Mugging in Milan

February 21, 2008 · Filed Under Milan · 2 Comments

This post has been updated to make it more accurate - Alex Roe, 22.02.1008.

I was rather worried to learn from the guy I work with that he had been mugged a couple of weeks back.

As if mugging in any circumstances were not bad enough, this case is worse. You see, this guy was attacked in the centre of Milan in the Duomo underground stop, on a Sunday, and while he was with his little daughter.

Apparently, while he was getting on a train, he was brought down rugby style, and then held down while an accomplice stole his wallet from his back pocket.

As you do after such an event, you head off to the nearest police station to report the miscreants. And as he arrived at the police station, my friend found himself in the midst of a whole group of people who had also been victims of what was a well organised and executed mass mugging.

The other victims were a mixture of foreigners and Italians alike, and many had lost money, credit cards, and important personal documents. The muggers, and there were five or six, my friend told met, were in their mid-thirties and may have been Italian.

In view of the brazen nature of these attacks, it should have been possible for the police to have caught up with the criminals. No such luck.

My friend suggested that the police use the CCTV system to identify the perpetrators, but was surprised to discover that the underground station video surveillance cameras were not working on the day of this rash of nasty attacks. Great, not.

In view of this potential problem, and I don’t know if action has been taken, it would be a good idea to carry two wallets if you venture into the centre of Milan via the underground railway system, the yellow line, at the moment. Put one in your back pocket, in which you can put 10 Euros or so, and hide the other in a less obvious place. Then, in the event of a mugging, at least the thieves would think they had got what they were after.

On no account try to remonstrate with these interesting gentlemen. Unless you are Rambo, you will most likely come off very badly.

Just watch you back, and keep your eyes open for signs of unwanted attention down in the underground stations, and, if something does raise your suspicions, keep your wits about you.

Tags: be careful, city, crime, duomo, Duomo stop, gang, Italia, Italian, Milan, Milano, mugging, People, police, problem, railway, theft, underground, watch out, yellow line

Knock, knock!

January 16, 2008 · Filed Under Life in Italy · 1 Comment

Who was there? A nice man who explained that he was from some gas safety company or other. He even had a nice little badge. Then he told me that he was here to carry out a ‘gas safety check’ and asked me if we had any other gas fired appliances. I replied that we did not. Then he whipped out a little gas alarm thingy from his briefcase, no box or anything, and was about to ‘install’ it. An operation which basically consisted of plugging the thing into the wall. He even demonstrated it for me. Very kind.

Recognising a district sales patter, I enquired whether I would have to pay for this all this gas alarm goodness. ‘Yes’, he replied breezily. I asked the price. ‘170 Euros’, came the reply, and credit cards, cash and, probably the odd kidney or two, were acceptable forms of payment. Maintenance was included as well, but he did not say if more cash would have to be handed over for some plan or other. Bit steep the price, I thought, and then I effectively said, ‘No thank you.’, but he would not leave until I had called my other half and asked her if she had seen any of the two notices he had supposedly left. She had not.

That was it. Bye, bye Mr Scam man. He looked a bit peeved, but left rather hastily.

This guy had been plying his wares throughout the condo, but I don’t know whether he had managed to hook anyone, although he implied that he had. After this nice man had moved on, I kept a weather eye out for him and noticed that he had rung one of our neighbours’ door bells. She had not answered, but a little later I noticed through our spy hole that her door was open, so I went to have a go at preventing the little man from conning her. Luckily he was not there. Anyway, I explained what had happened to her and she thanked me for the warning.

A very clever form of high pressure salesmanship, or should that be ‘con’, and it would have been rather difficult to have proved that you had been hoodwinked into buying something that you can buy on the open market for around 50 Euros! I know, I checked.

If you live in Milan, watch out for this ‘approach’, and do not get caught out - single women and older people, beware. Although dressed casually, this guy had quite an official air about him, was over 6 feet tall, around 30, thin and had a pony tail. The sales talk was quite polished, as if he had done some course or other.

Interesting experience, and he almost caught me out. Almost.

Tags: bad, beware, buying, company, con, condo, Milan, People, sales, trick, watch out, women

I called the fire brigade today

October 2, 2007 · Filed Under Me · Comment

It’s true. Don’t worry though, it was an accident.

I’ll explain. I was listening to some messages on my mobile, as you do, and at one point I tried to delete a message but, seeing as this was the first time I had used the service on my new phone, I pressed five. Before pressing 5, I had pressed 1, then, before that 1, which equals 115, if you are still with me. Now, 115 is the emergency number for the fire service here in Italy, and my phone cleverly, not, looked up the number and dialled it for me automatically. Some kind of auto number look up function - which I shall switch off, if I can.

Anyway, I’m sure you can imagine my surprise when I heard the man on the end of the line say ‘Pompieri’ (Firemen). I sort of blurted out an apology, and explained that I thought my phone was to blame (at that moment, I had not understood what had happened). Instead of being cross, the man told me that it had happened to him too!

The moral of the story: When in Italy and navigating a voice menu system on your mobile, watch out for the auto number search function!

PS I wonder just how much emergency services’ time is being wasted by this mobile ‘function’?

Tags: 115, be careful, call, cell phone, cellulare, emergency services, error, fire brigade, fire service, Information, Italy, Milan, mistake, mobile, mobile phone, number, phone, Useful, watch out