theft

It is part of everyday life here, theft. Everyone has experienced it to one extent or another. I have heard, though, that it is pretty mild here, and I believe it. After hearing stories of other countries, many other countries, I feel blessed to live here. I have had my purse stolen, we have had our house broken into.
Yet it is still disconcerting when your househelper steals from you. I get weary of it. Sometimes I wonder if I should just hire a Christian, someone I can trust. Yet this was my plan, to hire someone to build a relationship with. It still hurts, even though I knew it would probably happen. It especially hurts because I have helped her and done special things for her, things that she has delighted in and told all her neighbors about. She tells them how much she enjoys working for us. It hurts every time something else comes up missing. I have a whole list of missing things, there is so much missing now I can't even remember everything without a list. And I can't really confront her, she would lose face and it would end things between us. She knows I suspect now. This time she wasn't as careful. What I usually do is ask her to help me find the missing item. She usually comes up with it within a day or two. Usually I act cheerful, despite how I feel, but today I didn't. I figured she really needed to know that I knew what was going on, and I was not happy with it. So I asked her where the items were, she pretended not to know what I was talking about, and then went home for a few minutes. After coming back, she did some more work, and finally brought the missing items down, saying it was upstairs. It was in a different bag and had been opened. I took it with a little comment that it wasn't the same bag. I know it was very uncomfortable for her. I am going to pray she stops taking things, I don't want to fire her. I like her.