This wasn’t my first rodeo, though still I was thrown.
From years of traveling off the beaten path, I’ve developed habits that aim to prevent theft but still give me a Plan B if I am robbed, such as:
Don’t use a suitcase, which would mark me as a traveler; bring just a small amount of clothes in a dirty old duffle bag.
Don’t bring my regular pocketbook, but rather a teeny tiny one, and only carry exactly what I need.
Bring two bank cards on a trip, but only carry around one and keep the other hidden in my room as a backup in case the first is stolen. Keep the banks’ phone numbers written down to report theft.
The only key to bring with me is the one for the car. However, I keep another car key hidden on the outside of my car so that if my car key is stolen, I still have another to drive home from the airport. Underneath the car mat is another credit card to pay my airport parking fee, in case the two bank cards I brought on my trip were stolen.
While there, look as much like a native and as little like an American as I can. Believe it or not, I can now pull that off. I didn’t used to manage it.
Keep my passport hidden in the room where I’m staying, and only carry my driver’s license around (for the identification which sometimes is required).
My hostess and my family back home have photos of my passport, flight details and other information as backup in case the passport does get stolen.
As I’m walking around, carry my bags (old used bags from the stores where I am staying, not from back home) in my arms in a tight grip as well as by the straps, but fake nonchalance.
Carry enough cash in the purse so that if I am robbed the thief thinks he’s got it all. Keep more cash here and there in different places. Keep most of the cash back in the room. Give much of my money to my hostess to take care of things, so I’m not an obvious American flashing money.
I’m a When-In-Rome-Do-As-The-Romans-Do kind of traveler. That means spending hours a day crammed into subways and buses. However, for the major party we were going to, I insisted my hostess find us safe transportation. If we had to walk the normal half mile to the bus stop and take public transportation dressed in our evening gowns carrying packages — and one of us an American — criminals and kidnappers would rightly guess they had struck gold with us.
We couldn’t trust a taxi or ride-app driver, because it comes out often enough in the news that some of them rape and rob and kill their passengers. It took several days, but finally my hostess found a trustworthy driver, recommended by a cousin who had used that driver for years.
While she and her cousin were texting back and forth with the driver on the hours and his rate for the day of the party, I was so excited I accepted right away, with plans to pay him a hefty tip, too. The cousin, Estela, put her hand on my arm and tilted her head at me. “Tranquila!” she said – “Calm!” We are supposed to negotiate for a lower price, as is custom, she reminded me.
Urgh! That one sure wasn’t worth bickering over to me, but I let her do her thing, because when in Rome …
During my week there, the store across the road from the community gates – the start of our half-mile walk to the bus stop – was robbed, a girl three doors down was attacked (the police hung out at our house for a while during the investigation) and my hostess’s daughter’s phone was stolen.
As for me, though, I made it nearly the whole week through without any loss.
Until the night of the party: My glasses were stolen straight off the table when I got up to dance. As soon as the dance was over, I sat down at the table, where the glasses and the family who had been sitting there earlier were all gone.
I thought I was a careful traveler. It goes to show you learn something every day.
So I had to finish my trip without glasses, which filled me with a strong and strong sense of mourning and loss, on top of frustration and confusion. It was especially hard to navigate the airports without being able to see.
Those bifocals were expensive, and I loved their looks. In fact, for the past few years I’ve been actively looking for a replacement pair, but have not found frames I like, so that makes me miss my glasses even more.
So – I went into this trip expecting it to be dangerous, but then while there realized it was much more dangerous than I had thought, and a few times I was truly scared.
Given that, I got out easy with just the glasses being the only loss.
But the spoiled part of me – the American part of me who has gone through life in relative safety – is still mad about the glasses.
