Near Break In

Recently Hans and I got to experience the crime that South Africa is famous for. Burglaries pick up around the holidays and the building our apartment is in was no exception this holiday season. The other apartments in our building are rented out as vacation rentals, and the thieves must have noticed the guests moving in and out with their luggage and laptops. Thieves broke in to two of the other holiday apartments two days in a row, stealing 3 laptops. The third morning we woke up at 530am to two guys in the process of trying to rip the burglar bars out of one of our windows, which wasn't too difficult considering the rusty nails and corroded wood. But thankfully they made a lot of noise and woke us up. Hans scared them off before they could get into the house. We got the local private security company involved, and they said they saw the guys running away, but they didn't catch them. They were almost certainly junkies looking for something to sell to buy drugs.

That day, Hans proceeded to reinforce all the burglar bars in our house by replacing the rusty screws and added more locks to our front door. It needed to be done, and this close call was all the motivation he needed!

All this to say, we appreciate your prayers for safety! We've been doing surprisingly well, not feeling unsafe or having trouble sleeping. And we haven't had any more trouble. Here's a pic of our damaged burglar bars, and Hans on the rampage with a screw driver.