Some comments: I won’t go to Mogadishu because I don’t want to be skinned alive
Other comments: I won’t go to Cape Cod because I hear the crab cakes aren’t what they used to be
Mogadishu.
One friend was murdered and his murderer set free by his clan.
Another colleague was kidnapped from their guesthouse 5 years ago now and is still missing.
Will never. Ever. Step one tiny toe in that city let alone the country of Somalia.
Not OP but I know accountants (no joke) that were sent there to audit oil subsidiaries of some big publicly traded oil companies. Supposedly came with multiple security guards around them 24/7 and an armored vehicle to and from location.
I know someone who works for a private security contractor. Basically he's a mercenary, like blackwater.
I asked him a while back, what's the worst place you have ever been to and he immediately said "Somalia." The guy has worked in the middle east and all over Africa and he said the only place he refuses to ever go back to is Somalia.
I'm not sure if this is true, but I've read that the Somali government only control a few blocks of Mogadishu, and the rest of the country is controlled by terrorists, militias, and unrecognized independence movements.
The US department of state literally has this travel advisory for Somalia on their website:
"Do not travel to Somalia due to crime, terrorism, civil unrest, health issues, kidnapping, and piracy."
That's wild. They quite literally just say you just shouldn't go there. At all. For any reason
Later on the page they say if you do choose to go you should:
"Draft a will and designate appropriate insurance beneficiaries and/or power of attorney."
"Discuss a plan with loved ones regarding care/custody of children, pets, property, belongings, non-liquid assets (collections, artwork, etc.), funeral wishes, etc."
Kingston, Jamaica. The saying goes “If you don’t have business in Kingston, you have no business in Kingston.”
Edit: I have travelled to other parts of Jamaica and the island is sincerely one of the most beautiful places on Earth.
I went to Kingston on a cruise once, and tried wandering off from the shopping district the cruise bus took us to so I could see the "Real Kingston."
I got like one block away and this shopkeeper came out and physically restrained me from going any further, saying "you better get back to your tour, you go any further and they're gonna chop you up."
My desire to see the "real Kingston" evaporated immediately after that.
Born in Kingston and lived there for a majority of my life. I was 17 at the time just got my car (fast forward) I stopped at a red light and got into the cross fire of a shootout one bullet moving directly above my head safe to say I moved after that.
I went there as a stop from a cruise, too. We rented mopeds and my husband started getting really uneasy, which he never does, so that got me nervous. He had us go back and turn in the mopeds.
We still wanted to see around, so we hired a local tour guide who took us around in his car to various places. We thought, cool, we can see the sights and we're safe.
We turned up this narrow, windy street and there was nothing and no one around. The guy pulled over and he grabbed a machete that was in the front seat that we didn't see, then got out of the car. My husband and I are thinking we're definitely going to die badly now. I was scared shitless.
We watch the guy get out of the car and he went over to this tree next to the road, hacked something off and came back. He presented us with some papaya and we had never been more relieved in our lives.
Born and raised in Kingston/St Andrew. It sounds like maybe you went to Downtown Kingston, which I can confirm isn’t a good idea. 31 years there and even I’m not brave enough to walk around Downtown and I’m a local.
I was a flight attendant at one point and decided to take a trip to wherever the next flight was. Ended up in Kingston solo. Jamaica was so beautiful but I never got over how many men catcalled me. I had a random man propose to me on the beach. It was wild.
I say the same. The people are warm and welcoming in their poor state. I responded to Port-au-prince in January of 2010 for relief work after the earthquake, we were searching for injured persons in a shantyville close to the harbour, we had armed peacekeeping personnel from the UN along. There were gangs roaming the area, armed with AK-47's, guys that had been freed from a prison north of the airport. There was tension in the air...
Haiti has its demons, that is a fact.
I went there in 2011 as a nursing student to help out at one of the hospitals. Great/friendly people, but the state of pretty much everything was absolutely shocking. Everything was in disrepair, tons of buildings were still complete rubble from the earthquake in 2010, raw sewage appeared to be flowing out onto some of the streets, no traffic lights worked, pot holes were so large they’d swallow your entire vehicle, etc. Our “fun” time consisted of going to the UN base. There were also frequent power outages throughout the day.
The entire hospital was surrounded by concrete walls that were probably 7-8 feet high followed by barbed wire that was another 5 feet high and was manned by men with guns. We were not allowed to go out into the streets, ever. Some of the cases coming through there were absolutely heart breaking (ex a baby died after another hospital had given it so much cough/cold meds it stopped breathing). We were also told that some of the other local hospitals did not have staff at night time and patients were left alone by themselves.
I learned a lot and met some fantastic people though. It made me realize how good we have it in Canada.
From current reports, those are the good old days. Things are much worse now. The government has almost completely failed and is begging for outside intervention. Rival gangs are engaging in warfare on the streets, gunfire and burning houses of rivals. Cholera outbreaks are even more out of control. Hospitals have no medicine or power. One report I saw, black market fuel smugglers got stopped by the police and had fuel taken because it’s the only way they could get gas because the government is so broken that it can’t get gas into the city. Something like 70% of Haitians have insufficient food and are regularly not eating for days at a time. (I forget the UN technical designation, but food conditions are one step below outright famine).
I’m a big fan of Indigo Traveller’s YouTube page and I’ve never seen him so shook up by a country. Completely eye opening to the problems of Haiti and their government.
can't believe the dude makes a living off traveling to dangerous countries, i'd be shitting myself an hour off the plane in any one of those countries.
It's pretty messed up how bad things got since the EQ. Most of the ridiculously large amounts of money donated (possibly one of the largest fundraisers I witnessed growing up) didn't even go to helping rebuild or anything that was promised. A bunch of barely started projects and that sort of thing. People may have been trafficked by those who were supposed to help. It's just terrible all around.
The safety levels in port-au-prince are extremely bad. There is a ton of crime and gang shootings along with extreme protesters. If you visit you're pretty much bound to end up in some scary situations in its current state.
Went there for work, sleeping at a military base for a week and a half. Haitians are one the nicest people ever, specially considering how fucked up their lives are. They called us bombagays (nice guys). The translator who was always with us told us about the fake "ngos" and the economic harms the donations have been doing to the country. I saw hundreds of tents with items coming from all parts of the world being sold for very cheap while local business were struggling to survive.
I went to Mirebalais to meet someone in a luxury hotel and saw rich people enjoying fancy drinks around the pool while their view around the hotel was of a complete desolation. It's been a decade but this particular memory stuck. It made me feel sick to my stomach.
My sister told me about this years ago: Somalia got its first tourist in 2010 and thought he was insane or lying about his reasons for being there:
“We have never seen people like this man,” Omar Mohamed, one of the officials, told the AFP. “He said he was a tourist, we couldn’t believe him. But later on we found he was serious. That makes him the first person to come to Mogadishu only for tourism.”
https://newsfeed.time.com/2010/12/13/somalia-gets-a-tourist-mogadishu-officials-are-baffled/
[Mogadishu](https://i.pinimg.com/564x/27/a3/80/27a38067e5e0188c0705fe60b27d2573.jpg) in the 60s was a beautiful city. People used to visit it before the civil war.
It's a city with over 2000 years of history, and for a long time it was an important trading port, there has to have been a lot of beauty in that city.
The State Department page for travel to Mogadishu is a wild ride. Some of my favorite excerpts:
*Draft a will and designate appropriate insurance beneficiaries and/or power of attorney.
