Bad Luck in Brasov

Well... I can't say I've had the best few days. I was pickpocketed and lost my wallet (with all my cards and about $100) and camera. We had just arrived in Brasov, and were at the train station. We had to take a bus to the hostel, and as soon as the bus arrived, there was all these people pushing and shoving to get on. We're quite used to this now, people can be very rude while scrambling to get on a bus (don't even think about lining up), that we didn't think to much about it. Even on the bus (before it started moving), there were plenty of people pushing and shoving. However, because this seems to be quite common here, we paid little attention.

The problem was that after a little while, the bus was suddenly not very full. This seemed a little strange, and then just a few seconds later, I felt my pocket, and noticed that my wallet was gone. It all fell into place and made perfect sense at that exact second. All those people had been working together, pushing and shoving so that we wouldn't notice. I didn't know what to do, but we quickly got off the bus (it still hadn't left), and sort of looked around. Of course, they'd gone by then and there was nothing to do. We found a police officer, but there's nothing that he could do anyways. Apparently, these people 'work' the train station, and they are very good at what they do. That officer gets reports of this every couple hours, and countless others don't realise until they are in town. Of course, it didn't help that I've gotten very comfortable around here. At the start of the trip, I would always keep my hands in my pockets in those situations. I was also stupid to havemy camera in my cargo pocket, which is something I never used to do, but it's convenient. I won't be doing that again, though.

While the situation does suck, there's really nothing I can do about it. I'm glad that Jocelyn is with me (and that she didn't have anything taken), so I'll be OK money-wise until I can get my cards replaced. I'm also happy that pretty much every other Romanian we've met has been extremely friendly and nice, although this would probably also contribute to why I didn't suspect anything.