The Unsafe World

I never really viewed the world as unsafe. Yes, it was a little awkward when my internship boss in Belgium kept on telling me horror stories about how girls were kidnapped and sold as sex slaves, or how tourists in Greece got threatened with a knife by thieves, yet I went along alone with my backpacking trip across Europe. The only time I really felt vulnerable was when my camera got stolen out of my backpack in Barcelona while on the metro. And the time when I was semi-tricked about the train ticket on my overnight train from Budapest to Prague. But I handled the situation pretty well, even when the cashier lady almost short changed me at the Baths. I never felt threatened when weird old men approached me. And maybe it was smart of me not to have bungee jumped out of a moving cable car in Sigulda, Lativa. But being in more than 10 countries alone within the span of 5 weeks, that accounts for not much.

My next trip I wanted to backpack Southeast Asia. I wanted to do this in January, after my semester in Beijing. It was cancelled first when I decided to apply for a teaching volunteer position in Koh Chang, then when I decided to go back to the US instead of Japan. One guy I met while staying in a youth hostel in Beijing told me how this one girl in Thailand was on the cellphone talking out at the beach at night was murdered by a local fisherman. Lesson to be learned there: don't go out on the beaches alone.

Then today I read about how a peacecorp volunteer was killed in the Philippines when she went hiking on her own. Being that I know a few peacecorp volunteers out there in the world, that idea sort of sent a chill down my spine. Especially since I have gone so many places on my own without even a second thought...wandered the streets of China where I heard someone was killed in the bathroom stalls and had their organs taken out of them to be sold on the black market.

So two things came to my mind- the personal safety which my parents always rant about when I talk about going to dangerous places. And the idea of being alone- of there lackof.

I mean it's always nice to have someone there to go with you, but it is also impossible to find a compatible travel partner without giving up too much of your personal freedom.

So that means, am I finally coming to my senses that it really is a dangerous world out there? I really don't know how to take it. I don't want to say my personal travelling days are over, and it's such a hassle to travel with others or find the perfect travel buddy. I never thought how the guy in the hostel next door may be a thief or a murderer (you can tell I haven't watched the movie Hostel yet). I guess it's that feeling of helplessness during the moment of danger. Like a deer being caught in the headlights...I don't want to feel that way when and if that ever happens to me.