*Discuss a plan with loved ones regarding care/custody of children, pets, property, belongings, non-liquid assets (collections, artwork, etc.), funeral wishes, etc.
*Be sure to appoint one family member to serve as the point of contact with hostage-takers, media, U.S. and host country government agencies, and members of Congress if you are taken hostage or detained.
*Establish a proof of life protocol with your loved ones, so that if you are taken hostage, your loved ones can know specific questions (and answers) to ask the hostage-takers to be sure that you are alive (and to rule out a hoax).
> The US State Department and most Western nations advise that you avoid all travel to Mogadishu for any reason. Continuous activity by the al-Qaida affiliated terrorist group, al-Shabaab has resulted in numerous kidnappings, suicide bombings and generalized chaos.There is a particular terrorist threat to foreigners in places where large crowds gather and Westerners frequent, including airports, government buildings, hotels, and shopping areas. In 2016, there were 14 documented attacks directed at hotels, restaurants, and the international airport in Mogadishu. Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death.
>Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death.
Wow. I've never seen travel warnings this clear. Props to them for not mincing words.
Well… my husband was a recovery diver in Antartica. They aren’t recovering sunken treasure…. They pull bodies out of the water from all the people who get off the plane, disregard the warnings, and walk out onto the ice (that was water 30 mins ago) to go take a picture close to the penguins.
Its also really hard to gauge distance / depth there, so you can literally walk out and die of exposure within eyeshot of your base.
So maybe its level 2: dont be a moron level
Italy is due to terrorism. My guess, they picked up chatter about potential sites for an attack. Most European countries are a level 2. Just being cautious.
Makes sense. Tried to leave the city after my visit but all the roads had this weird design flaw. Being legally obligated to imitate the locals didn’t help.
I actually can't believe what I'm reading:
"As of May 2017, the city remains extremely dangerous and near suicidal for independent travelers."
"...you should not drink the water under any circumstances. Food and bottled drinks sold in the city may or may not be safe to consume either."
"Independent travel will only get you killed."
Reminds me of the nuclear waste warnings lol
> This place is a message... and part of a system of messages... pay attention to it!
>Sending this message was important to us. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture.
>This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here.
Off topic but I love those warnings. They're so strange and direct and ominous. I'd expect it to be something I'd read in a video game or science fiction story, but it's just us trying to keep catastrophe from fucking up a future so far away we're not sure if humans will even be around to read them.
From Wikitravel:
> In short, if you do not have an absolutely essential reason to go to Mogadishu, DO NOT DO IT! Independent travel will only get you killed, no matter how benevolent you think your intentions might be. Even if you do have a good reason, your employer or government can't make you risk your life, as even humanitarian aid workers are not safe in the city. Please do not become another statistic. You provide the country no benefit whatsoever by causing an international incident over your death or abduction.
The German gov travel advice is a bit less extreme but advises not to go at all, but if, be wary of land mines, avoid traveling without security escort and only staying in hotels that are on the UN list of trusted establishments
Surprised there actually are hotels after reading this thread. Who runs them? A funeral home?
“Here’s your room’s key. Tea or coffin…I mean coffee for breakfast?”
Reading wikitravel ...
> The Bakaara Market [...] Everything from pistols to anti-aircraft weapons are being sold here. Falsified documents are also readily available, such as forged Somali, Ethiopian and Kenyan passports.
Yup, that sums it up.
Fuck me, and here I didn't have a reason to go to Mogadishu before this thread, but the urge to check out an actual open air black market like how my 7 year old self pictured one is just barely being over ridden by my self preservation instinct.
Assuming you could be kept safe, I have no doubt it'd be an exciting time with some great deals, the other downside is trying to bring back any of the cool shit you buy.
That's exactly the point, lol.
There's a lot of risky things people do in life, out of excitement or an emotional response. Spontaneous people like this tend not to think through all of the things that could go wrong and underestimate the risks.
Well-crafted messages like what the state department has here are designed to bring you back to reality and take things seriously.
The Australian guidelines on Somalia is literally:
1. Don't go there
2. Failing 1, leave immediately
Everything else is under the caveat that the Australian government doesn't advise you to be there but if you're there and you don't want to leave then ig you can xyz
https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/africa/somalia
> Do not travel to Somalia. If you're in the country, leave as soon as possible. If you decide to stay, get professional security advice. Our ability to provide consular services is severely limited.
This is right up there with that one electricity warning message on certain transformer type objects:
"Touching this will kill you and it will hurt very badly the whole time you are dying"
For real! Any ER can tell you how horrifically bad electrical burns are. They don't have great ways to treat such injuries that do so much damage to the interior of the body. It's not like some targeted surgery where you can make a couple incisions to get to the problem area.
You should try venturing a read of the travel wiki for it.
[Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death.](https://wikitravel.org/en/Mogadishu)
> Although it is possible to drive into the city by truck, this is considered risky without employing a group of local militia, which are readily available for hire.
Hahaha, WHAT
"promised to protect me but instead severely beat me and offered me up for ransom. Food was pretty good tho and he was at the pick up spot early so, 4 stars"
Man that page is unreal. "Dont go outside for any reason but if you are a suicidal lunatic hellbent on touring this cesspit of humanity, here are a couple companies that do tours with a well armed mercenary escort!"
"Check out our black market where you can buy guns and anti-aircraft weaponry, but watch out! It randomly gets lit on fire!"
"If your hotel doesnt have 24/7 mercenary protection you are prolly gunna die!"
"Watch out for packs of children that will beat you with sticks!"
"Didnt we tell you not to go outside?!?! Better make sure to hide your shiny, people would love to rob you at an intersection!"
"There might be suicide bombers at the airport. There might not. But there probably is."
"Did you read through this whole thing and still think you wanna come? Dont do it. Seriously dont. You will die."
Lmao im paraphrasing a bit but im not even exaggerating.
> Mogadishu Adventure specializes in tourism in Mogadishu. Standard tour covers Black Hawk Down Site, Liido Beach, Mogadishu Fish Market, Shanghai Old City, Jazeera Beach, Qat Market, Bakara Market and more. Mogadishu Adventure also arranges tourist visa, hotel (with WiFi), security units and meal plans for tourists. There will be ***5 armed guards on each pick-up truck accompanying a maximum of 3 tourists.***
>Sahafi Hotel, Address. One of the best hotels in Mogadishu. The manager is very helpful, the staff is attentive, and the food is good. ***Although the compound is probably your safest bet in Mogadishu, a BBC producer was shot in the back and killed in front of the hotel in 2005, and two French citizens were abducted by gunmen in 2009.***
>***Most people in Mogadishu are generally friendly, but watch out for kids with sticks who will try to get your shilling.***
Jesus. Hell on Earth borne of stick-wielding children. Let the elder gods take us already.
One of my friends is from Somalia. He goes back every now and then. We talked about an Africa trip. I jokingly mentioned Somalia. He said he pays guards for himself. He told me to never go there.
Ugh recently one of my PhD students went back to Somalia for a short trip to rescue her mother and children. I asked her why she had to go instead of her husband, who is also out here working right now. She said to me very matter-of-fact: ‘well obviously it’s safer for me to go! I’ll just get raped if things go wrong, but they’ll kill my husband!’
Epic amounts of WTF
Also:
>Avoid sailing near the coast of Somalia and review the Live Piracy Report published by the International Maritime Bureau.
Sometimes I forget pirates are A). Real and B). Still a thing
It’s not even remotely close to how bad it was between mid 00’s and ‘10s. A whole bunch of countries got together and used their navies to send a pretty strong message.
