On
the morning I had planned to visit the Vatican City, my son left his passport
in a bag on the number 30 bus in Rome. It was horrible. The moment we had
dis-boarded, the bus doors slammed shut and the bus took off. Until that day,
he had used a bum bag. My son hadn’t realized what had happened until it was
too late. He ran after the bus but and vanished in the crowd.
In
his bag was his passport, cameras, phone, bank card and 150 Euros. Also
included was a change of clothes for the Vatican.
(Read
all my articles on Rome on my Rome
a Survival Kit)
I yelled after him to meet us at the Castel Sant’ Angelo, but I wasn’t sure he had heard.
I
went into meltdown, crying all down the Via del Corso. My daughter, Violet
tried to reassure me but I kept thinking about my lost son and passport. Our Vatican trip was due within an hour.
Read
my other article on how I managed to wangle our trip to the Vatican against all
the odds.
Also
read my guide on getting an emergency passport abroad.
So
we had lost a passport, valuables and I had lost my son in the crowds.
Violet
and I made our way to the Castel Sant’ Angelo where I told Josh to meet us, but
there was no sign of him. I couldn’t contact him because he didn’t have his
phone.
After
searching half an hour, my daughter’s phone went off. My son had gone into a
police station in the Piazza del Collegio. We used Violet’s sat-nav to get
there. It was boiling, crowded and horrible.
We
found Josh in the police station looking sorry for himself. A policewoman spoke
decent English and filed a police report. She assured us not to worry. The driver
of the 30 bus has informed our hotel that he has left Josh’s bag at the ‘lost and
found’. (My son’s bag still had his tag showing his name and hotel).
I
asked the policewoman where this ‘lost and found’ place was and she just waved
me away with the response, ‘Oh, just ask anyone. It’s at the main metro station.’
She
never gave us an address and so I assumed there was a central ‘lost property’
office in the main bus station, the Roma Termini.
When
we got to the Termini and asked about the lost property office, no one knew
what we were talking about. An official just stood there and told us to wait.
We waited an hour and then walked off. The official did nothing to help us.
In
the end, I found a kiosk in the Termini. The woman gave me a scrap of paper
with an address of a grotty place called Ostiense. Strangely, this place
happened to be just round the corner from our hotel (but nowhere near a bus
route).
The
woman then told us Ostiense was closed at 1pm not to open until Monday morning.
I couldn’t believe it. It was Friday afternoon. Josh’s bag was locked up within
an office somewhere in Rome and we couldn’t get hold of it. And worse, we were
due to fly back that very day.
And
horribly, a little voice inside me told me Josh’s bag wasn’t at Ostiense.
I
would soon learn of Rome’s appalling public services with early closures and scanty
staff. This seems due to poor public funding.
As
soon as I got back to the hotel, I rang the British Embassy and was advised to
wait until Monday. The passport is not ‘lost’ yet. If I applied for an
emergency passport, (called an emergency travel document or etd) I would have
to pay 100 pounds and Josh’s original passport would be void. I will also have
to wait 2 working days for the emergency passport to be ready. That meant I
would miss my flight.
So
the embassy advised me to wait until Monday and see if the passport is there.
In
the meantime, I could do nothing.
So
we carried on with our holiday.
We
had missed our slot for seeing the Vatican. I didn’t know if my son’s passport
was in Ostiense and I didn’t know if we would be flying back on Monday. My son
was also was short of clothes.
I
therefore went about wangling a visit at the Vatican after missing my slot.
Read my next article on how I got to see the Vatican City against the odds.
Lesson learnt
Don’t
lose your passport in Rome!
The
lost property office of Rome is not in central Termini bus station, but a
grotty little place called Ostiense, nowhere near a bus route.
The
public services are poor in Rome with early closures and few staff. This seems
due to poor funding.
Read
all my articles on Rome on my Rome
a Survival Kit
 |
| The Polizia in Piazza del Collegio |
 |
| The grotty Ostiense Lost property office |
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| Information kiosk at Termini |
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| An emergency passport |
