“Hand Picked Golden Dragon” RAM wrapped in gold silk brocade! Cleaning the garage, I found these gorgeous packages perfectly preserved in an airtight box. What the hell are they? One package still holds a 512 MB memory chip nestled in a bed of rich, red, synthetic suede, with a pretty pink ribbon for conveniently extracting the delicate thing. The other package is empty.
We can’t think of what they were for. An old Epson wide-format ink jet? A Panasonic video recorder? A camera? The packages are too nice to throw out. I guess that’s why the garage needs excavation.
Wondering about street crime in Nassau, Bahamas? First we witness a tourist robbery, then meet another tourist just robbed at gunpoint.
We’re standing on Bay Street, the main drag, while I’m checking email on my iPod.
“Hold onto your stuff, these guys are targeting us,” Bob said. I had the iPod in one hand, a good camera in the other. We’d planned to stroll down the beach to where we spent our first three years together. A seven-mile stroll, but one we’d done daily in the eighties, often on bikes.
I glanced up and saw the two suspects crossing toward us. Suddenly they caught sight of a better-looking target. A pair of men, one shirtless, who were cutting through the parking lot of the Hilton British Colonial, heading back to their room. As the scruffy suspects approached the tourists, Bob narrated: “They’re offering drugs,” he said. A tourist is offered drugs in Nassau as often as tourists are offered “copy watches” in Italy or Singapore.
Scene-of-the-crime
“Crack or weed,” was the actual offer.
“Weed,” the shirtless one said.
A deal was struck. $60 for an eighth, the victim later told us, twice what he pays in Canada, “but what the hell.” He pulled out the cash. The “dealer” grabbed it and ran. He dashed between cars in the parking lot, cut through a lush tropical border planting, jumped a five-foot wall, and ran down a side street. His partner had disappeared during the deal-making.
In terms of street crime in Nassau, this was pretty tame.
The victim, a Canadian, was both mad and bemused. A Bahamian man who’d also witnessed the robbery dragged the victim off to the police station. Interesting to see the story as slanted in the Nassau Tribune.
We gave up on visiting our old home and beach cove in Cable Beach. We wandered the streets and fended off a few more offers of pot. Do we really look like the target market?
Real street crime in Nassau
Then we met the Ad Koens, a visitor from Holland. He’d gone on a Segway tour. At 11:00 in the morning his entire group, eight tourists and one Bahamian tour leader, were held up at gunpoint and made to spread-eagle on the ground. Another group of nine was already down.
The bandits wielded shotguns. They tied one man’s wrists to a long wooden plank placed across his back. Ad was kicked in his ribs, others were kicked in the head. “It was very, very professional,” Ad said. They demanded everything of value: cameras, video cameras, iPods, wallets, purses, GPS devices—everything the tourists had on them. One man lost a Rolex and a laptop. Eighteen men and women robbed, and the two scruffy thieves got away.
After the ordeal, all eighteen victims were taken to the police department to file reports. They were shown 500 mug shots, 25 to a page, each the size of a postage stamp. When Bob asked the victim how he’d rate the police-reporting experience on a scale of one to ten, the answer was “Zero to one. It was a joke.”
The two robberies were front-page news in Nassau on Saturday, November 21.
I’m mortified to remember the time I refused to shake hands with an Egyptian.
It’s a sad commentary on the state of the world when one must look at every stranger with distrustful eyes, and in some ways it defeats the whole purpose of leisure travel. Spectacular landscapes, ruins, markets, shops, and food are only the skin of a culture. Its people are its core. Around the world people are attracted to people; locals are warm and welcoming to travelers, and swell with national pride. In many countries, to refuse a gift is to insult your host. In some countries, insulting your host is provocative indeed.
After a long hot morning interviewing the Cairo police, we returned to our hotel to wash up. We then intended to visit the American Express office at the Nile Hilton, and from there, we’d hunt down an excellent Egyptian lunch at the Khan el Khalili Bazaar. Refreshed, we made our way through thick air, deafening noise, and teeming crowds to the 6th of October Bridge, which spans the Nile.
Policemen at attention stood the length of the bridge, perfectly spaced every thirty feet, rigid and regular as toy soldiers. They were armed, however, like real soldiers. I asked an important-looking officer who appeared to be supervising the formation. “Is it always like this? Are there this many officers every day?” No, President Mubarak is coming, he said. At the end of the bridge we paused and looked up to locate the Nile Hilton.