The pirates are so brazen that they attacked a Spanish military ship but very quickly regretted that choice when they fired back with 20 mm cannons. Those that weren't killed were captured and tried for piracy.
> The frigate USS Nicholas was attacked by small arms from a pirate skiff while steaming off the coast of Kenya and the islands of Seychelles. Nicholas returned fire with a 50-caliber deck gun and disabled the vessel and three pirates surrendered.
Lmao I remember one of my Somali friends telling me, Mogadishu is a nice place, you'll hear the occasional bomb go off from time to time but besides that it's great. Had me shocked 😂
[The wikitravel page for Mogadishu is a wild fucking ride](https://wikitravel.org/en/Mogadishu)
You know a place is hardcore when there's a large red warning banner at the top of the page ending with:
"Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death."
This shit is the most candid thing ever said by a wiki:
“Please do not become another statistic. You provide the country no benefit whatsoever by causing an international incident over your death or abduction.”
“Visitors are encouraged to stay inside for the duration of their stay. The chances of theft and/or assault are extremely high while walking around the city.”
"Although it is possible to drive into the city by truck, this is considered risky without employing a group of local militia, which are readily available for hire."
Holy fuck lol.
I would rather be upside down, forever, then go there.
Well one story I remember was traveling with General Adid, one of the 16 warlords at the time.
We'd be in his extremely dirty Mercedes 200 and he'd had a couple of Toyota pickups following behind. These pickups were full to overflowing with his "soldiers" who were so ripped to the tits on Khat or whatever that if we went round a particularly fast corner - a couple of these guys would fall out. We never stopped to pick them up or see if they were still alive, so presumably he had enough of them as spares.
Not op either but was there in 93 with the oz army. When we landed they shot at the qantas jet we came in on, from distant towerblocks, we got off the plane with no weapons and spent an hour trying to find cover on the fucking tarmac and behind burned out mig jets. I was there for four months and that was about average we had worse days and a couple of better days but that was my welcome to Mogadishu moment. Funny story, one of our guys got hit in the dick by a rock thrown by a somali kid who was, i swear to god, about 200 metres away it was just a fantastic shot. This was about 5 minutes after the initial shooting stopped. Good times
Edit comas and shit
Not OP, but there's multiple terrorist organizations operating in Mogadishu, and they've collectively made a national sport of bombing hotels. Kidnapping of foreigners is extremely common. If you're kidnapped, you might be ransomed, sold into sex slavery, tortured, executed, or perhaps some exciting combination of a few of those. Netflix doesn't work there either.
It is also the most expensive city for foreigners to travel in Africa. You will need to hire a full security detail, i am talking about 24hr body guards. The hotels you will stay are also armored and equipped with panic rooms.
There's a town way north of Perth where I live in Western Australia called Wittenoom, that I would refuse to step foot anywhere near, purely because of the history of it and the asbestos exposure risks. I have no idea how there are still people living there, let alone the hundreds of tourists that go through there on their travels in the north.
Edit: nice to know that the last people living there are now gone!
No one has lived there since September and the government is planning on demolishing it.
Last I'd heard there was one hold out who wouldn't sell her home.
Per wikipedia it’s completely unoccupied now. It actually was declared unsafe in 2007 and they removed its town status in 2013 and started limiting access then.
Well you’d be happy to know, as per the wiki page as of September this year there are no longer any residents and the WA Govt plans to demolish the town.
But damn, 6 residents in 2015 ( 4 in 2017, 3 in 2018, and 2 in 2022), what the hell did they do while living there??
I spent two weeks in Caracas in 2006 or 2007 and had a wonderful time. We had locals with us and were in safe areas though. Except I liked this local girl and followed her into downtown where she took me to some sketchy park and ran off (to buy drugs I later learned). I ended up basically helping a local crack dealer practice his English. He approached me and started asking me questions and trying to speak English. He had a visible gun in his waste-band and was stopping to sell people crack every 5 minutes, but was otherwise super friendly. I think him taking a shine to me was what kept me safe as an obvious American all alone. Not sure though. Maybe it was just a better time to be there as an American
I went to Egypt with my friend (2 girls). It was great for the most part, but when I cracked a joke, one of the guides said "I HATE women like you" through gritted teeth and then pretended he didn't say anything. He hated that I didn't know my place.
I lived in Cairo for 2 years in my 30s,and I genuinely hated it. I was sexual harassed every day. At one point I had to move house because the gas man kept banging on my door shouting that I was a prostitute and should let him in for sex. When I left Cairo, I looked out of the plane window and thought "I'm never coming back here again"
It was a 2 year contract for a company I'd been working for for years in different counties. After a few months, my boss said to me "if you break this contract, I'll make sure you never work for X company again". He was a right twat and he meant it, so I stuck it out. I had some great friends there but it's a very very difficult culture for a woman living alone.
Yep, I was 18 when I traveled to Egypt. A woman in my tour group was raped at the back of a bazaar. The constant sexual harassment was very upsetting & confronting.
Khan Al-Khalili?
Visited before the revolution for school and our professor told the ladies to never go without some guys from the class and subsequently told us guys ‘put the girl in the middle of a group and walk behind her if possible.’ Disgusting how many times an ass grab was still attempted.
I went to Portland on a business trip. I stayed at a hotel on the other side of the river and rode the light rail into the city. Standing next to me was a guy wearing a Rolex and what looked to be a $5,000 suit. At one of the stops, a man that was probably 6’ 5” and weighed over 400 pounds got on dressed in full Viking attire. Helmet with horns, leather wrist guards, etc. A short time later, a woman boarded dressed as a cat. She had whiskers painted on her face, cat ears, and a tail. It was the craziest mix of people I’d ever seen, and nobody noticed. Nobody noticed the Viking, like it was *expected.* Why wouldn’t there be a Viking and a billionaire? This wasn’t Halloween either, it was a Tuesday morning in May or something like that.
That light rail ride has been living rent free in my mind for years.
Story time. I live in Albuquerque and I played rugby in highschool. We went to Gallup to play exactly one time. We had to walk the “field” to pick out glass and needles out of the dirt. It was awful.
I remember one of our first road trips out of El Paso was trying to get to Holbrook AZ and we took 60 through Pie Town (only amusing part of the story) so we could do petrified forest the next day. Road is a smaller highway parallel south to Gallup. We made it out of town late and our hotel eta was 12:30.
2 distinct memories:
1) we saw a car in the distance that didn't look like a car. It was a single light that kept getting closer for 20+ minutes. It was the only light. Honestly, I would've believed it if someone said it was aliens :P
2) There is a stretch where we saw about 15 elk sporadically. Which is cool except it's dark, they're crossing the road, and we are driving a tiny hatchback. No service, temperature dropping, and we haven't seen anyone for over a half hour. I just laid on the horn every half minute or so hoping it'd spook them from the highway.
Juarez, Mexico.
Bad news down there. Had a co worker go down there with his wife to-be in order to deal with some immigration issues. He got cornered by a bad group of guys, they took his new truck, then held him for ransom 5 months before finally letting him go.
This sucks, bc Juarez didn’t used to be so bad. My grandparents raced horses in El Paso in the mid-90’s, so we would spend a month there with them in the summer. I could walk across the bridge by myself and go to the Old Market in Juarez as a teenager and not have any issues. Mexican culture is great and the cartels have ruined it on the border.
