TNB Night Owl – Get Your Own Robbery

Street view of a spinach vendor in Johannesburg, South Africa. Photo by Refiloe776.

Videos go viral for a variety of reasons, and one of the most prominent is an oddity factor. A great example of this is a video from a convenience store robbery that has become a source of great amusement in South Africa, where the theft happened.

A gunman threatened the lives of the store clerks and proceeded to raid the till, stuffing a variety of bills into his bag before leaving. In his haste, he dropped three of the bills to the ground. That’s when the event became particularly noteworthy.

The blue arrow is used to direct the viewer’s attention, not that it’s really needed. A person slithering across the floor, risking a bullet, is going to draw attention, and as seen in the video he is eventually noticed by the robber, who chose to let him get away rather than shoot.

The part that drew the attention of South Africans is that the floor person targeted the three bills dropped by the first robber as he made for the doorway. At first it was assumed he was trying to get away and simply grabbed the money along the way because it was convenient; then viewers realized that the floor guy made an effort to keep his face out of sight of the store camera during his trip… he wasn’t just picking up the bills on his way out the door, he had decided to take advantage of the first robbery to grab some cash on his own.

It’s worth recognizing that the average monthly income of a South African is a little over 21K Rand, or about 1,425 US Dollars. This is considerably poorer than the United States.

The three bills in question had a pinkish color to them. That would make them either 50 Rand or 200 Rand bills… equivalent to $3.50 or $13 each. South Africa is by no means poor enough to make such a paltry sum as $10 to $40 worth risking one’s life… but the slithering man did it anyway, and now he’s the latest video star for his country.

Question of the night: Have you ever had a spur-of-the-moment decision which, in retrospect, you should have rejected?

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About AlienMotives 1991 Articles
Ex-Navy Reactor Operator turned bookseller. Father of an amazing girl and husband to an amazing wife. Tired of willful political blindness, but never tired of politics. Hopeful for the future.