“You can’t cross the street here,” a friendly local volunteered. “If you try, the police will only stop you. Our president is coming, you see.” He was curly-headed, short, chubby, and a bit rough.
“How do we get across to the Hilton?” Bob asked.
“You must use the underpass. Come, I’ll show you.” As we turned, the entry to the underpass became obvious. We thanked the man, but he wasn’t finished with us.
“Hello,” he kept saying. “How are you? Where are you from? You like Cairo?” He offered his hand, and Bob shook it politely as the three of us walked toward the underpass.
“Lady, what’s your name?”
“Bambi,” I said, walking ahead. I smiled at him over my shoulder, hoping he’d find me friendly but in a hurry. I had no wish to offend him, but I am not fond of shaking hands with any stranger on the street.
“Hello!” he persisted. I increased my pace slightly. That turned out to be an unwise move; thoughtless and undiplomatic.
“You don’t want to shake hands with an Egyptian? I am your host! Do you think I’m dirty?”
“My wife has a cold,” Bob lied, “she doesn’t want you to get it.”
“Perhaps she doesn’t like Egyptians! What kind of visitors are you!”
I felt terrible by then, and regretted my rude and tactless behavior when I should have been on my best. But now I was concerned about the man’s escalating verbal assault. He was still walking with us and, as the underground passage loomed ahead, the chicken in me pecked holes in my nerves. I should have turned and apologized. Instead, I sped up.
I heard Bob behind me, trying to explain the transference of germs from hand to hand to mouth and the Cairene not getting it. As I entered the tunnel, Bob not far behind, the agitated man gave up and dropped us. I was relieved and ashamed at the same time.
Later, we unwound in a barely-lit alcove of the cave-like back of the elegant Khan El Khalili Restaurant. The front of the restaurant, called the Naguib Mahfouz Coffee Shop for the Nobel Prize-winning novelist, was all about unwinding. Customers slouched among pillows sucking on hookahs, dark coffee and sweet smoke scented the room, narrow shafts of harsh sunlight illuminated the thick swirling air, and waterpipes burbled like aquariums.
In the back it was quiet, private, and dramatically lit. Over little plates of olives, babaganoush, hummus, and flat bread, we reflected on the encounter. It could have gotten out of hand; we were lucky. But why had I behaved so badly? What had repelled me from the one-man welcome committee? Was I just too street-smart, smelling a scam? Had years of thief-patrol put me off all humanity?
No, I lacked any credible excuse. I had just washed, was on my way to eating lunch with my hands, and just plain didn’t want to shake hands. Shame on me. I felt miserable, but allowed myself to be soothed by the atmosphere and luscious meal.
Encounters with locals can offer the deepest, longest-lasting memories of a trip. But when cultures collide, sensitivity and caution must be in balance. Judgment is critical, but how can we determine what our own behavior should be, with little understanding of foreign sentiment? A majority of Americans, cocooned as we are in our huge world of a nation, have a myopian global perspective, as limited as that of an Amazonian tribesman or a Mongolian herder. Our collective ignorance of political issues stuns smaller nations, which can’t afford to know only their own business.
Our naiveté may occasionally lead to confrontations such as mine with the Egyptian. It can also foster dangerous hostility, and it allows us to walk into scams, swindles, and set-ups.
If your room number is printed on your key, complain.
The Hilton Tokyo-Bay, aka Japan’s Disneyland Hilton, was shockingly behind the times when we visited. Our paper electronic room keys had our room number printed right on them, instead of on an envelope. That’s a serious security risk. This was two years ago. Anyone know what their keys look like today?
Barcelona visitors experienced 6,000 thefts per day during 2009’s tourist season.
115,055 pickpocketings and bag snatches in Barcelona were reported in the 12 months ending August 2009, police said. Newspapers did the math and trumpeted “315 thefts every day!” But take away the off-season, when thefts are way down, and add in unreported thefts to get the real number “per day.” More like a million in a year.