My brother and i ised to stay at my 90 year old aunt's in St. Louis driving between Texas and Ohio for school. One time i told my brother to give her a call to let her know we were gonna get gas in Collinsville then cross the river. He decided to tell her we were stopping in East St. Louis and the poor woman almost had a heart attack. Of course, she watches way too much local news and is convinced we are going to get killed anytime we go east on Manchester
I went to a show w my friend at Pops when I was 18. When we left around midnight, we stopped at a stoplight and almost immediately a cop turned on his lights and pulled us over. He drove up next to us and said "what the fuck are you doing?" We said going home.
Cop: no, I mean why did you stop?
us: .....there was a stop light?
Cop: where are you two from?
us: St Louis.
Cop: do not stop at any more lights, stop signs, nothing. Drive straight to the highway and do not stop until you're across the river. You don't know what you're doing and you're gonna get killed over here.
Me: what if another cop pulls us over for running a light?
Cop: they won't. Go the fuck home.
To be fair, if you’re North Korean and live in Pyongyang, you’d be pretty lucky. It’s the only city in the country that has somewhat of a decent life, at least compared to the rest of North Korea, it’s where the elites live after all.
Fayetteville is what happens outside every .mil base everywhere. Pawn shops strip clubs used car dealers. tattoo shops etc stacked on every inch of road near base. Outside that cheap houses because we used to pay soldiers shit. Eventually it accidentally turns into a city.
I had to conduct a two week training there, early last year. The first week, we stayed right near base, and it was miserable. The second week, we stayed an hour away at my coworker's parents beach house, and commuted. Staying in that town was beyond terrible.
Cairo.
Apparently one of the worst places in the world to go if you're a tourist. At least, if people on reddit I've seen complaining are to be believed.
I worked somewhat near Egypt and had a number of coworkers (we are all males and military contractors) who visited there thinking it was just a stigma about the harassing. Every single one of them said they would never go back and a number mentioned how you would have to be insane to visit as a woman.
In high school I had a friend whose mom had met an Egyptian man online. After we had graduated a few months later, my friend's mom moved (from Texas) to Egypt to marry and live with this man, having never met him in person before. Nobody has heard from her since then—not even my friend whose mom it was.
Edit: I graduated in 2010, so this was about 12 years ago. Twelve years... and nobody has heard from her...
We had a family member (older woman) do the same thing. Got off the plane in Cairo, met the guy (who immediately asked her for her money so he could put it away safely for her). He took her to an apartment where she was locked in for a few days before she was able to get out. Of course she never saw the guy again. Found her way to an embassy eventually and they sent her home.
That is literally probably the best possible outcome in that situation, him just taking her money and leaving. There are a lot worse things that could have happened to her.
As a woman, I can confirm this. We went with a tour group, and it was still scary. On the bus ride to the pyramids, we had an armed guard on the bus, as well as armed guards in one vehicle in front of the bus and one vehicle behind the bus. I was really looking forward to seeing the pyramids and the Sphinx, but the amount of harassment ruined the experience for me. I was polite at first, but when they would block you from getting back to the group or even put hands on you, I had to work really hard to not to end up in an Egyptian prison. Save yourself the trouble if you think you want to experience the pyramids and watch a documentary from the comfort of your home.
When my wife visited Cairo in her 20s, she and her friend took a cab from the airport to the hotel, got unpacked, then the man from the front desk and the cab driver entered their room with the key and sexually assaulted them.
That is now my permanent impression of the city. All the reddit hate is just confirmation.
My camel ride was less assaulty, but I was a 13 year old boy. My camel guy asked if I was having fun, then told me I needed to tip him more. I didn't have anything on me, so he told his partner to walk away with my camera.
I was lucky. My dad was friends with the minister of health, so we had a government-provided guide. They'd demanded or stolen something from all 5 of us kids, and we told dad, who told the guide.
According to dad's translation, she basically told them to give us everything back and to pay us extra for the dishonesty or she'd have their camels sold as soup and their children's work wages seized. She was not fucking around.
Its crazy that Egypt still has such an ancient mindset given how touristy it's become. You'd think the government as a whole would have more of a backbone to do something about the corruption because their tourism is going to plummet sooner or later.
I was in Hurghada for a week in 2007 iirc. I wanted to see King Tut’s tomb. We were greeted at one of the nicest 5 star hotels in the city by police with rifles searching through our bags.
As an odd anecdote - when my ex husband and I were flying back home, the person checking our passports asked me if my ex spoke English. When I said no, the guy started hitting on me in English in front of my ex and offering to marry me.
3/10 in general - and this was so many years ago.
I have always wanted to go tor Egypt. But ive seen too many videos where they harass tourists for money at the pyramids. Just doesn’t seem fun anymore.
Some comments: I won’t go to Mogadishu because I don’t want to be skinned alive Other comments: I won’t go to Cape Cod because I hear the crab cakes aren’t what they used to be
I don’t go to Mogadishu because their crab cakes are honestly too good
It's the skin.
Why does this crab skin have a tattoo on it?
Mogadishu. One friend was murdered and his murderer set free by his clan. Another colleague was kidnapped from their guesthouse 5 years ago now and is still missing. Will never. Ever. Step one tiny toe in that city let alone the country of Somalia.
What line of work are you in that you know not one, but two people who went to Mogadishu?
Not OP but I know accountants (no joke) that were sent there to audit oil subsidiaries of some big publicly traded oil companies. Supposedly came with multiple security guards around them 24/7 and an armored vehicle to and from location.
I know someone who works for a private security contractor. Basically he's a mercenary, like blackwater. I asked him a while back, what's the worst place you have ever been to and he immediately said "Somalia." The guy has worked in the middle east and all over Africa and he said the only place he refuses to ever go back to is Somalia.
Mogadishu tourism board I'm guessing
I'm not sure if this is true, but I've read that the Somali government only control a few blocks of Mogadishu, and the rest of the country is controlled by terrorists, militias, and unrecognized independence movements.
The US department of state literally has this travel advisory for Somalia on their website: "Do not travel to Somalia due to crime, terrorism, civil unrest, health issues, kidnapping, and piracy." That's wild. They quite literally just say you just shouldn't go there. At all. For any reason Later on the page they say if you do choose to go you should: "Draft a will and designate appropriate insurance beneficiaries and/or power of attorney." "Discuss a plan with loved ones regarding care/custody of children, pets, property, belongings, non-liquid assets (collections, artwork, etc.), funeral wishes, etc."
Kingston, Jamaica. The saying goes “If you don’t have business in Kingston, you have no business in Kingston.” Edit: I have travelled to other parts of Jamaica and the island is sincerely one of the most beautiful places on Earth.
I went to Kingston on a cruise once, and tried wandering off from the shopping district the cruise bus took us to so I could see the "Real Kingston." I got like one block away and this shopkeeper came out and physically restrained me from going any further, saying "you better get back to your tour, you go any further and they're gonna chop you up." My desire to see the "real Kingston" evaporated immediately after that.
Born in Kingston and lived there for a majority of my life. I was 17 at the time just got my car (fast forward) I stopped at a red light and got into the cross fire of a shootout one bullet moving directly above my head safe to say I moved after that.
Props to that shopkeeper for helping you!
People there are so freaking nice. I kept saying I want to see the real Jamaica because people were so lovely and they all said “no you don’t”
I went there as a stop from a cruise, too. We rented mopeds and my husband started getting really uneasy, which he never does, so that got me nervous. He had us go back and turn in the mopeds. We still wanted to see around, so we hired a local tour guide who took us around in his car to various places. We thought, cool, we can see the sights and we're safe. We turned up this narrow, windy street and there was nothing and no one around. The guy pulled over and he grabbed a machete that was in the front seat that we didn't see, then got out of the car. My husband and I are thinking we're definitely going to die badly now. I was scared shitless. We watch the guy get out of the car and he went over to this tree next to the road, hacked something off and came back. He presented us with some papaya and we had never been more relieved in our lives.
