Several years ago, I was working for the organizers of the Contemporary Art Biennial of Seville (which, sadly, has since closed due to financial difficulties), and a small team was recruited to travel to Madrid for an official presentation of the event at ARCO, Spain’s biggest contemporary art fair. So I and two of my co-workers, Esther and Rosa, hopped on the high-speed train called the AVE and flew north to the capital. We worked our little buns off for two days, carting boxes of press materials and racing around the fair venue to make all the necessary arrangements for the event. Of course we had all dressed to the nines, eager to make a good impression on the Spanish art world and represent our company well. But the heels wreaked havoc on our feet as we pounded the pavement to and from our hotel and covered miles of carpeted flooring at the fair.
On the last day, having completed our mission and taken in as much contemporary art as our weary brains could handle, my colleague Esther (who was handling media relations) and I limped our way to the subway station—after succumbing to the temptation to pick up two pairs of inexpensive flats at a shoe store along the way—and boarded the train that would take us back to our hotel for a night of much-needed rest before heading home to Seville the following morning.We were accompanied by James, an American guy who had come over to supervise on behalf of the biennial’s curator and didn't speak a word of Spanish. So I tried to facilitate communications between the two of them as we got our tickets from the automatic machine at the station and managed to push our way into one of the cars. The subway was packed with people leaving the fair and heading back into downtown Madrid, so we were shoulder-to-shoulder and back-to-back with a crowd of strangers. James retreated to the corner while Esther and I found a handhold on the overhead bar, and we chatted as the train hurtled through the tunnels. She asked me if I remembered what time our train was leaving for Seville the next day, which I didn't, so I decided to have a look at the ticket in my purse. As I carefully maneuvered my arm to avoid elbowing my fellow passengers and stuck my hand in my purse, I was surprised to find that the top flap was open. I was almost certain that I had closed and latched it after buying my ticket. With a sinking feeling, I began to rummage around inside for my wallet, to no avail. I frantically began emptying the contents and passing them to Esther, but a thorough search confirmed my suspicions. I started to wonder if I could have left the wallet at the ticket machine, but then I clearly remembered storing the ticket inside my wallet as we were moving toward the train so I knew that wasn't the case. It had to be a pickpocket, and given the fact that we were packed in like sardines and unable to move, I knew it was almost certainly one of the people in my immediate vicinity. We hadn't even reached the first stop so whoever it was hadn't had a chance to get off yet.
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I immediately went into panic mode: the wallet contained all of my documentation, including my prized foreign residency card (which if lost would mean loads of paperwork and hours of lines and rubber-stamping) and my train ticket home, as well as all my credit cards and cash. I whispered my conclusions to Esther, and we began to surreptitiously scan the people around us for a likely candidate. The only people within reaching distance were a well-dressed elderly Spanish woman, an equally well-dressed business man, and a girl who looked to be about 10 or 12 years old. The girl was lost to the world, humming to some tune blaring through her earphones, but I could see that she didn't have anything large enough to hide my wallet and her hands were in plain view. The elderly woman was staring at me and my cheap flats so unabashedly that I discarded her as a suspect; I figured that if she was the thief, she would have turned away to avoid attracting attention. That left the businessman. He certainly didn't look like a subway pickpocket: he was wearing a nice three-piece suit, holding a leather briefcase, and had a trench coat slung over his arm. Ah hah—the trench coat! It was the only possible hiding place, and he was the only one of the three whose hands were hidden from view.
Again I whispered to Esther, “I think it’s him.” She gawked at me in disbelief and said, “No way!” I said, “I’m going to ask him to show me his hands.” She urged me not to, saying that it couldn't be him, and if it was confrontation could be dangerous. But by that time I was too worked up to care; all I could think about was what a mess it would be if I lost my wallet and my ticket home, and I was trembling with a combination of fear and righteous anger.
So despite the frantic nudges from my co-worker, I tapped the man on the shoulder and in a shaky voice said, “Excuse me, sir, would you mind showing me your hands?” As soon as he turned to face me I knew I had the culprit. He held up the hand not covered by the trench coat and tried to look guileless, but I was now certain that my wallet was lying under the coat so I pointed to the other hand, indicating that I wanted to see that one as well. I suddenly felt something brush the hand that was at my side, and as I opened my fingers the wallet was pressed into my palm. I held it up to make sure it was mine, and I quickly checked to make sure that nothing had been removed as Esther looked on in disbelief. Meanwhile the “businessman” had quickly shifted his position to turn away from us and was trying to push through the crowd toward the door. The next stop was announced over the PA system, and the train began to slow down. I still couldn't believe that I had recovered my wallet, but as relief flooded over me I realized that the pickpocket was making his getaway and would disappear as soon as the doors opened, no doubt intending to catch the next train and prey on some other unsuspecting foreigner. The relief gave way to indignation and anger at the thought that he was going to get away scot-free without so much as a reprimand. By this time Esther, equally relieved that I had recovered my wallet and that the man hadn't pulled a knife on us, was also hopping mad and we both raised our voices and began yelling at the people near the door to stop the pickpocket. But the few who looked up simply glanced at us, some bemused and others pitying, and instead of blocking his escape the crowd actually parted to let him through. We tried to catch the attention of the subway employee standing at the other end of the car, but he either didn't hear us or didn't want trouble. No one within hearing distance could have failed to understand what had happened, but they just didn't care.
The ruckus had alerted poor James to the fact that something was wrong, but he didn't understand the rapid-fire Spanish we were speaking, so he edged over and asked what was happening. When he grasped the situation, he chivalrously offered to grab the man and hold him until the subway authorities could be summoned, but by that time there were about 10 sweaty bodies between us and the thief and the train had almost come to a full stop.
Esther, a small-town girl herself with an excellent repertoire of colorful insults, began shouting at the top of her lungs: “Ehcoria! Malnacío! Sinvergüensa!” (spoken in a thick Andalusian accent, which in English roughly translates as “Scumbag! Louse! Shameless man!”). Emboldened by her shouts and with my dander thoroughly up, I also began yelling, “Yeah, you’d better run! Coward!” The people on the car around us actually started laughing as the insults poured out, recognizing our southern accents and probably thinking, “Just another two hicks getting a taste of big-city life.” The man never looked back at us, and as soon as the doors opened he hustled off the car and melted into the crowd.Rattled and amazed at our own boldness, we discussed the episode for the rest of the journey and wasted no time in narrating our adventure to our husbands over the phone. What we found most surprising about the entire thing was the total apathy of our fellow passengers, and the fact that the only person willing to do anything about it was a guy who didn't even understand half of what was going on. If something like that had happened on a bus in either of our towns, the pensioners riding in the back almost certainly would have pinned the blackguard to a seat with their dentures, and he would have been lucky to escape with his suit and/or teeth intact. In any event, the story had a happy ending: I got my belongings back, we didn't get shivved, and we had an exciting tale to spice up after-dinner conversations. But we also learned a lesson: keep a hand on your purse at all times in large crowds, and don’t expect any help from strangers on the Madrid subway. We were two happy little country bumpkins when we finally made it home, grateful to be back in a small town where everyone makes it their business to know your business but can also be counted on to “have your back” in a pinch.
Green Acres is the place for me...
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