I think you hit it squarely Doris. Having lived in Europe and traveled in
Central America, it's more fear of the unknown. Being niave about where
you are, not paying attention to what's going on around you, and getting
careless are what make a target. I've never been in any great fear in a
foreign country . . . even in very impoverished areas. Doesn't mean I
didn't stay alert to what was going on around me . . . that's fundamental
safety applicable everywhere . . . including the supermarket parking
lot. I found people are fundamentally the same everywhere. The vast
majority want pretty much the same things out of life. Then there are a
very small handful of hoodlums, criminals, thugs and thieves. Economic
status doesn't seem to make that much difference with the mix either.
-- John
At 17:09 1/26/01, Doris Fang wrote:
IMO, A lot of these fears are ethnocentric. The fear that things are
meaner "over there", when in reality, they're far more likely to happen in
Washington D.C. The differences are that Dirk knows the city he lives
in, and that knowledge and familiarity give him a sense of security.
It's a statistical crapshoot, and one can bias the odds in one's favor
by practicing Olaf's recommendations (and others) and by famliarizing
oneself with the area before arriving.
A lot of people have an idyllic notion of travel, that it should all
be like a trip to Disneyworld. It's not. It's a lot like where you live,
only (for the most part --- in Europe) far safer. Like any other real-life
situation, you're always taking chances, large and small. Probably the
riskiest part of travel is the ride from one's home to the airport and
back.
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