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First experience of city fear:
Riots in my own town. Age around 7 or 8. Civil rights fiasco.
Travel wise: Philly. South side . ,nuff said.
Houston in daylight. Abducted. Got shoved in a car.
Houston police are a joke...and not the belly laugh kind.
Harlem in the late 90's. It was going thru a clean up...and apparently my purse was what they wanted to clean out .
I detest nyc..so Harlem just validated it.
Loved Europe overall...did find certain areas were less friendly if I said I was from America. Took those towns folks but a brief chat to understand their valid dislike. I respected hearing their side. And hoped they knew I wasn't like that.
Not to derail, but this is such a subjective question. It depends on so many factors. It's really not easy to answer, except pointing on the obvious most violent countries like Somalia, Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Yemen etc.
It depends on your age, gender, demeanor, race, physical shape. If you are a seasoned traveler or an anxious newbie always watching over your shoulders. If you know the language and understand the culture and customs. Your flexibility to adjust to different situations. Your surviving skills. If you are all alone or with someone or a group. How is your common sense and guts feeling? Are you open or shy - will you try to make conversation or ask for help even if is getting dark, you are alone and don't speak the language?
I mean... there are so many factors.
Some people feel unsafe in the safest parts of Europe, others can venture into the Amazon jungle or hike in Pakistan and feel like at home.
You see how hard is to judge that?
Since this is the travel forum this is related to travel right? Not "when I lived here we had this hurricane....".
Also not sure why people are focusing on crime so much. Does anyone do anything more dangerous than walk in unsafe neighborhoods?
Me, in relation to travel:
Crossing from Bali to Gili Islands in Indonesia, essentially a 40 or 50 mile stretch of the South China Sea, on a local fisherman's 10 foot Jukong (a sort of outrigger/canoe) with a 4HP motor engine. No emergency gear whatever, no life preservers, no navigation equipment, no radio, no life raft. Fisherman was bailing out craft every few minutes with a cut away milk jug. It was both exhilarating and scary as hell, took us 5 hours.
I have to think about other occurances -animal attacks, war zones, scary roads and drivers....
Ventured into a bad part of Paris, while on vacation. Got out quickly!
Bad parts of Los Angeles:: Watts, South Central LA, East LA, East Hollywood
Bad parts of the Bay Area:: West Oakland, East Palo Alto, Hunter’s Point, Visitacion Valley, San Jose (Alum Rock)
Not to derail, but this is such a subjective question.
An adrenaline rush is, physiologically, pretty objective -- the more so if it messes your pants. Every traveler stumbles into them unexpectedly when taking normal precautions. Seems like a pretty fair question to me.
In most scary travel situations, it is unanticipated humans that are the variable, but being a bit acrophobic, I wasn't very comfortable with Victoria falls with no guard rails.
I have been in a lot of places I shouldn't have been but never really felt unsafe.
Except the time I was driving through the panhandle of Oklahoma and had to stop for gas. Can't remember the name of the little town. As soon as I was close to town I had a pickup get right behind me. When I stopped at the only gas station the pickup parked across the street and the 2 people in it just stared at me. When I went inside to pay for the gas everyone in the station just stared at me. Then when I left the pickup followed me till I was just out of town. It was crazy and happened in the middle of the day.
In high school I was in San Jose, Costa Rica and took a wrong turn to a neighborhood that was seedy. Mostly prostitutes. May not have been extremely dangerous but nerve wracking for a high school kid.
In Morocco I remember really minding my p's and q's. Not sure how dangerous it was but I was careful what I did and said.
Coming out of Comerica Park in Detroit a few years ago late at night was very sketchy.
The only time I have felt really unsafe, ironically, was when I was walking home from filing a police report in Paris after my hotel room had been broken into. A man was clearly following me and it was late enough that many places were closed but it was still somewhat light out.
I had another time when I was driving and some gun store in a more rural town was testing gun sights out by pointing them out the road/gas station that was not particularly my favorite either. I elected not to stop there if I had to get gas ever again.
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