An Uneventful Robbery
During 2011, my house got broken into. It was a cold night, and my gramma, mom and I were getting home late. I don’t remember where my dad was, all I know is he wasn’t in Chile. As we walked around our house through the tall eucalyptus trees, I felt the cold night air making me shiver. My gramma opened the door that led directly into my parent’s room, and we immediately sensed something was off. We all looked over and noticed the TV was on. My mom never leaves the TV on. I remember a strange feeling filling my body. I can’t quite explain it. I just knew I was uncomfortable being there. I almost felt watched…As we stood in front of the tv displaying static, my mom and gramma started discussing what we should do. They both had worried looks on their faces and finally decided on staying the night at my gramma’s house. Leaving the house, I realized how afraid I felt. I wanted to get out of that environment as soon as possible. We quickly made our way through the dark property. It seemed to have a different energy to it. I loved my house, but this specific night didn’t feel right. The trees looked scarier than ever and the house seemed quite ominous sitting under the moonlight. We finally made it to my gramma’s. That night, we all fell asleep with a weird feeling consuming us. When we woke up, we decided to go check on our house. When we looked inside, we were in shock. It was a mess, the drawers inside my parents’ room were picked out and there were clothes dispersed around the room. We also found many things missing. Silverware, an expensive clock, my movie dvds-which were in English so I don’t know what the point of that was-and my parents' whole safe was gone. Apparently, they had found a crowbar in the shed and had dug it up even though it was drilled into the cement inside my parent’s bedroom. The safe contained 100 dollars of our friend’s money, my mom’s jewelry, and detailed paperwork of passports and visas. We learn to never keep important paperwork inside a safe again.
Eventually, the investigative police came and used fingerprint dust everywhere. It looked like a crime scene from one of those detective shows. Unfortunately, unlike the shows on tv, they didn’t find anything. We assumed the thieves covered their fingers. I guess we underestimated them. Later that morning, our neighbors offered to show us video footage from their camera of that night. They also offered us some tea and cookies. They were very sweet, however, we didn’t find anything in the footage. The rest of the day felt long and exhausting. My parents talked to many people and explained what had happened. We waited for answers for what felt like an eternity. Finally, a few days later, someone called us saying they had found our passport and visa papers at a park. I should note, sometimes people who are associated with the robbery like friends or family of the thieves do this to look less suspicious. My parents had tea with them and gave them a tip for giving them back the paperwork. Many people in Chile won’t give it back to you unless you pay them. We have an interesting culture. Unfortunately, we never found out who robbed our house. Although we were very frustrated, we were just glad they had not committed a violent crime. However, we will always remember, never leave important things in a safe, they’ll take all of it.