Barcelona authorities have finally, officially, admitted that the level of theft in the city is “extremely high.” This came only days after Barcelona made headlines around the world as “worst city for pickpockets,” thanks to TripAdvisor’s proclamation. It’s long been an open secret that otherwise lovable “bcn” has rampant thievery, but potential visitors and, more importantly, the conference business, have begun to wonder if there aren’t safer destinations. Hotels, tired of wiping the tears of robbed guests, must have been screaming for relief.
Police estimate there are 200-250 full-time thieves at large. That makes me laugh. The police, at one time, showed me their profiles of more than 300 pigeon poop pickpockets alone! “La Mancha,” the stain, is what they call them, because they dirty their victims. In my 15-year history of observing thieves in my favorite city, I find that the pigeon poop perps are but a small subsection of the thief pool. If there are 300+ pigeon poop pickpocket specialists, how many other bag snatchers and pickpockets lurk about?
Spot the thief. Answer: he’s holding the bag
Although I think 250-300 is a low estimate, it’s still a huge number of criminals who each make any number of efforts throughout the day to gather other people’s valuables. For each thief, there might be 10, 20, or 30 attempts to steal, each day. With each attempt, lots can go wrong to blow it. The victim may suspect something, and turn. He may move, though he suspected nothing. The thief may think someone is watching. Someone may be watching and shout out. The pocket or purse might be difficult to get into. the getaway may become blocked, a cop might be spotted… It’s a delicate balance; attempted thefts are derailed far more often than they’re completed. You may never have had your wallet stolen, but you may have been a target. Does that make you part of Barcelona pickpocket statistics?
And after the thief’s success? Even then, the deal’s not done. The victim may whirl around and accuse the pickpocket, who’ll then drop the goodies on the ground and pretend he had nothing to do with them. That’s a theft—but not counted in Barcelona pickpocket statistics.
The police finger North Africans and Romanians. I’ll agree that these groups are prominent among the perps, along with certain South Americans, other East Europeans, and an unmentionable group. Not that it matters to the victim. Not that visitors would know the difference.
Let’s not forget the transient thieves, either. For the past month Bob has been communicating with a pickpocket in Paris who enjoys lucrative field trips where the moolah is mucho and the heat’s not so hot. At this very moment, he’s shopping for wallets in Brussels. Next stop, BCN. “Barcelona police are easy, but there’s not much money there,” he explained. Yet, he’s making the trip. And he’s not alone.
The police claim that pickpockets try to steal less than €400 per person, because the perps know that stealing less than that will land them a fine if caught, rather than jail time. Uh-uh. No. Pickpockets steal wallets. Bagsnatchers steal purses. They don’t stop to ask how much cash the vic has. They don’t stop to look. And if they get a windfall, they don’t cry about it. “Son-of-a-bitch good,” is the feeling pickpocket Kharem described when he nabbed a briefcase filled with thousands of dollars. People who spend their days stealing expect to get caught and pay the consequences. They know it will happen. It’s part of their own pickpocket statistics. For them, the reward is worth the risk. If they get a lot of money in one hit, they can stay home and thereby cut their risk for a day or two.
A pickpocket’s fines
And they need all that cash to pay their fines. For each theft of under €400 for which he’s arrested, the thief “pays a fine of €200 and then returns to the street,” said an official of the City police who asked for anonymity. “But they work so much that it’s worthwhile to them to keep doing it and pay the occasional €200 fine.” Some of these thieves have hundreds of arrests in their records and are released over and over again; presumably to collect cash to pay their fines. Looking at the fistful of fines Kharem showed us, this is a pretty lucrative system for the city. A stupid-tourist tax perhaps, or a licensing fee for thieves.
“315 thefts each day,” another headline reads. In August 2009, the year-to-date total was 115,055 reported thefts. But why average them over a full year? Most of the tourist activity is from May to November. Pickpocketing is easier when people are in summer clothes rather than bundled up with coats that cover pockets. I’d say most of the 115,055 reported thefts occurred in the six good-weather months. That means about 600 each day that you’re likely to be there, sharply dropping off as the weather cools and the tourists dry up.
But that’s reported thefts. In Barcelona, I’d multiply the reported thefts by a factor of 10 to get actual thefts. That brings the number up to 6,000 each day of the tourist season.
