Lost and found

sarah: OH NO!
me: What?
sarah: I LEFT MY PURSE AND CAMERA ON THE TRAIN!

There's this ill feeling in one's stomach when they realize they just lost something very valuable to them. If my 12-year-old daughter didn't have her head glued to her neck... well... I don't actually have a joke for that one.

Here's a list from my memory of things she has lost. It may be inaccurate because I am old and I don't speak German::
- Purse and camera (turned in WITH CASH at the bahnhof lost and found)
- KEY TO THE APARTMENT (turned in at school)
- Scooter (turned in at school)
- Shoes, pants, coat, shirts (not sure how that happens, really)
- KEY TO THE APARTMENT AGAIN (turned in at school)
- School books and important notebooks (turned in at school)
- Purse at school (turned in WITH CASH at school)
- Backpack at bus stop (turned in by some random lady AT SCHOOL)
- KEY TO THE APARTMENT AGAIN (turned in at school)

Here's a list from my memory of things Gus has lost:
- ...

My purpose for this post is not specifically to point out what has been lost, although it is humorous to me and I would prefer that it stayed lost to teach. But it's more than impressive what has been returned. In the US, we learned the pit in stomach feeling because we always knew with 99.9% certainty we would never see it again. Here, there is (so far) a 90% probability that we will see it again if we check the various lost and found locations. That is impressive.

Not sure what it is that drives this behavior but it would be an interesting cultural learning for me. My first guess why so many people are motivated by honesty and paying it forward is fearing the risk of being caught and the resulting hits in reputation. Quality of reputation and protecting it seems exceptionally important.