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My Personal Sailing Adventures - with land trips on the side: Victim of a Crime in Johor Bahru Malaysia
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We were
about to park and I had taken my backpack off to check the time on my phone. I was holding the bag in my lap.
There were
two people on the crime bike too. One
the snatcher, the other the getaway driver.
We followed for a while in the hope of getting their number plate, but
they were too fast and there was too much traffic. And it had started raining.
We had just
given up the pursuit when we realised we were in front of a police guard
station. One of the cops immediately
said “follow me” to the central police station in town. At 100 kmph in the pouring rain. But we didn’t lose him.
At the Polis Diraja Malaysia ( Royal Malaysia Police )in Johor Bahru city, my report was taken
by a kind young cop.
It seemed to take forever as his English skills were only slightly
better than my uber basic Malay. And his hunt and peck typing skills were even more rudimentary.
Fortunately
my cheap phone, limited cash and Aussie driver’s license were the only items of
value. And more importantly at least we weren’t hurt!
No crime in Singapore
Apparently
it’s a totally different story over the causeway.
On my last
visit, a taxi driver told me proudly told me Singapore is the safest city in the world
then proceeded to go through a litany of recent JB crime:
An Iraqi guy had $US3000 stolen from his hotel room safe. “Obviously an inside job. A staff syndicate."
A group of ten of his friends were playing golf when they were held up at gunpoint for all their cash. “Mostly they had credit cards on them though.”
A couple of his family were shopping in JB when they had their bags snatched at knifepoint. “They were so frightened they didn’t go shopping in JB again.”
When I visited
an art gallery, and the attendant there told me “Malaysia is like America’s
south to us.”
After a
couple of weeks one of the inspectors from the JB central police station called me. He reported they had set up a police block for a kilometer around the scene of the crime.
But they
hadn't caught the perps or found my bag. No surprises there but I was truly
grateful to feel they cared enough to get back to me.
I am
interested in hearing about your experience of crime in Johor Bahru in Malaysia
and Singapore. Is Singapore as crime
free as the locals tell me? Is Johor Bahru as dangerous as some people claim?
