I’ll be updating this in a while. I just need to publish this one ASAP.
This day started out great, to be honest. Woke up okay, finished one of my projects in little over an hour and I won a Globe jacket!
But alas, trouble comes in the evening. Ironically, I was just 5 minutes away from home.
I was going up the overpass when a man tapped me, asking me if I had been in the vicinity a few hours before. I said, “No, it’s the first time I passed by here today” and he proceeded on relaying what happened allegedly a few hours before. The story goes as follows:
He is a kagawad of the nearby barangay. His god-daughter was harassed by a certain gang member while waiting for a jeepney. Her boyfriend who was with her fought back but for all he knew, they were actually a gang. So the guy got beaten up to half an inch of his life so they were taken to a nearby clinic.
Now, he said that there were descriptions of the suspects and that I fit one of the descriptions. So he was asking me to come with them (there were two of them now) to the nearby police station and well, thinking that since I’ve not done anything wrong at all, this won’t take a while, I came with them. While he was talking with me, a guy was going up and he signalled to his companion that that other guy also fit one of the other descriptions. So both of us are now suspected and we both went with them.
The rest of the conversations on the way to the station went on in such a way that the events that happened became much more vivid to my mind. How the girl was harrased, how the guy was beaten up, what things were stolen from the couple, etc. Eventually, the guy said that we had to go to the station separately for isolated interrogation. So the two of them went ahead, leaving the other suspected person’s phone and wallet with me for “security purposes” (as apparently the last guy that was interrogated called up his fraternity and there was some trouble).
So I was left with this other guy and we were talking while waiting for the other two to come back. When it was my time to go, they asked me to do the same thing. They also asked me to leave my ATM and asked me for my PIN number too for verification purposes (and by god, am I stupid — only realized that I should not have when I just finished saying it). Then the kagawad guy said to the one I am going with that he should let me wait a few buildings before the station because their kumpadres are already drunk and they may think that the suspect already got caught and beat me up. So, he did leave me in a corner.
While waiting, I reviewed the events and after 5 minutes or so, I just said: “Oh crap.” and then I ran as fast as I can home. I checked my ATM account balance ( 3k was drawn out ) I reported the card stolen anyway. I also called Sun Cellular to temporary disable my number (since we’re on a postpaid package) and tried Globe if they have blocking services for pre-paid (they don’t have, as I thought). I also sent messages to all my clients and mailing groups of what happened. The situation is, as far as I know, contained.
There is no regret in me. The 3k in my ATM, my old phone and the newer one were just cheap anyway. They’re just things. I can earn them back in a project or two. I’m not in a state of shock either. Or perhaps, all that mental processing was my state of shock.
The funny thing is, I even gave them my calling card.