Travel – Page 24 – Thiefhunters in Paradise

He Packs, She Packs

Packing tips. Luggage security. On the left: Bob's rig. A strip of white tape is just a spare piece, used to secure checked bags. On the right: Bambi's set-up. Not aluminum, but still like new after five years of hard use. — On the left: Bob’s rig. A strip of white tape is just a spare piece, used to secure checked bags. On the right: Bambi’s set-up. Not aluminum, but still like new after five years of hard use.

Road Warrior Packing Tips

Eighteen years of near constant travel gives one a certain authority on the subject. Bob Arno and I are on the road together about 200 days a year, making more than a hundred take-offs and landings per year. Although we travel side-by-side to the same destinations, we have very different ideas about how to pack and what works best on the road.

Let’s start with checked bags. What do you bring?

He: Zero Halliburton hard-shell aluminum cases. Usually a regular suitcase-shaped one for clothes, and an 18-inch cube-shaped one for equipment. They’re hard to break into and almost indestructible.

She: Same, but only one. It opens like a clamshell and both halves lay flat when open. I always slide it under the bed and use it like a drawer. I don’t unpack much.

How is your stuff organized within the suitcases?

He: Everything is in containers. Socks, shirts, shoes, shaving stuff, all of it. They all zip or close, and I’m rather fond of the containers as well as what they contain. Ties and belts are rolled. All shoes have shoe-trees. Suits lay flat and are interwoven to prevent creases. I bring a great steamer, but I usually just need a few blasts with it. I’m not a perfectionist wrinkle-wise.

She: My clothes are folded and stacked as they would be in a drawer. Even dresses. Clothes in one half of the bag, shoes and accessories on the other side. Shoes are all in bags. Belts are usually flat instead of rolled, because they take up no space that way. I’m fanatic about sealing liquids in plastic bags. I’ve had one leak too many. Other than shoe bags, I’m not big on containers.

Packing tips. Halliburton cube — Inside Bob’s Halliburton cube.

Cabin baggage. Do you use a roll-aboard?

He: Absolutely. A maximum regulation-sized Zero Halliburton, black aluminum. Its telescoping handle is actually too short for me—all roll-ons are too short for me!—so I have a snap-on handle extension that makes it really comfortable to drag. The bag locks, and it’s padded inside. I stuff it full of hard drives, video cameras, and other recording equipment. Because of the bag’s excellent security, I don’t have to worry too much when I’m forced to check it on smaller planes. However, because it’s so dense with electronics, I have to pull half the items out at every security check, lay them flat in a bin, and put them separately though the scanner.

She: Mine’s a red Mandarina Duck, also the largest regulation size. It has tons of zipped pockets, and anything I need is a just second away. The power cord for my computer, plug adapters, a book, iPod cord and earphones—they’re all in outside compartments. Inside I have a black suit and a dress, both on the same hanger, important shoes, a hard drive, and just a mass of necessities. I could probably live with just that bag. In fact I did once, out in Africa when my checked luggage didn’t show up. Ten days with just my carry-on!

What about your second carry-on, your “small, personal item”?

He: Yep, another Halliburton. It’s a briefcase, which holds two Mac laptops, a few more hard drives and power cords, my wallet, pens, and reading. It balances on my roll-on, and I can snap my extension handle over it to fasten them together. Strong and safe!

She: A Mandarina Duck shoulder bag that goes with the roll-aboard. This bag is fantastic. It holds my 17″ MacBookPro in one padded compartment, and all my important items in another. Wallet, iPods, jewelry, foreign currency, airplane power adapter, reading, a shawl, and innumerable little essentials (like passports and dark chocolate). The bag attaches securely on top of the roll-on and the two stand as a single unit.

Have any unusual packing tips?

He: 1. Bags and pouches for everything, and the same ones all the time so you know where everything is.

2. In addition to an international plug adapter, I keep a short extension cord with multiple outlets in my roll-on. It allows me to share a power outlet, even if, like in an airport, they’re all being used. It’s useful every single day.

