Coming seriously unstuck

I'm going abroad again, a few years since I've been in Europe, although I've been further afield. In the capital city I'm going to I probably won't have time to participate, though when I'm there I may make time.

It reminds me of the one time in many years of going off the tourist trail when I came seriously unstuck, which was in Europe. In my experience the punting "risk" in most countries is very low and far lower than many non punters would think. Manila, Rio, Bangkok, Bombay, wherever... No one involved, or at least very, very few, want trouble. Be reasonably sensible and respectful and there generally are very few if any problems.

But not for me in Budapest. I went there when it was being called the Bangkok of Eastern Europe. The wet and grey day I arrived it was more like the fucking Barnsley of Eastern Europe, or at least the so called "red light district" was. There were a few bars here and there and not a female to be seen.

I went into one big, almost empty, scruffy looking bar in the late afternoon. One way or another, after a few minutes I got chatting to three birds who were there and who had good English. I thought they were probably hookers, and they looked good. Budapest was looking better.

That was until I went to the toilet, in fine form. I came back, started chatting again, had a slog of booze, and that's all I remember. Having your drink spiked doesn't make you feel odd, or dizzy, at least it didn't for me. There's no advance warning of something not being right. The lights just went out. It's virtually a complete blank. I did have vague flashes of being somewhere and people laughing at me, one guy in particular, not pleasantly, but that's all. God knows where I ended up.

I came round lying face down on the floor of my room in the very large hostel/hotel type place I was staying in sometime after midnight. As my senses slowly returned I suddenly remembered my moneybelt, and then I woke up very rapidly. It was gone, along with everything in it. The bastards had taken the lot. They could have left my air ticket and my passport out of some kind of decency but there was nothing. At reception I was told I'd been half carried in by two guys who said they were friends and they took me to the room. The hostel name was on a card I had with me. I suppose they could have been worse and just dumped me in the street. But I still don't think of them very kindly.

So with nothing but the clothes I had brought I had to start putting everything back together again. Hugely important, I'd written down the Barclaycard emergency number in the UK and they were brilliant. Within a few hours a courier arrived with £200. They kept me in money and I stayed the full 10 days as planned. But a lot of paperwork needed to be filled in for a new passport and so on, though I still managed to do some punting. I had no thought of going to the police. It was just bad luck.

So it's Europe again, with no repeat of that.

But that's the one and only time I've come seriously unstuck in maybe 1,500 encounters over the years, which has to be a very acceptable ratio. Everywhere else, apart from one or two minor hassles, the other 1,499 have pretty much been fine.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/04/2023 17:43 by Nesslad.

The only other time I got into difficulty that was on the serious side actually was in Bombay, and it is the only other time. I was staying in the tourist area, Colaba I think it's called. There is no "red light area" there, but 10 steps out of your hotel you'll be approached by a young guy, usually young, asking if you want a lady. They're everywhere, with no problem.

But I had the name of the main red light area stuck in my head and one night I got in a taxi and told the driver to take me there. Why not? He dropped me in a street lined on both sides with curtains for as far as the eye could see. There were women standing or sitting in front of them. These were wall to wall mini knocking shops, hundreds of them.

After a brief wander and under some scrutiny I went behind one of the curtains and quickly found myself in a small, filthy room with a filthy hard bed and nothing else. The Indian bird was OK but the surroundings were dire, too much. I was only half a dozen steps from the road, and gestured that this wasn't for me and I was going. Or so I thought. Quick as a flash she grabbed my money belt and tore it from my waist. I grabbed on to one of the two cords but within seconds half a dozen others piled in and I found myself in a hopelessly losing tug of war. They pushed me and pulled, the cord inch by inch slipped through my fingers and then it was gone. The group rapidly dispersed and that was that. Everything but my passport had vanished.

This disaster was so sudden and so swift that it left me in a daze, almost of disbelief. I gave up. I went along to a place selling booze from a street frontage, and with the few rupees I had left bought a bottle of the local hooch, went back to the mini brothel, sat down against a wall of this shack, asked for a glass, which I got, and proceeded to get drunk. Some situations, what else can you do. I offered the women a drink, and drank some more. I had no plan other than to quietly get blitzed.

After maybe an hour or so a woman appeared and handed me back the moneybelt. I was almost too pissed to feel relieved, though I must have been relieved. The rupees and dollars were gone, maybe £70 in total, but everything else was still in it, including travellers cheques and credit cards. This was the kindest act of robbery ever committed. After a few more slogs of booze I drunkenly hugged every female in sight and thanked them for robbing me not too much and with decency. Then I got a taxi back to the hotel. It was only when I sobered up I felt the real surge of relief of how lucky I'd been.

Of course my naive and foolish mistake was going there in the first place. This was a red light area for Indians only, guys wanting 10 minutes for 50 pence. You live and learn. But I think of these Indian women with genuine respect and almost affection, unlike the thoroughly nasty fuckers in Budapest. I got off lightly, and they were more than welcome to the little money they got. I now have no other reports of misfortune to relate.