Losing wallets is one of my greatest talents. I have lost my wallet an incredible 3 times in the last 3 weeks. So what should you do if you lose your wallet? The most important thing is not to freak out. People seem to think it’s the worse thing that could happen, but it’s really not that bad- especially for me.
Losing my wallet has almost no impact on my life. The most useful items in my wallet are my license and my atm/credit card, but I can even do without them. My license is important for ID, but I can use my passport for that. Unless I lose that too, but that has only happened once. It turns out bars don’t accept birth certificates as ID.
As I busker I work in cash, so not having access to my bank account isn’t an issue most of th time. To answer that age old question: should I cancel my credit cards? I say no. Perhaps I’m too trusting but I’ve never had anyone charge stuff to my credit card, and I find getting a new one a bit of a hassle. I’ll give it at least a week before I cancel it. This tends to surprise people.
“Oh my gosh, you haven’t cancelled your cards yet?”
“No”
“You really should cancel your credit card.”
“How many wallets have you lost?” I ask
“None, I’ve never lost my wallet”
“Well I’ve lost a lot, so who’s the expert in losing wallets here?”
Yeah, that’s right, me. I am highly skilled at losing things, but wallets are my specialty. In the last 6 years I’ve lost 10+ wallets on 3 different continents. Here’s the good news, I’ve gotten 8 of them back. People think it’s because I’m lucky, but I don’t believe that, I think most people will get their wallets back, I just happen to lose them more.
In this experiment, 100 wallets were dropped around a city in the USA, 74% came back. This website did a similar experiment comparing various countries and cities. 70% of wallets in Australia and Canada came back, 83% in New Zealand and 67% in the US. The results for Sydney and Toronto were not as good as I would’ve expected or hoped, with only 40% being returned. I found this article about lost wallets in Toronto saying that 75% had been returned, and my personal experience in Sydney has been 7/8 returned.
Big thanks go out to all the people who have helped reunite me with my wallets. Central station, Wynyard station, NAB, Sydney police, Canberra police, my Dad, Queen’s University, that guy from Kingston, that guy from the Bridge hotel, and that bar, to name a few.
This is where summer and Australia come in handy. I lost mine here in February and didn't hear anything about it for a couple weeks so assumed it was gone, cancelled all the credit cards, got new bank cards and health cards, etc. Turns out it was just buried in snow. Thanks a lot winter climate!
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Also clearly I could be an arts major too since I'm just as proficient as losing things. Most recent one is the cell phone. Doing surprisingly well without it. Back to simpler times!
Wow I can't believe you lost it in the snow. That seems so unfair.
ReplyDeleteShame about the phone too. It might not recover so well if it's been sitting in the snow.
Maya, I think you hold the record for lost wallets. My specialty is loosing wristwatches. I only buy the cheapest watches that money can buy. I just purchased a new watch for $9.00.
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