Why by a factor of 10? Lots of cruise ship passengers get a single day in BCN. I’ve personally interviewed at least 1,500 of them. When they’re robbed, they don’t have time to file a report because they have to be on their ship. They tend to be of a certain type, too: mouth-breathing obliviates with protruding wallets and gaping purses who advertise their naiveté with every particle of their beings.
And lots of carefree youth visit; when they’re robbed, and their loss is small, they just chalk it up to their carelessness and don’t bother filing. Lots of drinking in the bars and pubs, where victims just assume they lost their wallet, phone, or camera.
And lastly, for those who do attempt to file a police report, the process can be long and arduous. Bob and I have assisted or accompanied many victims through the ordeal. It can take hours. It can be daunting: waiting for one of the few police officers who can take a report in English or French or whatever, going from one police station to another. It can suck up half a day or more. It’s very tempting to give up when the police tell you to come back in two hours to complete the process. Or even at the start when the lineup to file reports is out the door. And if a tourist has lost his passport, getting a new one is the priority. He may not file a police report at all. After canceling credit cards and figuring out how to get some quick cash, the victim is exhausted.
I know something about the rate of reporting losses from speaking to thousands of travelers over the years (around the world). I’ve conducted an informal survey on how often police reports are filed. Of the hundreds of victims who tell us their sad stories each year, a minute fraction say they bothered to file a police report. They don’t want to ruin even more of their trip. They, like the police, throw up their hands and blow air.
Did you filed a police report, if you were robbed while traveling?
This new, official recognition of the problem is laudable. Now it will be interesting to watch the coming season, hear the numbers, and do the math. Will Barcelona pickpocket statistics continue to rise?
Yes, I’m postulating that only about 10% of personal thefts in Barcelona get reported to the police. But the days are long in BCN, so that’s only, say 300 an hour. In the high season.
Yeah, this story’s everywhere, about the Phoenix couple who made a living stealing luggage off the airport carousel. Police found almost a thousand suitcases in their house.
Almost 1,000 bags found at home of thieves. Almost all black.Luggage stolen from Phoenix airport. Almost all black.Stolen luggage is gathered and moved from home of thieves. Almost all black.
Not a single report has pointed out that the stolen luggage is almost all black. I described this strategy in a post more than a year ago, and in my book way before that. This is an M.O. This is something to notice and learn from.
Thieves prefer to steal black luggage because so much of it looks alike. If the thief is caught red-handed by the bag’s owner, he only has to say sorry, it looks just like mine. And he’s out of there. Scot-free.
Look at the photos on the right. This is just a fraction of the bag booty as it was gathered on the thieves’ property. The bags we see are almost all black.
The bag-boosters are not rocket surgeons. Not a lot of brain power goes into concocting a brilliant strategy. These two, Keith and Stacy King, traipsed into the baggage area straight from the parking lot. They might not have been caught had they walked up a level, then come down the escalators as if from the gates.
They’re not the first to steal baggage off the conveyor belts. Earlier this year, a man was arrested at Dallas Fort Worth airport. He admitted taking over 400 bags, and police linked him to at least 600. He also “worked” at airports in Houston and Tulsa, allegedly stealing a number of suitcases every day. And long before that, a Las Vegas man regularly supplied a second-hand clothing store with the stuff from bags stolen off McCarran’s baggage belt. [Linked to above.]
Which is yours?
After 9/11, airports moved security staff from arrivals to departures. With no bag tag checkers, anyone can saunter out with anything. We passengers have minimal control. We can get to the carousel promptly, but what happens when bags get lost or delayed, or the bags make it but we are late? You’ve seen the jumbles of suitcases massed outside baggage service offices in arrivals halls. Do they look protected? At the most, they’re penned in by a crowd-control ribbon. No one will take responsibility. Not the airlines. Not the airports. Not TSA. Not police.
So here’s the obvious lesson. Buy pink luggage. Or green, or silver. If you have black, decorate it.
A member of the Raskol gangs of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Photo by: Stephen Dupont (Contact Press Images)
After further research, I feel compelled to write a little more about Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. For all the pretty pictures in my last post, I think I missed the real story.
Bob and I behaved quite like the typical tourists we seek to educate. We did not read up in advance about the dangers of the city. We strolled naively throughout the town and along deserted roads outside of town. We did leave our watches and jewelry behind, and we did dress down to the extent we were able. (We didn’t have torn jeans with us, the garb recommended in an old Time magazine article. And we were not out after dark. But I went out with a good camera and an iPod in a purse. Bob carried a new, $4,000 video camera. Were we nuts?
