Yeah, and I was just talking with a new friend who grew up in Compton. He told me all sorts of stories and particularly mentioned that I should avoid driving around LA in a car with foreign plates. He said he knew lots of ganstas who specifically targeted tourists. Violence is not just isolated to Islamic countries. It's everywhere.
I take such descriptions and warnings always with this particular grain of salt.
Especially warnings issued by a gov't that is currently waging a war of questionable motives against persons of said warning.Not that I'm saying every visit of every foreign person to these countries turns out peachy keen but many similar warnings could be issued about travel in this country. Remember all those carjackings that happened to tourists in Miami a while back?
But okay, there are definite precautions one should take.. That is, my friend's mother took a trip to Egypt by herself and she said she would never do that again and would advise any woman against it. She said because she was alone, and petite (though very tough- a carpenter), men thought they had the right to grab her indecently in public and it was really frightening. I wouldn't go there alone..
I would consider going to India.. That was mostly why I responded in the first place. I've heard such facinating things about it and would love to visit someday.
There is a great sage who lives there, called Amma, whom I would like to meet and visit the ashram of.
I don't see myself dying in a foreign country though.. I just got done watching the movie Big Fish.. It was great. They guy knew when he was going to die, he'd seen it in a vision and therefore was able to live his life without fear, doing all sorts of amazing things because he knew none of them would kill him. I want to live my life like that. I can't say I've had a definite vision of when I'm going to die but I have always felt intuitively, quite strongly, that I will die an old woman with a long life behind me. This has helped me keep my cool in several life threatening situations, from being shot at to nearly drowning in the Atlantic late one night.. It's what would give me the confidence to travel to India by myself, were the opportunity to present itself. But that's just me. Some people think I'm weird. *shrug*