She: 1. I keep a small pouch in my shoulder bag, about the size of my hand. It’s my airplane bag, and goes on my lap on every flight. It contains noise-canceling earphones, a pen, lip balm, and a nail file. Things I know I’ll want on the flight.

2. On the road, the lowly shower cap has a hundred uses. As shoe bags, a rainy-day camera cover, to hold not-quite-dry socks, collected seashells, or an oozy bottle of lotion… even to cover the tv remote if you’re squeamish.

3. When packing a nice suit jacket, stand the collar up and open the lapels so they’re flat. That way you avoid hard, sharp creases where the lapels fold and your jacket will look more elegant.

4. I use shampoo for hand-washing clothes.

Criticisms on each other’s method?

He: Bambi isn’t in charge of all our video equipment and hard drives for video editing (which we do on the road), so she can use her space for useful things that benefit us both. Neither of her cabin bags is lockable, though, so she’s always reluctant to leave them in a hotel storage room. To me, her bags are messy inside. I don’t know how she finds anything, but she does.

She: All his pouches and little bags! I don’t know what’s in any of them. And with luggage weight restrictions, why haul the weight of containers? Bob’s two carry-ons take too much time to get into. I can grab a credit card, loyalty card, pen, tissue, or bag of peanuts in an instant. I take out my computer, check email, and put it away all in a minute or two, while standing up. I get through airport security and I’m on my way in under a minute. Bob’s set-up is slow. But I’m not above locking my stuff into his bags sometimes.

Hotel room security check

How to do a hotel room security check

[dropcap letter=”B”]ob and I sleep more nights in hotels than in our own home and, to date, we have never been ripped off in a hotel room. True, we use a certain amount of care, but our laptops are usually left out and sometimes valuables are more hidden than locked. We stay in hotels ranked from six stars to no stars, depending on our sponsors and our intentions. In each hotel room, we make a quick and automatic assessment of risks and adjust our behavior to correspond. We have never walked out of a hotel* because of hotel room security issues; we simply adopt the necessary precautions.

The room key: we prefer electronic card keys. Old-fashioned metal keys can be copied, and where might copies be floating around? Electronic locks are usually recoded after each guest. Most electronic locks save records of whose keys have recently gained entry. Authorized keys are registered to their users. So if a guest reports a problem, security can tap into records stored in the lock’s mechanism and see the last ten or so entries, be they housekeeping, an engineer, a minibar man, or the guest himself.

Hotel room security: In 2007, Tokyo's Disneyland Hilton issued paper keys with room numbers printed on them. — In 2007, Tokyo’s Disneyland Hilton issued paper keys with room numbers printed on them.

Electronic key cards should not be marked with a room number. They’re usually given in a folder which identifies the room. Leave the folder in the room when you go out and carry just the un-numbered magnetic card. If you lose the key, the safety of your room won’t be compromised.

Some hotels still use metal keys attached to a big fat ornament and expect guests to leave keys at the front desk when going out. I’m not fond of this method for several reasons. First, I prefer privacy and anonymity rather than announcing my comings and goings. In some hotels, anyone can look at the hooks or pigeonholes behind the desk and know if a room is occupied or empty. Second, I don’t care for the delay entailed in asking for the key on returning. I could just take the thing with me, but its design discourages that. So third, I don’t want to haul around a chunk of brass the size of a doorknocker. And finally, these keys are usually well identified with the name of the hotel and room number. Losing it would expose one to substantial risk. When possible, Bob and I remove the key from its chunk and just carry it, re-attaching it before check-out. At other times, we go traditional and turn in the key as the hotel suggests.

Deadbolts and door latches: we like these for hotel room security during the night, but they aren’t universal. In Paris once, two men entered our room in the dead of night. Luckily, we woke up and Bob dramatically commanded them to get out. “Pardon,” they said, “c’est une erreur,” it is a mistake. The strange thing was that they had been standing there whispering for a moment. If it had truly been a mistake, wouldn’t they immediately back out of an occupied room? We should have placed a chair in front of the door beneath the knob.