Crime in Port Moresby
Absolutely. And stupid. We did not know about the vicious criminals called the Raskols. Usually referred to as gangs, the Raskols are more accurately described as loose associations of thieves, according to tavurur, a Port Moresby native blogger. Practically anything you read about Port Moresby credits them for the city’s astronomical crime rate, then mitigates the blame by citing an unemployment rate of anywhere from 60-90%.
Numerous lengthy articles online detail the safety and security precautions necessary to lessen the risk of misfortune. Drive carefully, because the locals react emotionally and violently to accidents. But don’t drive too slowly or you’ll increase the likelihood of being carjacked. Carry cash to hand over when you’re accosted. Move about with a certified escort. Women, don’t wear shorts or pants if you don’t want to be raped or gang-raped. The lists go on and on, one of which even advises (jokingly, I presume) chewing betel nut to look like a local.
Eric Lafforgue's Papua New Guinea photos are phenomenal. Click this image to go to all 466 of them.
In retrospect, Bob and I presented a tasty target. Alone, smiley, swinging our cameras… I’m thinking of the minutes we spent at a secluded dead-end high above the shore, looking down at a christening ceremony. We watched the formally dressed witnesses on the sand and the participants wading chest-deep in the sea. We looked across to a far village of houses on stilts over the water. It never occurred to us that we should be watching our backs.
It’s easy to be seduced by the sheer exoticism of Papua New Guinea, by the natives in traditional costumes, the spectacular flora and fauna of the highlands and ocean reefs. Travel enthusiasts I’ve spoken with have been quick to say oh, I want to go there. Local dangers are defined in guides and online, easy to be found, but still—Bob and I managed to get there oblivious to the status quo. Not all tour operators or trip providers are forthcoming when it comes to negative publicity. The burden, in the end, falls on the traveler. Know before you go, as they say. Do your homework.
Would a slathering of Dijon tempt the formerly (?) (supposedly) cannibalistic highland villagers? I couldn’t get myself to attempt the experiment. While on a visit to the north of Australia, Bob and I made a quick trip to Papua New Guinea. We were awed by traditional dancers from the highland villages. Only one of the men spoke English; he told me they are Huli “wigmen,” and that it took four years to grow his wig of human hair (presumably made of his own hair).
Though cannibalism and human sacrifice are reportedly no longer practiced here, Papua New Guinea does have a scarily high rate of crime and, just a year ago, Port Moresby was ranked among the top five murder capitals in the world. Hotels and local guidebooks warn of sudden, unpredictable, and violent eruptions of inter-tribal conflict.
“Papua New Guinea has a high crime rate. Numerous U.S. citizen residents and visitors have been victims of violent crime in recent years, and they have sometimes suffered severe injuries. Carjackings, armed robberies, and stoning of vehicles are problems in and around major cities such as Port Moresby, Lae, Mount Hagen, and Goroka, but can happen anywhere. Pickpockets and bag snatchers frequent crowded public areas.…Individuals traveling alone are at greater risk for robbery or gang rape than are those who are part of an organized tour or under escort.”
The U.S. Embassy in Port Moresby “emphasizes that there is no way to guarantee personal safety during a visit to PNG, only to minimize the chances of becoming a victim.”
Bob and I failed to do our homework. Had we read the above before wandering alone all over, we certainly would have changed our behavior appropriately. The fact that we traipsed back roads and the city center unmolested only proves that anecdotal evidence is not the whole story. We might have reported “we were fine!” But that doesn’t mean it’s safe.
As we explored the hilly roads of Port Moresby, Bob commented on the rolls and rolls of razor wire, the hefty security at housing complexes, and the number of security vehicles that followed residents into the complexes. Bob assumed the residents were high-profile mining executives, hence the security. After further study, it seems that these were simply foreigners working in the country, with the usual security detail.
A great number of the people we met, in the city as well, had the red gums and worn-to-stubs blackened teeth of the betel nut-chewer.
Betel nut, a mild stimulant, is sold everywhere in town, literally every few yards on some streets. It’s chewed with a pinch of lime (the mineral—in a jar in the photo below), a pinch of tobacco, and sometimes a favorite spice. Gutters are littered with betel nut shells and practically run red with spit juices.
