Tale Of The Missing Wallet and Heritage Day '09

Last week was Heritage Days in Edmonton. 5 days where you can walk around one of our parks and visit the entire world (more or less) by visiting the booths and vendors all run by people representing that country.
Despite being a rainy, cloudy day, it was the most fun I've had yet at any of Edmonton's many fairs.
Here's Jeremie and I sitting outside of the Eritrean booth.

We walked around all day and was thrilled when the sun decided to make an appearance. We ate ethnic food and drink. Did a bit of shopping and watched the many presentations that day.
Here the women of Lao are dancing. It was all very cool.

However one of the most interesting and amazing presentations was the Dragon dancing. It was spectacular. The aerobics and stunts these young children can do are mind boggling.

Their show lasted a good 20 minutes. When it was over, the boys under the dragon were sweating buckets - I don't blame them!

The dragons themselves were completely adorable, and did everything from wink, flutter their ears and wag their tails!

Not only did they preform, but they did it all standing on small poles and stilts!

Here I believe we were in Africa, but it may have been the Congo. I told Jeremie we should get one of those masks to hang on the wall, but he said they "creeped him out". Lol! I wanted the Zebra one. It's almost right in the middle on the left, with the strips and little ears.

So the day went by wonderfully until we got home and Emilie and I decided to get a Starbucks iced tea. I went to pay and I felt my stomach drop to my toes.
My wallet wasn't there! I have a pretty deep purse, one of those sling/bag types and I just about dumped my purse in the Starbucks to find it.
Emilie was kind enough to pay for my drink and encouraged me by insisting it must be in the car. I ran back to the car and dug under all the seats - Jeremie (who was waiting there) asked me wide-eyed what was wrong.
Almost crying now I told him I lost my wallet.

This was monumental for me. I've never lost my keys, my purse, my cell phone and definitely not my wallet. Needless to say, I did when I generally do, and freaked out.

But I called my bank and cancelled my credit card and debit right away. As it was a holiday I couldn't phone the police or call the Registration office.
This was a big loss, not only did my drivers licence and health card reside there, but my SIN card and birth certificate was in there as well.
The chances of my wallet being returned if a good Samaritan found were even slimmer as the address on my license was my old address, previous to Edmonton.

I knew it'd take months to get all ID back not to mention the mound of paper work I'd have to fill out.
That night I had a nightmare about my lost wallet, and I woke up relieved, then had that horrible sinking feeling again.

I slouched to the computer and checked my email. An interesting email appeared from the youth pastor of my former church.

"Jen - I got a weird phone call from a lady who needs to get in touch with you immediately. ..It could be about your wallet??" He gave me the name and phone number.

Holding my breath I dialed it right away and was soon was talking to a nice woman who said that yes she did have my wallet.
I could have kissed this woman - I did a happy dance while writing down her address and had a fit of hysterical laughter that brought most of the house questioning my sanity.

An hour later I was on my way to the house with a bunch of flowers as a "thank you." Jeremie and I were greeted by a lovely older Mexican couple who invited us in and gave me a good talking-to about not having all my ID in one wallet.
They apparently had looked for an hour for me, online, the yellow-pages and my ID. They had found my youth pastors photography card and rang him. And he knew how to contact me.

Truly the power of prayer!

- Jenny