Pickpockets

Merry and I arrived at the Madrid airport extremely bleary after a flight delay of four hours. We left home the day before at 9 am. Now it was noon the next day. Accounting for the time difference, we had been on the move almost non-stop for 21 hours with little sleep.

To get into the city from the airport we decided to ride the Metro. This involved a long walk through the airport, then two transfers between subway lines. We packed light but there were stairs and long hallways everywhere. At the end of the last transfer, a stranger appeared out of nowhere and tried to help me carry my suitcase down a short flight of a stairs. I managed to get him to let go just as a train pulled in. We hopped on at the last minute and found ourselves in a crush of passengers. When we got off at our station Mer discovered her backpack had been opened. A handbag bought for the trip but fortunately empty was stollen and her earring bag was missing.

We oriented ourselves and trudged to our hotel a bit shaken. Exhausted but safe we felt lucky to have carried all our money, credit cards and passports in our money belts. We reported the incident to the hotel desk, but they simply assured us we were lucky not to have lost more. We had planned to ride the Metro frequently in Madrid, but this episode made us change our minds.

A few days later we were walking in Barcelona in a nice neighborhood near the Sagrada Famillia. Suddenly we both realized our backs were wet. My pants and Mer's jacket were splattered all over with coffee. A guy rushed up to us with a handful of napkins and started to clean off the mess. He tried very hard to get us to go into his apartment where he claimed he would help us more. We both were aware enough to realize this was a scam. We pulled away. An older gentleman walked up and stopped to see what was happening. The first guy quickly disappeared. We walked around for the next few hours in spotted clothes that smelled strongly of coffee and creamora.

The desk clerk at our hotel told us this happens all the time. It turns out that throwing coffee, catsup or yogurt on clothes is a common scam. He suggested our best defense would have been to have thanked the guy for wanting to help and asked to take his picture.

We knew before making this trip that pickpockets and sneak thieves are common in Spain's large cities. We lost very little, but the psychological impact lasted throughout the trip. We always carried our valuables in money belts. We avoided crowds when possible and were always on guard. We had no further trouble. Everyone we met told us stories of their personal experiences with pickpockets, many of which were far worse than ours.

As I see it, the problem with the tactics used by sneak thieves is the reliance on the natural willingness people have to trust helpful strangers. When someone offers to help, my natural impulse is to be moved and thankful. This moment of relaxation is all a pickpocket needs to steal your wallet. As a consequence, in areas where pickpockets operate, a traveler needs to train themselves not to trust people who appear to be trying to be helpful. Is that seemingly nice guy who just offered to take your picture going to steal the camera?

I like to think I'm not naïve. I know there is a lot of poverty in the world. When I travel I know a certain portion of the people I encounter see me as nothing but an opportunity to make easy money. Nonetheless, pickpockets violate a trust that people ought to be able to count on no matter where they are in the world. Without that trust, travel is less enriching and more stressful. When we guard ourselves from open contact with the people in the country we visit, we miss the best part of the trip.

In the next few blog entries, I will share the stories of how we broke out of this distrust of strangers and found real adventure in Spain. Stay tuned.