Peephole in the door: I always look out at who’s knocking on the door, and if there’s no peephole, I ask through the closed door. Minibar? No thanks. Window cleaner? Wait til I check out. Engineer? I’ll call the front desk and find out who and why.

Connecting doors to adjoining rooms: I always double check to make sure they’re locked. They always are.

Windows: this is what I look at first, mostly because I hope they open. If they do open, I need to know about outside access. Is there a balcony? If so, there’s probably access to mine from a neighboring balcony. I’ve spoken enough with Frank Black, a career burglar, to never leave a room with an open balcony door. Frank specialized in burglarizing high-rise apartment buildings, but 21 years in prison has, apparently, retired him from that business. He’s now a respected tattoo artist and children’s book author.

In Florida (and I presume elsewhere, too), a certain subset of cat burglar is called a pants burglar. These creep in at night through open lanai doors, while the occupants are sleeping. They’re named for their beeline to men’s trousers, where they hope to find a wallet. They also visit the dresser top hoping to find, perhaps, a woman’s ring taken off for the night.

Hotel room security: One morning I woke to see a perfect convergence of wires out the window. Only the view from my pillow created this lovely, serendipitous intersection of three unconnected and discrete (phone? electric?) lines. — One morning I woke to see a perfect convergence of wires out the window. Only the view from my pillow created this lovely, serendipitous intersection of three unconnected and discrete (phone? electric?) lines.

I love an open window, but before I sleep with a breeze, I need to analyze window access. If my room is on the ground floor, on an atrium floor, or if it has a rooftop out the window, I won’t sleep with it open. If there are nearby balconies, forget it. Of course it also depends on the overall ambiance and character of the property. At a safari lodge in Tanzania I’ll worry more about baboons. In a thatched-roof teak tree-house in Bali, I figure I’ve paid enough to expect good security. At an all-inclusive beach resort with rooms that don’t lock—well? I planned for that when I packed.

After a quick appraisal of the hotel room security combined with its overall quality, we know how careful we want to be. In truth, we leave our laptops out in full view in about eighty-five percent of the rooms we stay in. Small valuables? Never. Wallets and jewelry? In the safe.

Some travelers believe in using duct tape to fasten their valuables to the underside of a bedside table, or other furniture. I can’t endorse that practice, unless it’s a last resort.

“During peak travel seasons hotels tend to use a lot of transient help,” Bob Arno says, “and sometimes the screening of these temporary employees is not as high as it could be. So yes, one always has to be concerned about hotel room theft.” The only way to protect your small valuables is to lock them in the hotel room safe.

But is the safe safe? We generally feel secure with electronic safes that allow us to key in our own code or swipe our own magnetic strip. For a magnetic strip, we use an airline or telephone card, not a credit card. The old-fashioned type of safe that takes a regular metal key we do not consider safe and do not use. We’ve surveyed police officers, hotel security, and FBI agents on this issue, and they agree with this reasoning.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Four: Hotels—Have a Nice Stay

*Once, during a short stay in a Greek hotel, we felt it unwise to leave the things in our room unattended. Had our visit been longer than overnight, we would have relocated.

Much more on hotel room security:
Hotel security in the hands of housekeeping staff
Hotel security: room door left open by housekeeping
Hotel room security lapses
Hotel room theft
Hotel room theft by doorpushers
Hotel Front Desk Safe Theft
Hotel lobby luggage theft
Hotel lobby luggage theft #2
Hotel room safe thefts
Beware hotel phone scam

hotel key security

Bambi’s bag snatch

[dropcap letter=”W”]as it instinct or anger that made Bob chase my bag snatcher? He rocketed down the street brandishing the famous umbrella weapon that was so ineffectual in Naples. I had managed nothing more than “Hey!,” but my weak protestation was like the starting gun at the Monaco Grand Prix. Two grown men went from zero to sixty in an instant.

Bag snatch!

I can’t say I was caught unaware when the bag snatcher stepped up to meet me, face to face. He calmly looked me in the eyes, seized the strap of my purse with both hands, and yanked it hard enough to break the leather against my shoulder. It happened much faster than you can read that sentence.

