I was having a quiet evening on Tuesday chatting with my girl friend and I was disturbed by a phone call from my roomate. I was completely annoyed and hoped to God that he wasn’t calling me to open the door because he forgot to take his keys. I know its only a few steps away but I’m just lazy that way 
. It turns out that the reason behind the call was that one of my friends got mugged at gunpoint. Three black guys came asking for a nickel and just took everything he had on him including his cellphone and wallet, which had his atm card, a few credit cards, his university identity card and several visiting cards he had collected in conferences he attended all these years as a Phd student. They called me to find out the bank phone number so he could de-activate his cards.
The painful thing about being mugged is not just the monetary loss. The few dollars you lose can always be made in a couple of months but the trauma is just unimaginable. This guy was the funniest guy I have known, who was always cheerful and joking about everything in life but he was visibly shaken by this experience. He couldn’t think clearly and we had to make the calls to the respective banks so he could talk to them. It was horrifying to say the least. He had to get a new identity card which cost him $25, a new cell phone and lost a whole bunch of contacts because he took his wallet for granted. He has to get new credit cards and change the card numbers for all his services. Getting robbed is one thing but getting everything back in order after getting robbed is another headache everyone has to put up with.
The weird thing is that, my roomates nearly got mugged two days after this incident. They were walking back home at 230am in the night from a friend’s place. Its just a stupid thing to do, especially after what happened. They were chased by a black guy carrying a gun and they immediately escaped into a nearby apartment complex. They tried knocking on the door but nobody opened and they hid near the stairs until the guy just disappeared. They called one of the guys and he picked them up in his car.
Its just bizzare because Auburn is generally considered to be a quiet place. Its a university town and there have really never been any instances of mugging or anything remotely violent (a few last year but far away from the campus). Even if it happened it was unbeknownst to the desi community living here. This has definitely put me on my toes and this probably means not going out to eat later in the night. Staying away from work late nights and generally looking out in the surroundings. So everyone out there, be careful. Do NOT take your streets for granted. Anything can happen. These are just bad times.
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