From phipo site:
http://www.pinoyphotography.org/foru...?topic=14797.0

"Since I got my hands on my SLR, it never left my side. To the point wherein it was always with me wherever I went, as I was afraid of missing an opportunity shot, and at the same time, these were my babies and a big part of my life that it just had to be with me to document my life travels. I have changed a few things for the glory of photography like always parking under the shade and looking for parking with the tightest security, who wouldn’t?. Un-begotten to me, storing all my gear in a single place would be a crucial decision with an effect I’ve never fathomed.

Last night, May 23, 2007 between approximately 9:00 – 10:00 in the evening, my car window was smashed and my WHOLE camera bag containing ALL my gear was stolen.

I had just arrived around 9pm, barely making it to my radio show Counterflow at Nu107 in Ortigas. Since my job required me to be there for an hour show every Wednesdays, I had routinarily parked at an open, paid parking lot called PARK PLUS, which is adjacent to the building which houses Chef and Brewer Café and the radio station. I arrived there at 9pm and proceeded to do our radio show with my good friends James Deakin and Pacho Blanco. After the show, an hour later, we then proceeded to the parking lot to continue our conversation and to chat a bit as like we always did every week. To my horror and disbelief, I saw my left passenger window smashed and my whole camera bag gone. I was literally just a few cars away from the reception booth since I was a bit of an o.c. when it came to safety. I couldn’t believe that everything I had freaking worked hard for was gone. I had lost my new tarmac pro 5 which I had recently purchased to house my 5 lenses and my d80 camera and accessories like my sb600 flash, chargers, batts, sd cards, remote, extra cam batt, polarizer’s and filters.

I then reported it to the police and preceded to their Pasig headquarters to secure a police report which didn’t do much good to alleviate my sadness. I really felt cheated with these pay parking lots and their ”get out of jail” clauses like they are “not liable for theft” considering you are parked in their vicinity and under their watch. What disgusts me the most is that my car was just 4 cars away from the booth and I hadn’t been gone that long. They make hundreds of thousands a year, charging steep prices for parking your car and we in-return would entrust our cars and valuables, thinking that we were paying for safety and security. They demand payment upon entry and they don’t follow through at their end, collecting away and no security in return? I should have just parked in the side streets, since there wasn’t that much of a difference anyway. I had called their main office, and as you would expect with opportunistic business people, management magically disappears and to this hour, I still haven’t received a single call from the company. What kind of a business is this? Not to my amazement, there wasn’t even a single security guard on the site except for the lady in the reception booth.

I have been trying to be positive about this whole incident but I am just at a loss with words. Hard earned cash for my gear, gone in an instant, after all the safety precautions. You really never know what can happen no matter how hard you try to prevent things. We may not be able to predict what may happen but I would like to impart what lessons I have learned from this incident, so as to save next person for heartache like this. If you have a camera bag or anything valuable for that matter, the trunk would be the best place to keep it. As much as possible just bring the lens that you would require to use and not the whole line-up. Just bring everything when you really have to. As for pay parking I really don’t have the words………………………….."