It is a little past 9 in the morning. An orange fresh, two eggs with salad and morning plans with the gang at work, before leaving for a shooting for work. We are at Ikea, where we had no idea you could have breakfast before the store opens. I discovered a lot of people drinking coffee at this time here.
Well nourished, we left, as we had the job to do.
After an hour and a half, an unknown number called me.
“Are you Dana Mladin?” – a man’s voice asks me.
“Yes”.
“Have you been in Ikea Bucharest earlier?”
At first I could not understand, then I thought they had called me for a quick survey or something… To see if I am satisfied with their services, if the eggs were fresh, if the cashier lady was not naughty… Things like these. I think they’ll have my number since I got an IKEA card.
“I was” – I answered a bit harshly.
“And didn’t you forget anything?…”
Ooops. In two seconds, I looked in the car to see if I had the other phone – I had it. The bag – I had it. What could I have forgotten? Then I get it: THE WALLET! DAMN!
The wallet that I took out at one point from my bag and then I left it nicely on the chair next to me…
I tell the man directly, without any help. He validates my answer, as if we were playing “Who wants to be a millionaire”, I feel victorious that I am (again) a millionaire (I know I had about 4-5 million in my wallet. Old lei…) and, after repeatedly thanking him, we agree to meet in some good hours, when I return to Bucharest.
I have to travel now without any papers, no cards and no money. I feel… empty. Vulnerable. I am at the mercy of my colleagues, to be able to eat something.
After about 10 hours, I reach the “crime scene” again.
I call the number that called me in the morning, I reach Customer Relations, a gentleman from the Security comes smiling to me with a sealed envelope and my wallet inside.
“Some young people found it”, he tells me. Seeing my name on the cards, they wanted to look for me on Facebook (good idea!). Then they found my business cards and so they found my phone number too.
The man lays out in front of me a sheet of paper on which I see details about finding the wallet and what it contains. God, how much I have in it – only now I realize…
In a fraction of a second, I do a mental census of things in my wallet: driving license, the card of the car, personal card, company cards, press card, subway subscription, bus subscription, money, health card, some more cards from stores, gas stations and restaurants, access card to the National Library, ID card, then… brace yourselves: icons, thermometer, centimeter, a mini nail file, a smartphone needle, a microsim adapter, a card for removing the hoods (!!!), toothpicks, salt, pepper, safety pins, aid patches and my business cards! Phew!
What do you say? Am I ready for a nuclear war?… (And you have to know that my wallet is one of an absolutely normal size!)
I return to the sheet of paper, I declare in writing that I have got back the entire wallet, unharmed, I sincerely thank the man from the Security, in my mind I thank the young people who found it and, happy that I have found it, I decide to spend some money from my wallet in Ikea J).