I gave my little shout and the creep was off and running, Bob on his tail. It took me several seconds to realize that I still had the purse clutched tightly in my hands. I could have laughed, but for the fact that my husband was in pursuit of a potentially dangerous criminal in a decidedly unsafe neighborhood.

The street we had walked was full of the necessities of life in this non-touristy part of Barcelona, lined with tiny hardware, shoe repair, and paint shops. We had been directed there, without any specific warning, in search of a few pieces of wood. Peeking through doorways seeking the lumberyard, we revealed ourselves as obvious outsiders. As we strayed ever further from the relative safety of La Rambla, we sensed a vague but growing threat of danger.

My antennas were out way before the interloper trespassed so suddenly into my aura. I didn’t see his approach, but I had already assumed a protective posture. Both my hands held the small purse I wore diagonally crossed over my chest.

Bob was a few steps ahead of me and didn’t see the confrontation. It only lasted two seconds. It’s astonishing what analysis and conclusions the brain can manage in those instants. I thought the man looked ordinary but grave. He stood uncomfortably close and made uncommon eye contact. I thought he would speak. I thought he would ask a question, or offer advice. Against my will, I slipped into the trusting attitude of a traveler in a foreign land. And that was my mistake.

Perhaps I’d have reacted quicker or with more suspicion if the bag snatcher had looked sleazy, mean, or desperate. But he didn’t, and I gave him the benefit of any doubt. In those two seconds, the gentleman had all the opportunity he needed to seize the strap of my bag and yank.

My feeble objection was enough to get Bob’s attention. He whirled around and leapt into pursuit, his long stride a clear advantage. When the perp dashed into a crowded alley, I thought it was all over. Bob bellowed “Policia!” at a volume that would fill an amphitheater. I, far behind, expected to see the escaping sprinter blocked or tripped by the local loiterers.

On the contrary. The sea of people opened for his getaway, then closed up again to watch the tall guy run. They didn’t exactly block Bob’s path, but seemed to plant themselves firmly as obstacles. Bob had to give up.

For me, the humiliation suffered by the would-be thief was almost enough. Like a cat with a mouthful of feathers, he ran with nothing more than twelve inches of torn leather strap in his fist. Yet, I was shaken and weak-kneed immediately following the experience, and the after effects lingered for months. Despite the fact that I wasn’t hurt, I lost nothing of value, and Bob hadn’t been tripped in the chase, I felt victimized.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Five: Rip-Offs: Introducing… the Opportunist

bag snatch Barcelona thieves

Pirañas: Pickpockets in Lima, Peru

A dozen boys swarmed around Gary Ferrari in front of the Sheraton Hotel in Lima. At least it seemed like a dozen—they’d appeared out of nowhere and were gone in just a few seconds. In that cyclone of baby-faces and a hundred probing fingers, they got his wallet and the gold chain from his neck.

Pickpockets in Lima

“We call them pirañas,” said Dora Pinedo, concierge at the Sheraton. “They are everywhere.”

“I don’t know how they got my chain,” said Gary, rubbing the red welt on his neck. “It was under my shirt.” He didn’t realize that the boys had learned to recognize the telltale ridge of fabric that covers any chain worth stealing.

“They’re usually seven-, eight-, nine-year-old boys,” Dora told us, “and they mob their victim in groups of six to ten. There is nothing one can do with so many little hands all over.”

We interviewed Petter Infante, 28, and Wilmer Sulca, 17, both grown-up pirañas. We found them at Lima’s University Park, where a comedy presentation was taking place in an entertainment pit, rather like a small amphitheater. Hundreds of people surrounded the pit, transfixed. Others loitered around the audience, more sat on cement benches, and many were asleep in the grass. Petter and Wilmer looked at us skeptically but agreed to talk to us after Gori, our interpreter, paid off a policeman patrolling the park.

“But not here,” Wilmer said.

“Anywhere you want,” said Bob. Right, let’s enter their lair, and let’s take our fancy equipment in with us. The five of us piled into a taxi and Wilmer instructed the driver in staccato Spanish. Where were they taking us? I looked at Gori for assurance but our fine-boned archeology-student interpreter was not a bodyguard.