As a great contrast to the ubiquitous promises of doom and crime to the tourist, Bob and I, in our naive wanderings, quickly considered Port Moresby the most friendly city we’d ever walked. Every single person, without exception, said good morning or good afternoon, and those we stopped to speak with immediately offered their hands, touched our arms, or both.
The Crowne Plaza Hotel in Port Moresby has a stunning collection of masks, some seven feet tall. I’m showing great restraint by posting only one mask photo.
I know what you’re thinking. This photo, below, looks fake, like we’ve stuck our heads through holes in a painted backdrop. Uh-uh. No. And the men’s faces are painted, not masks. Through an unofficial translator, a wigman told that the yellow pigment is dug out from “between the gas and the oil.” We’d asked because it looks so unnatural.
Yellowcake, uranium oxide
“What do they use for the yellow?” my mother, a painter, asked on seeing this photo. I explained what the wigman told me. “It doesn’t look natural to me,” my mother said.
“Let me Daddle that,” I said. My sisters and I have always asked our brilliant chemist father whatever curiosity needed an answer. As he was already on the line, my father said it sounds like they use “yellowcake,” a kind of uranium oxide. “Can’t be too good to rub on the skin,” he added.
Atul and Smriti Shah experienced it first-hand. “It happened during the night,” they concluded. “The entire compartment was sprayed with some sort of gas that knocked us out. Then our suitcase was slowly extracted from under our seat, the lock twisted loose and, with all the time in the world, the suitcase was looted.”
Atul and Smriti live with their small daughters in Mumbai, India, where railway is the customary way to crisscross the country. For the occasion of a relative’s marriage, the family traveled to the town of Kanpur, in Uttar Pradesh. As tradition dictates, they brought along their finest clothes and jewelry to wear to the many matrimonial celebrations and ceremonies. As a high-caste woman from a wealthy family, now married to a successful businessman, Smriti carried an enviable display of gold and diamonds.
“She had diamonds on her fingers and in her nose and ears,” Atul explained with pride, “and gold bangles and necklaces. Also, she wore the good-luck vermilion mark on her forehead that Indians always wear when traveling away from home.”
After the wedding and family visits, the Shahs boarded the train for the twenty-hour journey home. They had one suitcase, but it was a large one: fifty kilos, Atul estimated. It contained all the family’s finery, including Smriti’s jewelry, and had a small padlock on the zipper tabs. Atul forced the suitcase under Smriti’s seat in the train compartment, where it was tightly lodged. They did not open the suitcase for the duration of the journey.
The Shahs boarded in the evening, had a meal packed by Smriti’s mother, and settled down for the night.
“The strange thing is that none of us woke up during the night,” Smriti told me. “Even the children slept the night through, and they never do.”
She remembers a vague sensation of bitterness in her mouth during the night, then the desire for water. But she remembers too the lethargy she felt, the heaviness of her limbs.
Food- and drink-drugging has long been a problem on trains, but could knockout gas really be in a thief’s arsenal? In my early research, doctors had doubted the likelihood of a thief acquiring the right gas and the victims not waking from the smell. I went back to the doctors and this time they all agreed it could happen. Chloroform is often used in primitive surgical conditions and has no smell at all, some said. An anesthesiologist mentioned Halothane, which would be readily available from any surgical facility or veterinarian. Halothane has a slight odor but not enough to wake an already-sleeping person.
“Within twenty or thirty minutes,” Dr. Jared Kniffen told me, “someone could be in a deep enough sleep so that you could enter the room without his awareness. The danger of this is you could kill someone if too much were used. There’s a second possibility—a gas called Cevoflurane. It’s odorless, but much more difficult to obtain.”
But wouldn’t the robber himself be knocked out? I asked.
“There are ways to avoid that,” Dr. Kniffen said. “A certain travel supply house sells a smoke hood that gives twenty minutes of oxygen.” It’s meant for use in escaping from a burning building, but a clever thief might employ one for another use.
It sounds too sophisticated to me, too troublesome and risky. But if the reward were a treasure chest like Smriti Shah’s, it must be worth one thousand times the risk of simply snagging a laptop from a business traveler.
