One of the best of these markets is called Chatuchak Market. We’re told it’s one of the largest outdoor weekend markets in Asia. I believe them! It’s the size of several football fields and has everything you can imagine.
We went a few Saturdays ago and had a blast. We really enjoyed seeing all the different foods, smells, clothes, toys, and handcrafts.
About 4 hours into our day, it started to POUR rain. I grabbed my youngest’s hand and we were quickly moving along to get to a good covered area. While passing through a fairly narrow passage way, this old lady gets in front of me and stops walking. I ask her politely in Thai to excuse me but she just would turn around, look at me, and stay there. At the same time a bunch of other younger Thai girls formed a line of sorts by this stall all around us and bumped into me a few times. I thought it was a bit weird, but didn’t think much of it.
About 10 seconds later, I was able to get past the old lady and immediately felt the weight of my wallet missing from my velco’d shut pocket! I turned around and the old woman and girls had disappeared….along with my wallet. Ugh!!! I felt completely helpless. I shouted to Candace (who was 15 feet away) that someone had lifted my wallet and to hold onto the kids. I ran back about 50 ft and looked all over, but the lady and her gang of girls were no where to be seen. I pretty quickly accepted the fact that I had been pick pocketed and there wasn’t anything I could do to get all my credit cards, IDs, and cash back. I felt awful.
Luckily, I had taken secure pictures of all of my credit cards on my iPhone, so Candace and I used MagicJack (which I LOVE) to call the States and immediately put holds on our cards. That was done in about 30 minutes and then we went to the local police to file a report.
The police were amazing. Seriously. They put me on the back of one of their motorcycles and drove me to the nearby station (that experience was the most life threatening of my life, I might add – including driving the wrong way on a major street). At the station, a Thai Air volunteer, who spoke great English, helped me file the report. He explained that they’d had 4-5 other pick pocket victims that day from the same gang. One guy even had a wallet stolen from his zippered pocket. These people are amazing at their craft. I’m told they follow you for a while, take an opportune moment, and bam!
After filing the report I returned to the family and suggested we head home. I was pretty crestfallen about losing my wallet and wasn’t sure how we were going to pay for several upcoming items…and all this was on the heels of me coming out of the hospital. About 30 mins later, the police called me and said they’d captured a suspect and wanted me to ID her. Sooo, I walked back the long walk to the station, got on another motorbike, and was taken to where they hold the suspects. Unfortunately, it wasn’t her. So the nice Thai Air guy got me a trolley back to the family and we went home.
Moral of the story – NEVER carry more than cash and maybe one credit card when going to anywhere with lots of people in Asia. I even have an under-the-shirt holder that I normally use, but since we live here now, it didn’t even occur to me. Oh well, lesson learned.
Follow-up: It’s now 2 weeks later and I have all of my replacement cards. While I’m still worried about ID theft with the loss of my driver’s license (I’m told that’s a fairly big crime here), so far no other fraudulent purchases have happened.
Ugh, I'm so sorry. I was pickpocketed in France (my cell phone was stolen)- no fun!
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