Our office is an open space community and my desk is right beside the walking path (I don't know if it's called that way), where people are passing by all day long. Of course I placed some stuff at my desk such as bottle of water, a cup for a tea, notebook, phone, snack sometimes, pens and etc. And there is this coworker that whenever comes around my place, he keeps stealing something from me (jokingly of course), provoking me to chase him around in order to get back my stuff. It was funny the first 2-3-4 times, but now it's getting really annoying. I stopped paying him attention and told him couple of times (with a serious tone) to just return my stuff, but he doesn't seem to get the message and just keeps laughing and running away with my stuff. Eventually, at the end of the day he comes at my desk to return whatever he stole, but It is still not cool to not have my bottle or something else the whole day. I am stubborn and sometimes I have to go out and buy another thing to eat, because I don't want to deal with him and go "beg" for my own things. He doesn't seem to understand that I stopped playing this game long ago.
I don't know how to deal with this without insulting him or having bad feeling at the end. I'm even thinking of switching place with another coworker in order to eliminate the reason for him to pass by me. How can I get him to stop without complicating things further?
Update:
So it didn't go to the HR, but I shared my thoughts to the coworker next to me. When it happened again he told him to stop, because we are not here to play around, but to work. It was a little embarrassing but everything is okay since then :) We will see.