Despite the Shahs’ conviction, gassing on an overnight train is only a remote risk; my paranoid apprehension on our journey to Prague was out of proportion. Breaking into and stealing from compartments is a real risk though, and so is food- and drink-drugging. Nembitol, scopolamine, and benzodiazepine are the drugs most commonly slipped into food or drink, but only after the thief builds trust and confidence with the mark.
Overnight train travel requires watchfulness. Stations can be seedy. They’re open and available to anyone, with or without tickets. They attract a varied population of travelers and non-travelers alike. Vigilance is vital.
Stations with the biggest theft problems are those that are connected to, or nearby, bus or subway stations, which are often hangouts for gangs, drug dealers, and other undesirables. Thieves are able to loiter unchallenged within the stations, without attracting attention. Then they can take advantage of congestion for cover and easy escape.
Train stations and daytime journeys are covered in Chapter Six [of my book, Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams]. Here, I’ll discuss overnight trips. Certainly not all overnight trains carry such risks as the following, which are surely worst cases. They’re a popular and logical mode of travel, not to be dismissed. If you plan well, you make the most of your vacation days, see a bit of countryside, meet some other interesting travelers, and save the expense of a hotel night.
My Swedish friends called me “exotic” because I had never been on an overnight train. It’s easy to find a European who has never been on an airplane, they told me, but everyone’s been on an overnight train. So when Bob and I found ourselves in Venice, Italy, ready to visit Prague in the Czech Republic, we decided to go by rail, overnight.
We boarded in late evening, and it seemed we would encounter our first train scam immediately. A large, slobbish, dreary man blocked the aisle and demanded our tickets.
“Tickets!”
He wore baggy black pants and a soggy white shirt. Nothing official, no monogram, badge, cap, embroidery, name tag, nothing to identify him. Yet, as his bulk impeded our path, we had no choice but to give him our tickets. He pointed to our reserved compartment. Thankfully, he didn’t demand money. But he didn’t return our tickets, either.
We could have been assigned to an Italian-owned wagon, or an Austrian one, possibly even a Swiss one. But we got a wagon owned and maintained by the Czech Railroad. We entered our dismal compartment and tallied up the security risks.
First though, what happened to our tickets? Bob went to find the big sour slob who had confiscated them. I could just imagine the moment a uniformed conductor would come to punch our tickets.
“But… but… we’ve already given them to the conductor!” we’d say.
“What conductor?”
“The man in black pants!”
“No tickets, no travel! Get off the train!”
Bob and the Czech ticket-taker argued in mutually exclusive languages. Bob returned without the tickets. We had nothing, not even a receipt. My turn. I tried another way. I found a Czech lady who explained: the man is our “attendant.” He keeps the tickets to show officials at border crossings. He’ll wake us in the morning, and will return the tickets then.
Okay.
Back in our dusty quarters we assessed the realistic hazards and dismissed the rest. We would not, for example, worry about knock-out gas being snuck under our door as a precursor to robbery. Bob said we wouldn’t worry about it. I merely insisted we keep the window open. Where, then, shall we put our luggage? Under the window is the obvious place, but not if we leave it open. The only other possibility would block the door.
Block the door.
We had not brought anything suitable to secure the door, but its flimsy chain would be enough. Bob said so.
I couldn’t sleep.
The gentle rocking I had imagined would seduce me to slumber was instead a rude awakening. It was jerky and ruthless, like being aroused by an earthquake. If I slept, I could be rolled like a drunk and never parse the violence of the assault from the brutality of the jolting train.
The noise from the open window was deafening. The rhythmic, metallic percussion of the tracks combined with a menagerie of whistles, screeches, and shrieks when we stopped at stations and borders. It was torment, but I wouldn’t shut the window.
Just a few days before, we had interviewed a railway police officer in Milan whose detail was theft. He claimed that most, if not all, the “gassing” tales are made up by victims too embarrassed to admit that they had slept through their own robberies. I had read an interview of a young Czech train thief who described exactly how he enters a compartment, watches his sleeping victim, slices open the victim’s pocket, and lets the wallet drop into his hand. Without gas or drugs. That sounded unbelievable to me; impossible. Surely the victim would awaken? But having experienced the dreadful noise and ceaseless motion of an unair-conditioned overnight train, I realize how horribly possible it is.
