Thursday, September 27, 2012

Read and Heed EPJ

Tim Moriarty emails:

A few months ago I read your article, The World's Most Dangerous Cities, and I sent
it to my brother whose oldest son had just graduated from a religious
college in NC. Taking the advice of the counselors there, he took on a
year-long trip to Nairobi to assist at a religious orphanage, although I
know of nothing he learned in college that would qualify him to do anything
there.

After reading the article, my brother replied, "Oh, swell," but there
wasn't a whole lot he could do about it since his kid was legally an adult,
plus he thought it might not turn out to be all bad.

At a graduation/bon voyage party shortly before he left, one of his cousins
laughed that, if my nephew got into trouble, they'd have me, an
ex-paratrooper, go over and rescue him. I said ha, ha, very funny, and if
my nephew didn't have enough sense to stay out of bad places, then he'll be
on his own when he's grabbed and held for ransom from Duh Rich White Man.
(I doubt that went over well.)

Being an even bigger dumbass than his Uncle Tim, my nephew went over and in
the first week he came down with some sort of bad cold/flu as a result of
his initial exposure to nasty stuff in the environment, coughing and
sneezing up green glop. In his second week he was robbed of $75 by some
locals who claimed to be the police. (Given the location, they may very
well have been the police.) The dummy could have stayed in this area (VA
suburbs of DC) and been robbed by locals in SE or NE Washington DC,
Anacostia or Prince George's County without having to travel nearly as far.
The good news is that he made it through the third week recently without
getting robbed again. Eleven more months to go...

Anyway, thanks for your informative article. Now, if only people would
"read and heed."

3 comments:

  1. As an American who lives in Nairobi, Tim Moriarty's comments reveal him to be nothing but a coward.

    Your nephew with or without $75 at least has the cahunas to go out into the world and do something to make it a better place.

    Stay home under your bed, Tim. Real men go into dangerous places and get things done. Sometimes we die. Sometimes we get robbed. But men can handle that.

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  2. Ive travelled extensively and some of my best experiences have been in so-called "dangerous" places . I agree with "read and heed" , but heed doesn't mean "don't go". It means be smart, be aware of your surroundings and know the environment going in.

    The key is street smarts, and not having those can cost you whether you're in Nairobi , Bogota or Pawtucket.


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  3. There is only one way to get street smarts. Spend time on the streets.

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