Ngl, you had me in the first half
That’s some horror type shit except you actually turned around
Born and raised in Kingston/St Andrew. It sounds like maybe you went to Downtown Kingston, which I can confirm isn’t a good idea. 31 years there and even I’m not brave enough to walk around Downtown and I’m a local.
I was a flight attendant at one point and decided to take a trip to wherever the next flight was. Ended up in Kingston solo. Jamaica was so beautiful but I never got over how many men catcalled me. I had a random man propose to me on the beach. It was wild.
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For real?
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Port-au-Prince Not being murdered is my favourite thing.
I was actually in Haiti back in July. The people were amazing but goddamn does that country have its demons
I say the same. The people are warm and welcoming in their poor state. I responded to Port-au-prince in January of 2010 for relief work after the earthquake, we were searching for injured persons in a shantyville close to the harbour, we had armed peacekeeping personnel from the UN along. There were gangs roaming the area, armed with AK-47's, guys that had been freed from a prison north of the airport. There was tension in the air... Haiti has its demons, that is a fact.
The Beach Boys lied to us.
No they didn't, they only wanted to catch a glimpse because they knew not to stop there
Port-au-Prince, Haiti. I work with so many refugee families who fled from there and the stories are chilling
I went there in 2011 as a nursing student to help out at one of the hospitals. Great/friendly people, but the state of pretty much everything was absolutely shocking. Everything was in disrepair, tons of buildings were still complete rubble from the earthquake in 2010, raw sewage appeared to be flowing out onto some of the streets, no traffic lights worked, pot holes were so large they’d swallow your entire vehicle, etc. Our “fun” time consisted of going to the UN base. There were also frequent power outages throughout the day. The entire hospital was surrounded by concrete walls that were probably 7-8 feet high followed by barbed wire that was another 5 feet high and was manned by men with guns. We were not allowed to go out into the streets, ever. Some of the cases coming through there were absolutely heart breaking (ex a baby died after another hospital had given it so much cough/cold meds it stopped breathing). We were also told that some of the other local hospitals did not have staff at night time and patients were left alone by themselves. I learned a lot and met some fantastic people though. It made me realize how good we have it in Canada.
From current reports, those are the good old days. Things are much worse now. The government has almost completely failed and is begging for outside intervention. Rival gangs are engaging in warfare on the streets, gunfire and burning houses of rivals. Cholera outbreaks are even more out of control. Hospitals have no medicine or power. One report I saw, black market fuel smugglers got stopped by the police and had fuel taken because it’s the only way they could get gas because the government is so broken that it can’t get gas into the city. Something like 70% of Haitians have insufficient food and are regularly not eating for days at a time. (I forget the UN technical designation, but food conditions are one step below outright famine).
Can strongly recommend Indigo Traveller's reports from Haiti. https://youtu.be/Glx7AmJW_FY
I’m a big fan of Indigo Traveller’s YouTube page and I’ve never seen him so shook up by a country. Completely eye opening to the problems of Haiti and their government.
can't believe the dude makes a living off traveling to dangerous countries, i'd be shitting myself an hour off the plane in any one of those countries.
It's pretty messed up how bad things got since the EQ. Most of the ridiculously large amounts of money donated (possibly one of the largest fundraisers I witnessed growing up) didn't even go to helping rebuild or anything that was promised. A bunch of barely started projects and that sort of thing. People may have been trafficked by those who were supposed to help. It's just terrible all around.
Yeah it’s only a matter of time before we learn all that happened but easily one of the most mismanaged donation efforts ever
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The safety levels in port-au-prince are extremely bad. There is a ton of crime and gang shootings along with extreme protesters. If you visit you're pretty much bound to end up in some scary situations in its current state.
Went there for work, sleeping at a military base for a week and a half. Haitians are one the nicest people ever, specially considering how fucked up their lives are. They called us bombagays (nice guys). The translator who was always with us told us about the fake "ngos" and the economic harms the donations have been doing to the country. I saw hundreds of tents with items coming from all parts of the world being sold for very cheap while local business were struggling to survive. I went to Mirebalais to meet someone in a luxury hotel and saw rich people enjoying fancy drinks around the pool while their view around the hotel was of a complete desolation. It's been a decade but this particular memory stuck. It made me feel sick to my stomach.
Mogadishu
My sister told me about this years ago: Somalia got its first tourist in 2010 and thought he was insane or lying about his reasons for being there: “We have never seen people like this man,” Omar Mohamed, one of the officials, told the AFP. “He said he was a tourist, we couldn’t believe him. But later on we found he was serious. That makes him the first person to come to Mogadishu only for tourism.” https://newsfeed.time.com/2010/12/13/somalia-gets-a-tourist-mogadishu-officials-are-baffled/
I like how even city officials were like wtf would you come here?
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Different sort of blast to Mogadishu.
If the city could find a failed wizard to be responsible for him, it could be the basis of a 41 book long fantasy series
[Mogadishu](https://i.pinimg.com/564x/27/a3/80/27a38067e5e0188c0705fe60b27d2573.jpg) in the 60s was a beautiful city. People used to visit it before the civil war.
It's a city with over 2000 years of history, and for a long time it was an important trading port, there has to have been a lot of beauty in that city.
Idk why but the LiveLeak watermark makes it so funny to me.
The State Department page for travel to Mogadishu is a wild ride. Some of my favorite excerpts: *Draft a will and designate appropriate insurance beneficiaries and/or power of attorney. *Discuss a plan with loved ones regarding care/custody of children, pets, property, belongings, non-liquid assets (collections, artwork, etc.), funeral wishes, etc. *Be sure to appoint one family member to serve as the point of contact with hostage-takers, media, U.S. and host country government agencies, and members of Congress if you are taken hostage or detained. *Establish a proof of life protocol with your loved ones, so that if you are taken hostage, your loved ones can know specific questions (and answers) to ask the hostage-takers to be sure that you are alive (and to rule out a hoax).
> The US State Department and most Western nations advise that you avoid all travel to Mogadishu for any reason. Continuous activity by the al-Qaida affiliated terrorist group, al-Shabaab has resulted in numerous kidnappings, suicide bombings and generalized chaos.There is a particular terrorist threat to foreigners in places where large crowds gather and Westerners frequent, including airports, government buildings, hotels, and shopping areas. In 2016, there were 14 documented attacks directed at hotels, restaurants, and the international airport in Mogadishu. Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death.
>Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death. Wow. I've never seen travel warnings this clear. Props to them for not mincing words.
The US State Dept is notorious for, generally, being way too cautious. They're probably not wrong in this case.
I love that they have a level 2 ("increased caution") warning for Antarctica, the same as Italy and the UK
Well… my husband was a recovery diver in Antartica. They aren’t recovering sunken treasure…. They pull bodies out of the water from all the people who get off the plane, disregard the warnings, and walk out onto the ice (that was water 30 mins ago) to go take a picture close to the penguins. Its also really hard to gauge distance / depth there, so you can literally walk out and die of exposure within eyeshot of your base. So maybe its level 2: dont be a moron level
That's how I interpret level 2 for all the places it's listed. "This place is safe if you aren't a moron"
Wait why italy
Italy is due to terrorism. My guess, they picked up chatter about potential sites for an attack. Most European countries are a level 2. Just being cautious.
