Sun, Sand & Scandal

With the holiday season upon us once again, millions of people will be leaving the comforts of home to either visit family in a far off place or to take a relaxing vacation in an exotic location (or both if you're lucky). When people enter a new environment they are often disoriented and let their guard down when it comes to sensible decisions. This tends to leave foreigners and tourists open to common street scams. If you are traveling to a foreign country you are even more susceptible to scams because you may look different from the locals and you may not have a grasp of the language.

Conde Naste Traveler this month featured an article on just this topic. Sad but funny, I thought I'd share a few of my favorites:

The Baby Toss - where a woman tries to throw her kid at you so that you will drop your purse and catch the kid as a reflex (come on... really?)

The Phony Parking Lot Attendant - who takes money in return for watching your car, or worse yet - takes your keys for the valet (I think I've fallen for this!)

The Metal Detector Trap -  when the friendly airport staff is yelling at you to stop! and proceed! through the line up and you get separated from your bags in the caffufle (amazingly this hasn't happened yet but I usually try to put my stinky runners on the top of the pile on the conveyer belt to stave off any lurking thiefs)

The New Yorker also recently published some fun, but rather off-the-wall situations. Like the guy who  offers to take a polariod of your money doing weird touristy things like admiring art, and then runs away with your money leaving you with a photo to remind you how stupid you were. Now that's just funny... it would almost be worth the photo if someone pulled that off.

Our advice: always keep your eyes open and try to fit in like a local.

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