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The
South American Handbook
seems loaded with warnings about pick pockets, muggers, drugged sweets being offered to travellers, break-ins
to hotel rooms, and lawlessness on the roads; a minefield of opportunists competing for the belongings of the unwary
traveller.
No wonder the American
Foreign Office warns its citizens against back-packing around Columbia and Peru.
Machu Pichu
© Michel Guntern
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Ever since
Pizarro tricked the Inca, Atahualpa, into capture, slaughtered him, and looted the
City of Cuzco, this Andean country has become synonymous with robbery. Unlike Brazil, a gun is rarely
used; the Peruvians are too professional. Their art is well crafted, and the sneak thieves
are very nimble. If you give them the slightest opportunity, they will relieve you of your
possessions quicker than an armed mugger could even produce a weapon. |
The
tourist police, noticeable by their white armbands, or braiding, are friendly enough, and
often warn you when known thieves have had their eye on you. They will tell you where the
tourist police-station is located, should you need them, but they are too overworked to be
your guardian angel.
| You can
usually tell the watch snatcher as he homes in on your glittering wrist. This person runs at you from a
distance greater than the visibility of the watch could possibly be, slips two fingers
under the back of the watch face, and jerks the timepiece from its strap.
Fluidly, the stranger
then speeds up faster than Carl Lewis receiving the baton in a 4x100 relay. |
Cuzco
© Michel Guntern
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