I had spent the night in another city where I attended a conference and went to the theatre in the evening with a group of other conference attendees.
The next day I decided to do some shopping before heading home so I went to a mall and bought a pair of Panama Jack hiking boots.
After, I went to the bus depot and was surprised to see not one person waiting for the bus I was going to take but dozens of people standing under the bus shelter waiting for other busses.
The number 23 bus soon arrived and moments after I boarded and took my seat, the driver changed the route and the bus became the number 24.
Taking it in stride, I pressed the stop indicator and walked to the front of the bus where the driver asked if I wanted the next stop or the one after and asked if I hadn't just boarded the bus.
I told him I got on the wrong bus and he apologized.
At a traffic light, I noticed what looked like a car on fire just up the street and mentioned it to the bus driver who looked over and acknowledged that it was indeed a car on fire whose owner was trying to fan the flames to no avail. I thought I noticed a man casually reading a newspaper in the passenger seat of the car seemingly unfazed by the fact the car was engulfed in flames.
The bus driver then got on his two-way radio and called his dispatch to report the fire.
The bus drove along and after having a good long gaze at the familiar-looking driver, I realized he was the spitting image of television newsman Tom Brokaw.
I wondered to myself if it really could be Tom Brokaw, thinking perhaps he chose to drive a bus during his retirement years in order to continue observing people and scenes of everyday life.
Just before exiting the bus, I gave the driver a curious look and smiled. He returned the smile which I understood to be an acknowledgement that it was indeed Tom Brokaw who I had recognized. I wanted to tell him that I had been a lifelong admirer and ask him if anyone ever recognized him, taking into account that people in that country probably wouldn't be all that familiar with television personalities in other countries.
I got off the bus realizing I would have to walk quite a ways to get the number 23 bus, so I decided to walk over the main street and head over to the metro station, where I would have a larger selection of busses, trams and underground trains to choose from.
As there was an indoor shopping center on the corner, I decided to walk in and remove the boots I had purchased earlier from their box and pack them into my travel bag so I wouldn't have to carry the box on its own.
I opened the box and looked at the shoes wondering if I had made a good purchase.
I removed the shoes and had a look at the accessories that came with the boots—a chamois, cleaning brush, extra pair of shoelaces and two small plastic bottles I assumed to be some sort of leather protector and cleaning cream.
Realizing the boots and all the accessories wouldn't fit in my travel bag. I returned everything to the box and headed for the depot.
Having decided to take the metro, I started walking towards the station when my phone rang.
I retrieved it from the inside pocket of my suit jacket and saw it was my daughter calling but I was confused to find no green button to accept the call, only an option that said "rear camera."
I was finally able to answer the call without video and I set my travel bag and brief case on a bench that had many people sitting on it.
My daughter asked when I would be home, that my family had expected me the day before.
I explained it got late after the theatre so I decided to spend the night at a small hotel.
Having only taken my eyes off of my bags for a split second, I realized they were no longer on the bench in front of me and I began to panic, frantically looking around to see if perhaps the woman with small children who had just sat down had moved my things out of her way. But I soon came to realize my things had been snatched right before my very eyes and in broad daylight.
I told my daughter that my bags had just been stolen and as I looked around I saw hundreds of people in the square and young men with bags running everywhere and realized I would never stand a chance in a million of finding the thief or my bags.
My daughter passed the phone to my wife who asked me what had happened and I went into shock, beginning to whimper and talk in an erratic manner, repeating over and over again that my bags were gone and all of my things were gone, that I would never get my things back again.
Then I woke up.
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