I Left My Camera Bag on a Train

Human Interest Story 

Alexander Jansen is stationed in Germany and took advantage of some leave time to tour Europe with his two younger sisters. They took the train from the airport to their Dublin hotel and realized too late that Jansen's backpack was left on the train car! It had a long list of photo equipment…

…in it, but also my and my two sisters’ passports. The holy grail of things to NEVER lose.

Eyes growing incredibly wide, he picks up the phone and calls someone. He explains the situation to the person on the other end of the phone when I hear him say “Don’t joke like that.”

He hangs up the phone and says, “There’s no one on the train other than the driver, and he can’t stop the train. You will have to wait for it to reach the end of the line and then have my guy at Howth (the final stop) check to see if it’s still there. I’m going to be completely honest with you: I don’t think it will be there. That train is passing through some really bad areas.”

You might say that the story has a happy "ending," but it gets even better after that, as Jansen ponders how much the kindness of a group of young Irish girls meant to him. More