If you live in Honduras, you always have to be on your guard against theft. If your car door is unlocked, and you leave your car for just a minute or two, you are likely to find that anything you left in the car is missing when you return. Small expensive items, like cell phones, cameras, etc, can disappear in a moment of inattention. Of course, you also need to prepare for planned, intentional robberies. For these instances, properties have high walls (sometimes with glass shards or razor wire on top), houses have barred windows, cars have loud alarms, large dogs are kept for watch duty, etc.
Today we experienced a loss due to theft. We have a large shipping container on the property where we are doing construction, and we use that for storage. The multiple locks we had on the container were broken, and some items were stolen - mostly bags of cement and a pile of bricks.
We know that the break-in occurred last night, because a neighbor checks the property for us on a regular basis, and he reported in today, saying that everything was fine yesterday afternoon, but he found the damaged locks this morning.
There were other items on the property of greater value than those which were stolen. In particular, the pile of stolen bricks was from a batch which we had bought early on in the construction process, and found to be so weak and badly made that we weren't planning to use them for building. The other items stolen were two thin mattresses, which we have used occasionally when we have had someone spend the night at the property. We've actually not had a watchman sleeping out there for several months. We feel, based on the items stolen, that these were local people who just took advantage of an opportunity, not professionals who would, for instance, take on robbing a house with people at home, with dogs, etc.
We were very glad to find that our losses were not any greater, and of course, we've replaced the locks on the container, and we will be renewing our vigilance in having a watchman stay out on the property occasionally enough to make the place appear somewhat 'inhabited.'
All in all, it could have been a lot worse.
2 comments:
I'm sorry to hear that you were robbed. I think the thief might try again, so I'd say, be extra protected for a while, to dissuade him.
Many thieves are lazy and prefer easy targets.
So sorry to hear that things were taken and grateful that it was not a big loss. I will expand my prayers to include your new property and supplies there.
Love Beth
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