In a message dated 7/21/01 8:04:14 PM Eastern Daylight Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: << Subj: RE: Semi-OT: Pickpockets & oops. Date: 7/21/01 8:04:14 PM Eastern Daylight Time From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Amita Guha) Sender: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Reply-to: <A HREF="mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]";>[EMAIL PROTECTED] </A> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Good question! I live in NYC and I've walked around with my camera around my neck with no problem. Heck, the tourists do it. :) I even took my tripod out to a park and hiked with it for two hours, and no one disturbed me. Granted, so far I've only done it in areas where there were a lot of people around, during daylight hours. I keep my gear in my camera bag, which goes inside my LL Bean book bag. Its padded straps are too thick for anyone to snip quickly. --Amita ___________________________________________________ During my recent hiatus from the list, I spent 25 days in Brooklyn (My hometown!) NY. Not having been at home for some years, I too walked the streets of Brooklyn & Harlem (above 110th street) and spent five afternoons at B&H (!!), using B&H and the nearby Nathan's as my "downtown" headquarters. At no time did I feel threatened (but to be fair, NY ~is~ "home."). Never used a tripod but my Manfrotto monopod saw heavy use (how else are you going to shoot downtown in the "canyons" with winds gusting up to 35 mph)? To be fair, wearing a Fila (on my head) kinda inoculated me from being seen as one of the "accidental" tourists. (Even ~I~ was a bit astonished at the number of languages and dialects you're likely to (over)hear on the streets of NY.) As Amita said, nothing happened when exposing (get it)? a personal or pro level camera. To be perfectly frank, most tourists, in-country and out, get in trouble because they look and act like... tourists. The bad guys always (still) pick on the weak, the timid and the stupid. Walking around like dressed up like Pillsbury Doughboy/girls wearing "tourist" shorts exposing their chubby white legs sure as hell won't help either. ("White" Americans and Europeans can and do present all degrees of vulgar dress when on vacation, wearing clothes no "native" would ever wear, marking them as targets for local grifters, whether in NY or Istanbul). *Don't ever think your $300 dollars P&S is worth something to the grifters. Who're they gonna sell it to, tourists? The ~real~ targets of pickpockets and snatch and grab thieves is not (necessarily) your camera or cash, but your credit cards and American passport, itself worth ~hundreds~ of dollars on the black market whereas your $300 P&S will be sold for $5 American. - This message is from the Pentax-Discuss Mail List. To unsubscribe, go to http://www.pdml.net and follow the directions. Don't forget to visit the Pentax Users' Gallery at http://pug.komkon.org .