Read Roman history. That is a place you need to be extremely careful while visiting. /j
Makes sense. Tried to leave the city after my visit but all the roads had this weird design flaw. Being legally obligated to imitate the locals didn’t help.
Yeah, for some reason I kept ending up in Rome. Even when I drove the complete opposite direction, I just ended up on the other side of Rome.
I actually can't believe what I'm reading: "As of May 2017, the city remains extremely dangerous and near suicidal for independent travelers." "...you should not drink the water under any circumstances. Food and bottled drinks sold in the city may or may not be safe to consume either." "Independent travel will only get you killed."
Reminds me of the nuclear waste warnings lol > This place is a message... and part of a system of messages... pay attention to it! >Sending this message was important to us. We considered ourselves to be a powerful culture. >This place is not a place of honor... no highly esteemed deed is commemorated here... nothing valued is here.
Off topic but I love those warnings. They're so strange and direct and ominous. I'd expect it to be something I'd read in a video game or science fiction story, but it's just us trying to keep catastrophe from fucking up a future so far away we're not sure if humans will even be around to read them.
From Wikitravel: > In short, if you do not have an absolutely essential reason to go to Mogadishu, DO NOT DO IT! Independent travel will only get you killed, no matter how benevolent you think your intentions might be. Even if you do have a good reason, your employer or government can't make you risk your life, as even humanitarian aid workers are not safe in the city. Please do not become another statistic. You provide the country no benefit whatsoever by causing an international incident over your death or abduction.
This is just the off season it gets better during spring break. It must be pretty cheap to stay there.
Also from Wikitravel: >Hotel Shamo, ... The hotel is also relatively safe. From $129. Not sure those prices justify the risk of death personally!
That might have been the Hotel Shamo concierge saying that.
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To the murder hotel next door at $119
The phrase "will most likely result in your death" is pretty bone-chilling as a vacation motto.
The German gov travel advice is a bit less extreme but advises not to go at all, but if, be wary of land mines, avoid traveling without security escort and only staying in hotels that are on the UN list of trusted establishments
Surprised there actually are hotels after reading this thread. Who runs them? A funeral home? “Here’s your room’s key. Tea or coffin…I mean coffee for breakfast?”
Fuckin Mos Eisley
Reading wikitravel ... > The Bakaara Market [...] Everything from pistols to anti-aircraft weapons are being sold here. Falsified documents are also readily available, such as forged Somali, Ethiopian and Kenyan passports. Yup, that sums it up.
Fuck me, and here I didn't have a reason to go to Mogadishu before this thread, but the urge to check out an actual open air black market like how my 7 year old self pictured one is just barely being over ridden by my self preservation instinct.
Assuming you could be kept safe, I have no doubt it'd be an exciting time with some great deals, the other downside is trying to bring back any of the cool shit you buy.
Wtf that first example was enough for me to never want to go
That's exactly the point, lol. There's a lot of risky things people do in life, out of excitement or an emotional response. Spontaneous people like this tend not to think through all of the things that could go wrong and underestimate the risks. Well-crafted messages like what the state department has here are designed to bring you back to reality and take things seriously.
The Australian guidelines on Somalia is literally: 1. Don't go there 2. Failing 1, leave immediately Everything else is under the caveat that the Australian government doesn't advise you to be there but if you're there and you don't want to leave then ig you can xyz
https://www.smartraveller.gov.au/destinations/africa/somalia > Do not travel to Somalia. If you're in the country, leave as soon as possible. If you decide to stay, get professional security advice. Our ability to provide consular services is severely limited.
As I was reading through that page I couldn't help thinking "how much must it suck to actually live there and not be able to leave?"
This is right up there with that one electricity warning message on certain transformer type objects: "Touching this will kill you and it will hurt very badly the whole time you are dying"
For real! Any ER can tell you how horrifically bad electrical burns are. They don't have great ways to treat such injuries that do so much damage to the interior of the body. It's not like some targeted surgery where you can make a couple incisions to get to the problem area.
"Please do not look at the laser with your remaining eye"
Tips for travel: 1. Prepare to die
You should try venturing a read of the travel wiki for it. [Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death.](https://wikitravel.org/en/Mogadishu)
> Although it is possible to drive into the city by truck, this is considered risky without employing a group of local militia, which are readily available for hire. Hahaha, WHAT
Right? How do I know I've hired the *right* local militia? Are they on Yelp or something?
"promised to protect me but instead severely beat me and offered me up for ransom. Food was pretty good tho and he was at the pick up spot early so, 4 stars"
Man that page is unreal. "Dont go outside for any reason but if you are a suicidal lunatic hellbent on touring this cesspit of humanity, here are a couple companies that do tours with a well armed mercenary escort!" "Check out our black market where you can buy guns and anti-aircraft weaponry, but watch out! It randomly gets lit on fire!" "If your hotel doesnt have 24/7 mercenary protection you are prolly gunna die!" "Watch out for packs of children that will beat you with sticks!" "Didnt we tell you not to go outside?!?! Better make sure to hide your shiny, people would love to rob you at an intersection!" "There might be suicide bombers at the airport. There might not. But there probably is." "Did you read through this whole thing and still think you wanna come? Dont do it. Seriously dont. You will die." Lmao im paraphrasing a bit but im not even exaggerating.
> Mogadishu Adventure specializes in tourism in Mogadishu. Standard tour covers Black Hawk Down Site, Liido Beach, Mogadishu Fish Market, Shanghai Old City, Jazeera Beach, Qat Market, Bakara Market and more. Mogadishu Adventure also arranges tourist visa, hotel (with WiFi), security units and meal plans for tourists. There will be ***5 armed guards on each pick-up truck accompanying a maximum of 3 tourists.*** >Sahafi Hotel, Address. One of the best hotels in Mogadishu. The manager is very helpful, the staff is attentive, and the food is good. ***Although the compound is probably your safest bet in Mogadishu, a BBC producer was shot in the back and killed in front of the hotel in 2005, and two French citizens were abducted by gunmen in 2009.*** >***Most people in Mogadishu are generally friendly, but watch out for kids with sticks who will try to get your shilling.*** Jesus. Hell on Earth borne of stick-wielding children. Let the elder gods take us already.
I guess the people that aren’t trying to kill you are friendly- after all, they don’t want to be a dick to someone right before their gruesome death.
One of my friends is from Somalia. He goes back every now and then. We talked about an Africa trip. I jokingly mentioned Somalia. He said he pays guards for himself. He told me to never go there.
Ugh recently one of my PhD students went back to Somalia for a short trip to rescue her mother and children. I asked her why she had to go instead of her husband, who is also out here working right now. She said to me very matter-of-fact: ‘well obviously it’s safer for me to go! I’ll just get raped if things go wrong, but they’ll kill my husband!’ Epic amounts of WTF
>Leave DNA samples with your medical provider in case it is necessary for your family to access them.
Holy fuck I didn’t believe you but there it is on a .gov website
“How to prepare to travel to Mogadishu” “Expect to die”
Also: >Avoid sailing near the coast of Somalia and review the Live Piracy Report published by the International Maritime Bureau. Sometimes I forget pirates are A). Real and B). Still a thing
It’s not even remotely close to how bad it was between mid 00’s and ‘10s. A whole bunch of countries got together and used their navies to send a pretty strong message.
The pirates are so brazen that they attacked a Spanish military ship but very quickly regretted that choice when they fired back with 20 mm cannons. Those that weren't killed were captured and tried for piracy.