Wilmer led us into a garage-like cantina, dark, deserted, music blaring, disco lights flashing. The boys ordered huge bottles of Cristal beer. Bob wired Petter with a microphone and I set up our video camera, hyper-conscious of our vulnerability—read that: scared. My eyes were glued to Petter’s left arm, a mass of parallel scars, layer upon layer of them. A cut on his wrist was gaping open, infected. I used the gash to focus the camera.

Petter's arm. Pickpockets in Lima, Peru. — Petter’s arm.

“The first thing I ever stole was a chicken,” Petter said. “I was twelve years old, alone, and hungry. I had small brothers to take care of.” Petter’s expressive face told a many-chaptered tale of violence: his snaggle teeth were edged with gold, his cheeks crosshatched with scars.

“I’m best at stealing watches. I just grab it off someone walking, then run. I’m a very fast runner. The victim could never catch me. We call this arreba tar. It means run-steal.”

He stood to demonstrate his expertise. Bob stood to be victim. “You can see there’s nothing in his front pocket, it’s flat,” Petter said. Then he did a lightning fast dip and grab into Bob’s back pocket. The wallet flew upward with a grand flourish, like the follow-through of a tennis stroke.

“We’ll steal anything,” Wilmer said, “nothing in particular. It’s all easy. It’s like a game.” Wilmer then showed the same method from Bob’s front pocket, finishing with the same exuberant flourish. “Cocagado—I’m already gone. By the time the victim realizes, we’re cocagado.”

The knife scars on Petter’s arm are like stripes on an officer’s shoulders: you have to respect him. You see he’s tough and dangerous. He started cutting himself a few years ago.

“If the police catch you, you cut yourself and they release you. They don’t want you if you’re cut and bleeding.”

“I’m on the street nine years and I never cut myself,” Wilmer said. “I don’t like to do that. We don’t have the same philosophy, Petter and I. He likes to cut himself, I do not. We think differently.”

(A police officer explained that an injured arrestee must be taken to a hospital, which requires hours of paperwork. If an arresting officer is near the end of his shift, he may not want to pursue such lengthy formalities.)

Petter and Wilmer, pickpockets in Lima, are opportunists, pirañas grown into hardened thieves. Petter thinks nothing of threatening his victims with a knife. I don’t know if he ever has or would use it. The boys’ main operative is speed.

Petter's cuts. Pickpockets in Lima, Peru. — Petter’s cuts

“We wait at the bus stops and look for someone with a good watch, or something else to take. We wait until the bus doors are ready to close then grab it and run. And sometimes we grab things through the open windows of the bus. We reach inside and grab cellphones, watches, glasses, purses, anything.”

Opportunists look for sure bets, for temptations, for the fat wallet protruding from a back pocket “like a gift,” as a pickpocket in Prague told me. “We call it …˜the other man’s pocket,'” a Russian thief revealed; “the sucker pocket,” said another. “Tourists make it too easy,” complained a man in Prague whose family members were admitted thieves.

Excerpt from Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams
Chapter Five: Rip-Offs: Introducing… the Opportunist

bag snatch Lima Peru thieves

Common sense takes a vacation

What’s in the nice red bag? Camera? IPod? Cash? Credit cards? Its owners are snug in the hammock, backs turned, oblivious.

theft

Pickpocket statistics

You want pickpocket statistics? How prevalent is pickpocketing? How many thefts occur in one day in New York, or Rome, or St. Petersburg, Russia? Or at the Rose Bowl Parade, or the World Cup? How many thefts are actually reported? Raise your hand if you think you lost your wallet or phone.

If your wallet is suddenly just—gone!—does your pride make you say that you must have lost it (because no one could steal from me!)? Or does your vanity tell you that it must have been stolen (because I never lose things!)? Is it your nature to accept responsibility or assign blame? On which list should your missing wallet be placed? Lost or stolen?

Pickpockets are an enigmatic breed. Most are never seen or felt by their victims—or anyone else. Mystery men and women (and boys and girls) moving freely among us, they’re as good as invisible. So how can they be quantified?

