My office mate’s van was stolen on Saturday evening. He was working in Chang Lam Plaza, the up market shopping centre where we have our office, until about 9pm. When he went out, he found a bunch of teenagers sticking something into the lock of the building manager’s car and told them off. They stood shame-faced while he asked which school they went to and whether this was conduct the school condoned. Eventually he let them go, only to find that his own car was missing. There’s no proof that the kids were responsible – it’s likely they were just mucking around rather than actually trying to break the lock.
‘It’s embarrassing,’ he said after relating the episode. ‘We like to brag about how peaceful Bhutan is, but then things like this happen. It’s surprising in such a small town.’
He spent the night driving around in his personal car, looking for the company van, but no luck. The police haven’t found it yet either. There aren’t many places to hide a car in this country is it will have to turn up soon, but it’s shock that it happened at all.