Unfiltered Story #18569

My friend and I have traveled to another city for a martial arts camp, taking a long-distance bus that left very early in the morning, the tram, and then a local bus. Right after we get off the local bus, I check my pocket out of habit and notice my phone isn’t there. I usually keep my phone in my pocket, but being a neurotic person, I usually double-check it’s still there before I exit the bus. But of course, this one time that I didn’t…

I frantically check and re-check all my other pockets and my sports bag, hoping in vain I’ve just misplaced it and trying to hold off a full-blown panic attack. I ask my friend to call my phone, but of course she just ran out of battery. My panic is growing, because it’s Sunday, so even if someone turned it in to lost and found, I cannot get it back the same day – which is a big problem as I need to return home the same day, because I have no place to stay the night and no money to afford one, as I’m a broke student. So needless to say, I cannot afford to replace my smartphone either, and even if I could, it’s very important to me as lots of my stuff is on it. I cannot even buy a bus ticket to return home without it. My friend suggests we head to the camp location and figure things out there, as the camp is about to start. But I notice in the map at the stop that the bus route ends and turns around just a little further from our stop, so I decide to wait for the bus to come back on the off-chance that someone had found and turned in my phone.

As soon as the bus stops and the front door opens, I ask the driver (different guy this time) if anyone’s turned in a phone and begin to explain the situation. I have hardly finished the question before the driver hands me something – my phone! I thank him profusely as I step out of the bus.

As the bus leaves, I burst into tears out of relief. I don’t know which passenger or driver found my phone and decided to turn it in, but they saved me from a much bigger catastrophe than they probably realized. To this day, I’m grateful for the honesty of the people in this country – and perhaps karma, as I’ve turned in my own share of found cellphones.