How many thefts does each commit in a day? How many attempts that fail? How many successes that must be reversed, by handing back the loot or dropping it on the ground when accused?

What exactly is pickpocketing, anyway?

…Fingers stealthily extract a wallet from a man’s pocket.
…They reach into a woman’s purse for hers.
…It’s demanded “for examination” by a pseudo-cop.
…They take only cash from a wallet.
…A watch is ripped off your wrist.
…A phone is lifted from a restaurant table, right under your nose.
…A woman’s purse is taken from under her chair at a cafe.
…It’s snatched from her shoulder on the street.
…It’s slit with a razor in broad daylight.
…A gold chain is yanked from your neck.
…A backpack is taken from an airport luggage cart.
…A briefcase from the ground at your feet.
…Cash or jewelry is taken from your bag in the airplane overhead bin.

Do all of these count? How do police reports define them? Larceny? Robbery? Lost property? Do the police reports further break them down into pickpocketing verses bag snatching verses mugging?

I’m often asked for actual statistics. Occasionally, I half-heartedly go looking for some. I’ve learned that this ambiguous crime is not uniformly classified and, of course, not uniformly reported at all.

Pickpocketing is a phantom crime. In many cases, only the perp knows the deed was done. There are no witnesses or evidence; no dead body or weapon—just the lack of some personal property which—you know—could have been misplaced.

To most police except the passionate few, pickpocketing is “petty;” too insignificant for them to take seriously. It’s more paperwork than they want to bother with, especially at the end of their shifts. They throw up their hands. They blow air. And now, it seems, they “downgrade” police reports, chalking up reported thefts to lost-property.

The news is scandalous over at New York’s JFK Airport, where the Port Authority Police Department is allegedly fudging reports:

When laptops and suitcases are reported stolen by travelers, officers are routinely ordered to downgrade the incidents from thefts to merely lost luggage—to keep the airport’s crime stats down and their bosses looking good, sources told the Post.

High theft numbers make people feel unsafe and make the police departments look bad. City administrators want to seem as if they’ve cleaned up crime. But high numbers also help get budget increases for additional personnel. Numbers can be tweaked to fit the day’s whim. It’s all political and arbitrary and very fuzzy. Pickpocket statistics are amorphous.

The New York Post reporter describes the police report filed by a pickpocketing victim:

Kaya Tileu, 26, a resident of the Upper East Side who works on Wall Street, filed a theft report Feb. 22 alleging that his $200 wallet, $300 in cash and credit cards were swiped from inside a JFK McDonald’s.
The original paperwork listed Tileu as a grand-larceny victim. But a Post-it note attached to his police report advised the cop who filed it, “This is a lost property.—Capt.”

Police aren’t counting reported thefts? I didn’t even consider this possibility when I extrapolated the numbers for Barcelona and came up with a whopping “6,000 thefts per day on Barcelona visitors.” I took the police at their word when they reported 115,055 pickpocketings and bag snatches in a recent 12-month period. I started with that number—I didn’t say but wait, let’s increase it to include the victim reports they’re not counting…

In my book, Travel Advisory: How to Avoid Thefts, Cons, and Street Scams, I wrote of the impossibility of compiling pickpocket statistics:

Of the pickpocket incidents reported, most, according to a New York cop on the pickpocket detail who wishes to remain unnamed, fall into the “lost property” category. “They don’t even realize they’ve been pickpocketed,” he said. “They think they just lost it.” Incidents reported as thefts are lumped under one of several legal descriptions. Larceny is the unlawful taking of property from the possession of a person, and includes pickpocketing, purse-snatching, shoplifting, bike theft, and theft from cars. Robbery is the same but involves the use or threat of force. The theft of a purse or wallet, therefore, may fall into either of these categories, and usually cannot be extracted for statistical purposes. Similarly, the figures collected under larceny or robbery include offenses this book does not specifically address; shoplifting, for example.

For many reasons, victims don’t always report thefts. Hotels and theme parks and other venues actively discourage them from filing police reports, and incident rates are suppressed. It’s bad publicity for Paradise. It’s terrible for pickpocket statistics. Pickpocketry may be a dirty little secret, but Bob and I know that this petty theft, collectively, is huge.

