Yes. My husband and I were traveling from Civitavecchia to the Rome Termini Station, with all of our luggage from the 10-day cruise. Keep in mind, we had become very familiar with the train system by the end of our cruise, and we had been vigilent about our belongings. We were sitting next to each other, with all of our bags in the seats in front of us, except for our briefcase, which was in the overhead rack right in front of our noses. We were robbed two stops before Termini. I had been forewarned of pick-pockets in Rome, and even of their tactics to distract people while robbing them, but we were unaware of what was happening at the time and it all happened in just a few seconds. These people are professional criminals and they work in teams to victimize unsuspecting, good-natured tourists. A young man got very close to us and put a train ticket in our faces, and he spoke very loudly and acted as if he needed help in figuring out if it was his stop on the train. My husband felt it was odd that he was so close to us, and standing in the middle of us when he could have just asked my husband, who was sitting on the aisle. I thought it was odd that this guy's train ticket was purchased in Termini, when the train was on it's way into Termini. But this is all realized in hindsight. He pointed to the ticket and to the station outside. Then a few seconds later, he ran off the train. It was not until we arrived at Termini, 5 minutes later, that we discovered our briefcase was gone, and the shock and heartache sank in of losing our photos, which cannot be replaced. It was difficult to find someone to help us because no one spoke English. It took us 30 minutes to find the police station in Termini, which was located in the middle of nowhere in the basement, with no signs. I think the police station was under renevation (in the height of tourist season no less). However, there is no visible police force on the trains or in the stations, which is unbelievable given the amount of crime that happens there. Then we had to wait 90 minutes to fill out a police report because there was only one officer who spoke a little English, and by then I knew our photos were long gone. While waiting at the police station, tourists piled in who had also just been robbed on incoming trains. One guy we spoke to from Australia had been traveling in Europe for 3 1/2 months, and he had one week left of his vacation before returning home, and he lost his camera and memory cards with over 2500 photos. We were able to give a description of the guy who distracted us, and we knew what time he got off the train and at which station. The police said there was a chance to find our things, because that station was small and had video cameras, and they would try their best. We notified the American Embassy of what happened as well, but they said not to expect anyone to work on our case before Wednesday August 16 because of the holiday. We are happy to have returned home safely, and we still plan on going on future vacations overseas. We'll just have to go back to the places we just saw on our vacation and take more pictures someday.
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