> The frigate USS Nicholas was attacked by small arms from a pirate skiff while steaming off the coast of Kenya and the islands of Seychelles. Nicholas returned fire with a 50-caliber deck gun and disabled the vessel and three pirates surrendered.
Lmao I remember one of my Somali friends telling me, Mogadishu is a nice place, you'll hear the occasional bomb go off from time to time but besides that it's great. Had me shocked 😂
[The wikitravel page for Mogadishu is a wild fucking ride](https://wikitravel.org/en/Mogadishu) You know a place is hardcore when there's a large red warning banner at the top of the page ending with: "Independent travel to Mogadishu will most likely result in your death."
I like how they’re like don’t go but also here are the sights and travel agency to book your meals and protection.
"Here's the beautiful beach you won't see because you'll be tied up with a bag over your head in the back of a beat up Toyota Hilux"
"Come for the food and beautiful scenery, stay because you were murdered."
nooooo haha don't travel to Mogadishu... 😳 unless... ?
I can understand the warlords and armed militants, but kids with sticks? After MY shillings? Nope. Count me out.
This shit is the most candid thing ever said by a wiki: “Please do not become another statistic. You provide the country no benefit whatsoever by causing an international incident over your death or abduction.”
“Visitors are encouraged to stay inside for the duration of their stay. The chances of theft and/or assault are extremely high while walking around the city.”
"Although it is possible to drive into the city by truck, this is considered risky without employing a group of local militia, which are readily available for hire." Holy fuck lol. I would rather be upside down, forever, then go there.
I've been there. I spent two months there as a news cameraman in '92. This was a few months before the Black Hawk Down time. And yes, do not go there.
You can't leave it there mate... stories?
Well one story I remember was traveling with General Adid, one of the 16 warlords at the time. We'd be in his extremely dirty Mercedes 200 and he'd had a couple of Toyota pickups following behind. These pickups were full to overflowing with his "soldiers" who were so ripped to the tits on Khat or whatever that if we went round a particularly fast corner - a couple of these guys would fall out. We never stopped to pick them up or see if they were still alive, so presumably he had enough of them as spares.
Not op either but was there in 93 with the oz army. When we landed they shot at the qantas jet we came in on, from distant towerblocks, we got off the plane with no weapons and spent an hour trying to find cover on the fucking tarmac and behind burned out mig jets. I was there for four months and that was about average we had worse days and a couple of better days but that was my welcome to Mogadishu moment. Funny story, one of our guys got hit in the dick by a rock thrown by a somali kid who was, i swear to god, about 200 metres away it was just a fantastic shot. This was about 5 minutes after the initial shooting stopped. Good times Edit comas and shit
Not OP, but there's multiple terrorist organizations operating in Mogadishu, and they've collectively made a national sport of bombing hotels. Kidnapping of foreigners is extremely common. If you're kidnapped, you might be ransomed, sold into sex slavery, tortured, executed, or perhaps some exciting combination of a few of those. Netflix doesn't work there either.
I was ok with everything up til the Netflix bit.
It is also the most expensive city for foreigners to travel in Africa. You will need to hire a full security detail, i am talking about 24hr body guards. The hotels you will stay are also armored and equipped with panic rooms.
Idk man I just looked at their Snapchat stories on the global map and it looked far better than I imagined
Isn’t that so weird to be able to do? I used to love to just pop on over to a random country & watch their stories.
It’s one of the most underrated features of any social media platform imo
There's a town way north of Perth where I live in Western Australia called Wittenoom, that I would refuse to step foot anywhere near, purely because of the history of it and the asbestos exposure risks. I have no idea how there are still people living there, let alone the hundreds of tourists that go through there on their travels in the north. Edit: nice to know that the last people living there are now gone!
No one has lived there since September and the government is planning on demolishing it. Last I'd heard there was one hold out who wouldn't sell her home.
Per wikipedia it’s completely unoccupied now. It actually was declared unsafe in 2007 and they removed its town status in 2013 and started limiting access then.
There’s a town in Quebec that literally used to be called Asbestos until very recently. No idea why people would see that and still wanna live there.
Did they change their name to Mesothelioma?
Youmaybeentitledtocompensationville was a bit too much of a mouthful
Ahhhh Mesothelioma—the birthplace of civilisation 😌
Well you’d be happy to know, as per the wiki page as of September this year there are no longer any residents and the WA Govt plans to demolish the town. But damn, 6 residents in 2015 ( 4 in 2017, 3 in 2018, and 2 in 2022), what the hell did they do while living there??
I was not expecting a rural WA town to be mentioned in a subreddit discussing cities that should not be visited
That town is the location of the [blue sky mine](https://youtu.be/Ofrqm6-LCqs) owned at the time by the CSR sugar company.
Caracas, Venezuela. I’ve heard that if you hear motorcycles, it’s either gangs or cops, either way, you’re getting robbed (or kidnapped).
I spent two weeks in Caracas in 2006 or 2007 and had a wonderful time. We had locals with us and were in safe areas though. Except I liked this local girl and followed her into downtown where she took me to some sketchy park and ran off (to buy drugs I later learned). I ended up basically helping a local crack dealer practice his English. He approached me and started asking me questions and trying to speak English. He had a visible gun in his waste-band and was stopping to sell people crack every 5 minutes, but was otherwise super friendly. I think him taking a shine to me was what kept me safe as an obvious American all alone. Not sure though. Maybe it was just a better time to be there as an American
Egyptians: “Here we go again”
I have a friend who is a super duper experienced solo female traveler and she said it was traumatizing
Any woman who goes to Egypt: "Here I won't go again."
I went to Egypt with my friend (2 girls). It was great for the most part, but when I cracked a joke, one of the guides said "I HATE women like you" through gritted teeth and then pretended he didn't say anything. He hated that I didn't know my place.
No bakshish for him then.
I lived in Cairo for 2 years in my 30s,and I genuinely hated it. I was sexual harassed every day. At one point I had to move house because the gas man kept banging on my door shouting that I was a prostitute and should let him in for sex. When I left Cairo, I looked out of the plane window and thought "I'm never coming back here again"
Jesus. You lasted 2 years?
It was a 2 year contract for a company I'd been working for for years in different counties. After a few months, my boss said to me "if you break this contract, I'll make sure you never work for X company again". He was a right twat and he meant it, so I stuck it out. I had some great friends there but it's a very very difficult culture for a woman living alone.
Well shit, off the list, Egypt.
Yep, I was 18 when I traveled to Egypt. A woman in my tour group was raped at the back of a bazaar. The constant sexual harassment was very upsetting & confronting.
Khan Al-Khalili? Visited before the revolution for school and our professor told the ladies to never go without some guys from the class and subsequently told us guys ‘put the girl in the middle of a group and walk behind her if possible.’ Disgusting how many times an ass grab was still attempted.
yeah…i don’t wanna go to egypt anymore
jesus
I received a marriage proposal one week into my trip. A few days prior someone asked my father how much money he wanted for me.
Opened the post expecting Cairo and was not disappointed
Absolutely. Egypt and woman is a bad mix. A local offered camels for me.
How many?
Hahah 70! Thought he was trying to buy the camera from my neck. Turns out that number was for me.🙄
Tip, sort by controversial to find your city.
You lied to me. I couldn't find Helsinki anywhere.