So give it to me already: Pickpocket Statistics

Yeah. Sorry. Here’s my big conclusion: Catch-22. As long as pickpocketry is considered petty, no one will bother collecting data. And as long as there are no large numbers, the crime will continue to be considered petty. Petty crime—who cares? Even actually reported incidents, which we know are only some fraction of a larger number, will continue to be lumped into disparate broad legal categories, unextractable. Who will expend resources on an element that can’t be counted, a scourge that can’t be seen? Like a virus, pickpockets will continue to lurk invisibly, impossible to eradicate, wreaking their havoc.

crime statistics pickpocket police theft

Coffee on the road

Go ahead—laugh.
I did.

Is there a more phallic kitchen tool on the planet? Or one more ridiculous?

You should see the thing in action! This is an espresso-maker for the coffee-obsessed traveler. To work it, you grab the black “head” and pump vigorously. I am not kidding.

Of course, first you need a source of boiling water, which sort of spoils its promise of convenience. You can’t just pull to the side of an endless desert road and pump out a shot of espresso; or whip one up on a beach blanket. But in a hotel room equipped with a water boiler, it makes a passable coffee with a nice crema. You need to carry around the coffee, sugar, and the right cups, too. Maybe even a grinder. It’s not my idea of convenient. For all its trouble and the extra stuff that must be carried, it’s not, in my opinion, trip-worthy.

But it sure is amusing to watch a man operate it. I don’t mind drinking the coffee, either.

food odd travel

“CYA” theft warnings

In my previous post on theft from lobbies, I reported that the Hertz office had a sign on its door warning that thieves worked the interior of the office. The fact that the door was propped open, making the alert invisible or unnoticeable (and potentially letting the thieves in) may or may not cancel Hertz’s effort at due diligence.

I just found a story called Plan B for Spain (because it linked to Thiefhunters in Paradise), which cutely describes a brazen theft from an occupied rental car in Barcelona. The account relates a similar “CYA” warning of bag theft at the rental counter. However, the warning is meant to be found only once the renter is in the car, long after his exposure to that risk of theft. What’s the point? We-told-you-so? Victims must fume when they finally get into their car, minus a bag or two, and find that warning.

In his story, Peter Zingg wrote: “The first thing I noticed when getting into the car was a small notice placed on the dashboard (Europcar’s form E-20919) proclaiming in four languages:

ATTENTION

Organised gangs who rob rental vehicle users have been reported in the area. The most usual ways they act are:
Stealing luggage at the counter while the documents are being prepared and/or in the parking lots while loading or unloading luggage from the vehicle. PLEASE WATCH YOUR LUGGAGE AT ALL TIMES.

Puncturing the vehicle tyre. They then tell the driver from another car. When the driver stops, they “kindly” offer help to change the wheel and tack advantage to steal your belongings. PLEASE DO NOT ACCEPT HELP IF IT IS NOT FROM THE POLICE OR CIVIL GUARD AND DO NOT STOP UNTIL YOU REACH A PETROL STATION OR POLICE STATION.

Do not leave or hand over the keys to your vehicle at any time, as there are cases of thieves ransacking houses or apartments and taking the keys and the vehicle and people passing themselves off as rental company employees and asking you for the vehicle keys. Remember that you remain responsible for the car and its keys until Europcar has taken reception of these. PLEASE KEEP THE VEHICLE KEYS WITH YOU AT ALL TIMES. KEEP THEM IN YOUR HOLDAY HOME’S SAFE WHEN YOU ARE OUT OR AT NIGHT AND DO NOT HAND THE KEYS OVER TO ANY PERSONS, EVEN IF THEY CLAIM TO BE AN EMPLOYEE. RETURN THE KEYS TO THE CAR HIRE OFFICE.

“CYA” warnings are meant to protect the company, not its customers. If corporations could sleep, would they be able to?

hotel luggage theft

Lobby luggage theft

Purses and backpacks go missing at the worst times. Like, when they’re filled with cash, passports, cameras, medications, travel documents, and laptops. Like, when you’re far from home.

