed out that we should count our blessings. We only lost one day’s worth of pictures. It could have been a lot worse. It could have been stolen when it had a week’s worth of pictures on it. And, in the grand scheme of things, it wouldn’t be a big deal to replace it. It only cost a couple hundred bucks.

While that was all true, I didn’t want a new camera. I wanted that camera back. We had been through a lot together. It had served me well.

Several days later, on yet another bus ride, I was flipping through our travel guide to pass the time and there it was on page 342 in a little side bar. “Be careful on the overnight buses. They are notorious for theft and pickpockets.”

Sadly, I can attest to that fact.