Bump In The Road!
How safe is it? Well, we bought a safe, put our small electronics and cash in it, and someone waited until we were gone on a day trip and took the safe, which was bolted to the concrete wall! There was not a scratch on the wall but all 4 bolts along with the safe, were just pulled out of the wall, in one piece, by The Incredible Hulk, I presume.
They broke the window you see, and touched nothing except the safe (and 3 of my shirts in the dirty clothes pile???). All our windows are "glass-less". They have an outside screen and the wooden louvers you see on the remaining windows. So it's pretty easy to push them in. All the louvers (none of which were damaged???) were neatly piled next to the house.
My current theory is that we became an attractive target because we had contractors visiting the house and providing work estimates the day before the break-in. Our expectation was to repair/repaint windows, do a total house repaint, and do some minor roof and A/C repairs. We now have a higher priority and that is decorative ironwork for the doors and windows.
All-in-all, we lost cash, small electronic devices and one iPad, plus one passport. We have had renter's insurance with State Farm for some time at our PA home. And we have continued that at the home where our stuff is now stored prior to shipment down here. State Farm and our agent (Tom Roth in Lansdale) could not have been more helpful. Two days after our report, we had money transferred to our PA bank account to cover the lost items (they only covered a few hundred dollars of the cash though). I can't say enough for the folks we've dealt with at Tom Roth's office. This time it was Cyndy, but our past experiences with Evonne and Sandy have been nothing less than fantastic! If you're looking for a good insurance office for auto, home, etc. don't hesitate to contact them.
Our experience with the U.S. Embassy, on the other hand, has been and likely will continue to be terrible. They were totally unconcerned when we called to report the passport stolen. They offered no assistance at all, the first time we called. It was Friday around 8pm, so they said to call back Monday! And they had no interest in knowing the passport number or our name or anything else. After conversations with 3 different people on the following Monday, nothing had changed. They didn't record any info. They said to fill out forms online (and only online, forms filled out by hand would not be accepted!!!), regardless of whether our computers were stolen. In this case we just happened to be lucky enough to still have have our main computer (my laptop). Filling out the forms on their website was excruciating. The site looks nice but constantly had glitches (that were not due to our internet service) during the process. And there were really bad or no instructions on how to enter the data. But we now have the 2 required forms filled out and will use a neighbor's printer to get the hardcopies the Embassy wants. NO! It's not good enough to arrive with the electronic forms filled out and stored on a phone or laptop, that can be transferred to them when we visit. And now we have to go to the main Embassy in Santo Domingo (5 hour bus ride each way - only $20 each, roundtrip though). And No, it couldn't be done at either of the consulates with 30 minutes of us. So stay tuned for the next episode in the Embassy saga.
Had we not let ourselves get a bit too complacent for a tourist area like this, we would have opened a bank account sooner, which would have minimized the cash loss. We would have also have gotten the "passport cards" in addition to our passports (which alone, are good for travel to/from Mexico, Canada, and the Caribbean). Had we done just those 2 things, our loss would have been almost nothing. Some good news was that our version of iPad allowed us to lock and erase its contents, using the Find My Phone function on the laptop. We still went through the tedious and necessary precautionary measure of changing all of our passwords etc. So unless our data ends up in the hands of a Nigerian prince, we will hopefully be OK.
The 18"W x 12"D x 5"H safe was bolted into the corner of our closet. You can see that the only marks visible are the 4 holes where the bolts were. We have a better (and simpler and less costly) option for the future, but that's a secret.
So, once we get a replacement passport (if that ever really happens), we will be able to get back on track with previously house renovations, plus the addition of the ironwork.
We now plan to return home for part of the holidays and for necessary doctor appointments. We will have a house/pet sitter to take care of things for us here, while we are away. If my doctors allow it, we will be back before the start of the New Year to continue our journey. Stay tuned!