Paranoia?

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You probably don’t want to hear about the mundane existence I’m living while I’m watching our three houses here in Costa Rica, i.e. getting my daily grout onto the kitchen counter, or redigging trenches to drain my property during these non-stop thunderstorms and incessant rains created by some tropical storm or disturbance or whatever. (Seven inches in three hours yesterday.) Or going over to Gary's house every evening to turn on the makeshift outside lights I had to install after his original high-dollar ones failed. (Then turn them off again every morning so that thieves will maybe think that there is someone living in the house. Outside lights on during the day is a dead give-away that the house is vacant.) Like I said, you probably don't want to hear about that. But I do guess you want to hear about last Wednesday.

I drove into San Ramon for a gringo meeting concerning civilian security (or lack thereof). Months ago, I had told one of the leaders of this group that I would attend, and I had already missed one meeting, so there I was, at this meeting. The three speakers were pleasant enough, but pretty much non-informative regarding solutions. There were a couple of embassy officials on the panel, and an ex-vice president of Costa Rica. Her name was Astrid Something. “Work with the community,” they kept saying. What? You mean fix Fabian the cop’s motorcycle, so he can take a nap on my patio. Well, I have it from Fabian’s mouth that no Publica Fuerza is going to risk his life going into a bad area in town (or any area) for his measly three hundred and fifty dollars a month.

Anyway. The meeting was boring until, one by one, several gringos stood up and told about their robbery experiences. And one guy even said he was there to tell the story for a friend who couldn't make it to the meeting because he was afraid to leave his house unguarded. It had been broken into a week earlier, and everything of value was stolen. So I started thinking, hmmmmm, there's no one up at Butterfly (our so-called development) right now. And my reason for coming down to Costa Rica for a few weeks was to keep the ladrones (thieves) at bay. Maybe I shouldn’t hang around and socialize at the meeting afterwards. Maybe I should head back to Butterfly and check on the houses like I'm supposed to be doing. In other words, I became a little paranoid. So I hopped in my car and drove back.

I arrived at our new gate around five PM to find a four-door gray sedan, parked just in front of it. There was just enough room for me to drive around and in front of it, close to the gate and lock. A weasel-like, short guy stood before me, jibber-jabbering away at me. But he was talking too fast for me to understand. He had kind of pointed ears, and two earrings, and probably another piercing. I don't remember. He reminded me of a mutated, dwarf-like Spock. But, you see, I now heard that a house alarm was going off, and I thought it was my house, which is about 200 yards from Gary’s house, which loomed above the gate. I looked up at Gary’s house while Spock jabbered. It looked okay. Spock finally slowed his speech and I understood him to be asking if there were any houses for rent here. I told him, no. That's a stupid question. Like some derelict city dweller wants to live out here in the country with us gringos. I didn’t know at the time what he was up to. Our alarms go off for all kinds of reasons; birds, cows, no reason. I didn’t suspect any serious wrong - doing at this time, although I always keep an open mind when it comes to possible nefarious activity here in Costa Rica. (I'm a firm believer that 'just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you. ') So I brushed Spock off, opened the gate, drove through and closed the gate. But I did have the foresight to stare at his car and license plate and make sure he knew I was doing so.

When I turned the corner, I realized it was Gary's alarm that was going off, so I parked in front of his yard, and walked around his house. I figured maybe that Spock had tried to knock on his door or something. But then I thought, well, Gary only has an outside alarm in the back of his house, so someone would really have to be snooping around to set it off. But, like I said, alarms go off for different reasons. But was it a coincidence that there happened to be a mutant lurking below? I doubt it. He must have come up here.

Then I checked the side garage door. The lock to the solid metal door had been broken off. What the ….? I could see a little slot in the broken opening but I needed a screwdriver to open it. You need to understand that Gary had shipped all of his U.S. belongings down here in one of those shipping containers, and his house and garage were filled with goodies that most Costa Ricans would consider as grand and magical as a cave full of pirate s' treasure. I looked at that little slot in the door, and almost used a key to try and open it. But then it dawned on me that maybe the guy at the gate was the lookout, and maybe there's a guy in the garage right now, and I've surprised him during the heist of his life, and what is he going to do if I open this door right now to save himself from going to jail. Hmmmm. Paranoia, again?

I opted, instead, to drive over to my house, where I parked and checked out my house quickly to see if any ladrones had been there. They had not. (I have very little of value at my house, anyway.) Then I grabbed a screwdriver, took out my cell phone and called my buddy, Fabian the cop. He was napping at his nearby office. He said he would come over right away. I walked back over to Gary's garage, opened the garage side door with the screwdriver, and entered. The lights were on. I was in there the evening before, and distinctly remember making turning the lights off when I left because someone could see in through the windows at night with the lights on. (By the way, there are, of course, bars on the two windows.) But it appeared to me that nothing was missing.

I tried to piece together the plan now. It fell into place when I went into Gary's house and looked outside the living room window and saw the mutant Spock standing with a taller, chubbier guy on the main dirt road. They were looking out at the landscape toward the ocean and talking, like, oh, it wasn't us that broke into the garage. We're just hanging out. Come on, we wouldn’t be standing here all innocent like if we had done something like that, now would we? I thought for a second whether I should go out and confront them - but only for a second. Then I walked through the kitchen and locked the metal gate on Gary’s back door. If they know I'm here alone, then I'm the only one they need to take out if they wanted to rob all three houses. Most of the time, thieves in Costa Rica are non - confrontational, but there’s often stories in the local papers where they break into a house, tie people up, and even kill them. And I’m not a gambling man. After a minute or so, they 'sauntered' away. But not before I snapped a picture of them through Gary’s bedroom window as they walked to their car.

When Fabian came a few minutes later and checked things out, he actually found something I had missed. Alongside the back corner of the house lay a canvas bag with pliers and screwdrivers and other stuff that would come in handy for burglaries. I guess they must have really been caught unaware. But how stupid of them to just park at the gate and send one guy up to burgle. Cocky ladrones? Cracked-out pissants? You tell me.

So now, Fabian and Jairo (my builder/friend) want me to go down to the Federal Investigative bureau and sign a denuncia or something like that. Ha! I don't have the time. I've heard the process is a joke, anyway. And I told Jairo that the 'alleged' thieves will see my name and come after me. He said, no, they don't know you. You're gone a lot. You're probably safe, he said. I told him I don't like them odds. Like I said, I’m a bad gambler. I'd rather just have Gary shoot them with his 40 caliber Glock when he gets back on Wednesday. I like them apples better.

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Comments

[Danielle]

Funny story!!
Good funny story!