Last month, Ron and Sharon Dasil were renting a car in Barcelona. Very experienced savvy travelers, they took all the precautions. Sharon sat with their four suitcases and two backpacks while Ron stood at the counter in the tiny Hertz office near Sants train station. After resisting up-selling efforts by persistent employees, Ron finished the paperwork and asked for driving directions. To make notes, Sharon joined him at the counter for three minutes, max. When she returned to her chair, her backpack was gone.

The office was only about a 12-foot square; the two employees faced out toward the door. When Sharon exclaimed that her bag was gone, one of the employees took a few steps to the door and closed it, pointing to a sign that the Dasils had not seen: “guard your stuff, thieves are around,” or something to that effect.

Had someone been watching from outside, waiting for the office’s only customers to turn their backs? Was it pure flukey timing? In such a small space, why hadn’t the employees noticed the arrival of a new person? Wouldn’t they greet a potential customer? If thieves are around, why was the door propped open?

These are questions the couple is asking the police and the Hertz headquarters. They also wonder if there was some complicity or collusion between the Hertz agents and the thief. “One of them bent under the counter for a while. He could have been texting someone,” Sharon worried.

Luggage left in hotel lobby — The four men who own the luggage at left are far out of sight at the front desk.

At about the same time, Paul Hines was checking into the Holiday Inn Kensington Forum Hotel on Cromwell Road in London. He and his wife piled their luggage next to some chairs in the lobby, with their backpack on top. Mrs. Hines sat with the bags while Mr. Hines checked in. Mrs. Hines was briefly distracted when she noticed a man in the lobby with his fly open. That was all it took. The backpack was gone.

Purse left unattended in hotel lobby — This gaping open purse was ignored for more than ten minutes while its owner checked in.

Who was the man with the open fly? An intentional distraction? Or just a staff member or hapless guest? Holiday Inn staff claimed to have the theft on video, but wouldn’t reveal much else to the Hines’s. Neither were they very helpful after the incident. They marked the location of the police station on a map, but didn’t get a taxi for Mr. Hines, who had no cash for a cab. He walked there and back again in the rain.

Both the Dasils and the Hines’s lost a lot in their backpacks. Both couples spent considerable holiday time filing reports, canceling credit cards, replacing passports, etc. While the Dasils, frequent travelers, took care of the theft business then got back to their adventure, Mr. Hines still seemed angry and frustrated several days later, when I spoke with him.

A bag completely out of its owner's site in a hotel lobby. — He could have put his bag anywhere. He put it behind his chair; not only out of his sight, but out of his companions' sight, too.

Now you see it, now you don’t. We all know to guard our stuff, but it’s worth remembering how quickly these thefts happen, and how frequently. The opportunist thief is lurking, waiting for you to drop your guard. The strategist thief turns your head himself, with some devious distraction or other.

Lobby employees don’t know whose luggage is whose. They don’t know every guest or customer. They are not luggage guards—not even the doormen are.

How exactly are purses and backpacks stolen, right out in the open? The technique usually involves a sport coat or jacket. We know some thieves who use an empty garment bag. The thief simply drapes the cover over the object of his desire and walks off with the goodies hidden underneath—often barely breaking stride. Bob Arno has done this many times on television.

I’ve heard about a hundred too many stories like these. Now I’m calling on you, readers, to help put an end to lobby theft. Watch your stuff. Keep a hand on the heap, or some other body contact with your bags.

bag hotel lobby luggage theft thieves

Hotel lobby luggage theft #2

The scene: a hotel lobby, late morning.

Guests sit with their luggage, waiting for rides. Some are waiting to check in.

A man walks quickly through the lobby. He doesn’t notice when his wallet drops to the floor. A guest sees the wallet fall, runs over to pick it up, and chases after the man to return it.

Nice distraction, isn’t it?
On returning, the guest’s backpack is gone.

backpack bag hotel lobby luggage theft

PICKPOCKETS, CON ARTISTS, GANGSTERS, THIEVES, AND TRAVEL