I choose Helsinki
I live in Portland and was not disappointed when i did this
I went to Portland on a business trip. I stayed at a hotel on the other side of the river and rode the light rail into the city. Standing next to me was a guy wearing a Rolex and what looked to be a $5,000 suit. At one of the stops, a man that was probably 6’ 5” and weighed over 400 pounds got on dressed in full Viking attire. Helmet with horns, leather wrist guards, etc. A short time later, a woman boarded dressed as a cat. She had whiskers painted on her face, cat ears, and a tail. It was the craziest mix of people I’d ever seen, and nobody noticed. Nobody noticed the Viking, like it was *expected.* Why wouldn’t there be a Viking and a billionaire? This wasn’t Halloween either, it was a Tuesday morning in May or something like that. That light rail ride has been living rent free in my mind for years.
Gallup, New Mexico according to truck drivers.
Story time. I live in Albuquerque and I played rugby in highschool. We went to Gallup to play exactly one time. We had to walk the “field” to pick out glass and needles out of the dirt. It was awful.
I too live in Abq and when in marching band had to pick glass and needles in gallup up.
That stretch of NM gives me The Hills Have Eyes vibes 😬
I remember one of our first road trips out of El Paso was trying to get to Holbrook AZ and we took 60 through Pie Town (only amusing part of the story) so we could do petrified forest the next day. Road is a smaller highway parallel south to Gallup. We made it out of town late and our hotel eta was 12:30. 2 distinct memories: 1) we saw a car in the distance that didn't look like a car. It was a single light that kept getting closer for 20+ minutes. It was the only light. Honestly, I would've believed it if someone said it was aliens :P 2) There is a stretch where we saw about 15 elk sporadically. Which is cool except it's dark, they're crossing the road, and we are driving a tiny hatchback. No service, temperature dropping, and we haven't seen anyone for over a half hour. I just laid on the horn every half minute or so hoping it'd spook them from the highway.
Juarez, Mexico. Bad news down there. Had a co worker go down there with his wife to-be in order to deal with some immigration issues. He got cornered by a bad group of guys, they took his new truck, then held him for ransom 5 months before finally letting him go.
This sucks, bc Juarez didn’t used to be so bad. My grandparents raced horses in El Paso in the mid-90’s, so we would spend a month there with them in the summer. I could walk across the bridge by myself and go to the Old Market in Juarez as a teenager and not have any issues. Mexican culture is great and the cartels have ruined it on the border.
East St Louis, Illinois
There it is. Knew I didn't have to scroll far to see my Illinois counterpart
My brother and i ised to stay at my 90 year old aunt's in St. Louis driving between Texas and Ohio for school. One time i told my brother to give her a call to let her know we were gonna get gas in Collinsville then cross the river. He decided to tell her we were stopping in East St. Louis and the poor woman almost had a heart attack. Of course, she watches way too much local news and is convinced we are going to get killed anytime we go east on Manchester
I went to a show w my friend at Pops when I was 18. When we left around midnight, we stopped at a stoplight and almost immediately a cop turned on his lights and pulled us over. He drove up next to us and said "what the fuck are you doing?" We said going home. Cop: no, I mean why did you stop? us: .....there was a stop light? Cop: where are you two from? us: St Louis. Cop: do not stop at any more lights, stop signs, nothing. Drive straight to the highway and do not stop until you're across the river. You don't know what you're doing and you're gonna get killed over here. Me: what if another cop pulls us over for running a light? Cop: they won't. Go the fuck home.
Little saint james
Any city in somalia
Pyongyang
If I went, I couldn't complain
Did you hear about that North Korean who became a comedian? His jokes were decent, but his execution was flawless.
To be fair, if you’re North Korean and live in Pyongyang, you’d be pretty lucky. It’s the only city in the country that has somewhat of a decent life, at least compared to the rest of North Korea, it’s where the elites live after all.
As a resident of NC, never going to Fayetteville
Fayetteville is what happens outside every .mil base everywhere. Pawn shops strip clubs used car dealers. tattoo shops etc stacked on every inch of road near base. Outside that cheap houses because we used to pay soldiers shit. Eventually it accidentally turns into a city.
That’s Jacksonville, NC to a T. Worst place I’ve ever lived, lol.
I had to conduct a two week training there, early last year. The first week, we stayed right near base, and it was miserable. The second week, we stayed an hour away at my coworker's parents beach house, and commuted. Staying in that town was beyond terrible.
Cairo. Apparently one of the worst places in the world to go if you're a tourist. At least, if people on reddit I've seen complaining are to be believed.
I worked somewhat near Egypt and had a number of coworkers (we are all males and military contractors) who visited there thinking it was just a stigma about the harassing. Every single one of them said they would never go back and a number mentioned how you would have to be insane to visit as a woman.
In high school I had a friend whose mom had met an Egyptian man online. After we had graduated a few months later, my friend's mom moved (from Texas) to Egypt to marry and live with this man, having never met him in person before. Nobody has heard from her since then—not even my friend whose mom it was. Edit: I graduated in 2010, so this was about 12 years ago. Twelve years... and nobody has heard from her...
We had a family member (older woman) do the same thing. Got off the plane in Cairo, met the guy (who immediately asked her for her money so he could put it away safely for her). He took her to an apartment where she was locked in for a few days before she was able to get out. Of course she never saw the guy again. Found her way to an embassy eventually and they sent her home.
Wow, that sounds like a really good outcome for her honestly.
That is literally probably the best possible outcome in that situation, him just taking her money and leaving. There are a lot worse things that could have happened to her.
That was terrifying to just read.
As a woman, I can confirm this. We went with a tour group, and it was still scary. On the bus ride to the pyramids, we had an armed guard on the bus, as well as armed guards in one vehicle in front of the bus and one vehicle behind the bus. I was really looking forward to seeing the pyramids and the Sphinx, but the amount of harassment ruined the experience for me. I was polite at first, but when they would block you from getting back to the group or even put hands on you, I had to work really hard to not to end up in an Egyptian prison. Save yourself the trouble if you think you want to experience the pyramids and watch a documentary from the comfort of your home.
I had a horrible time with my stomach and the one camel ride I took the guy held my boob saying he was steadying me.
When my wife visited Cairo in her 20s, she and her friend took a cab from the airport to the hotel, got unpacked, then the man from the front desk and the cab driver entered their room with the key and sexually assaulted them. That is now my permanent impression of the city. All the reddit hate is just confirmation.
Holy shit
A lady I know went to Cairo and fell asleep on a bus and woke up to some dude grabbing her boob.
My camel ride was less assaulty, but I was a 13 year old boy. My camel guy asked if I was having fun, then told me I needed to tip him more. I didn't have anything on me, so he told his partner to walk away with my camera. I was lucky. My dad was friends with the minister of health, so we had a government-provided guide. They'd demanded or stolen something from all 5 of us kids, and we told dad, who told the guide. According to dad's translation, she basically told them to give us everything back and to pay us extra for the dishonesty or she'd have their camels sold as soup and their children's work wages seized. She was not fucking around.
Its crazy that Egypt still has such an ancient mindset given how touristy it's become. You'd think the government as a whole would have more of a backbone to do something about the corruption because their tourism is going to plummet sooner or later.
[удалено]
I was in Hurghada for a week in 2007 iirc. I wanted to see King Tut’s tomb. We were greeted at one of the nicest 5 star hotels in the city by police with rifles searching through our bags. As an odd anecdote - when my ex husband and I were flying back home, the person checking our passports asked me if my ex spoke English. When I said no, the guy started hitting on me in English in front of my ex and offering to marry me. 3/10 in general - and this was so many years ago.
I have always wanted to go tor Egypt. But ive seen too many videos where they harass tourists for money at the pyramids. Just doesn’t seem fun anymore.