Medellin Reports

It is not something I do. It is not unusual or a new idea. There are regular references to multiple wallets, burner phones, cheap phones, pocket money etc. I don't think any of the Colombia specific travel kit ideas do any harm beyond the inconvenience. I take a different approach and maintain a way to recover my phone configuration and data including the telephone numbers. I also have a way to disable my phone and financial apps and cards, none of which have access to funds until I add them from tools that are not on my phone but are accessible to me via the web browser on my phone or any other device.

[QUOTE=TjBrazil;2880774]Now that Medellin is getting more dangerous, have you guys ever thought of having two wallets. One with a little money with no ids you give to robbers and your real small wallet with your money you put in your sock. When you need to pay for your meal, you go to the bathroom and take your cash out.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=JohnGault;2880944]Club de Amigas Sexy. Sala de Masajes, Carrera 45 the # 57-67.

Zanday Carrera 47 #57 a-34.

New Life. This one used to be good but I have not been there in years.[/QUOTE]Line up really sucks. No good anymore.

[QUOTE=JohnGault;2880944]Club de Amigas Sexy. Sala de Masajes, Carrera 45 the # 57-67.

Zanday Carrera 47 #57 a-34.

New Life. This one used to be good but I have not been there in years.[/QUOTE]New Life lineup really sucks, not good anymore. Always crowded with gringos.

Oh boy.

[B]Colombia - How I was Almost Taken & Kidnapped in the Colombian Mountains [/B]

[URL]https://youtu.be/5ULF1Qt7LaQ?si=ctry4291_BekKeva[/URL]

At least he was bold enough to speak up about it.

[QUOTE=TexasPistol;2880730]This is poor fellow is not having a Merry Christmas.

[URL]https://youtu.be/dJ9QG8r3BGY?si=bcMmQ3fM0EyttA8i[/URL][/QUOTE]Some of you guys believe this? You do not shit where you eat. You believe that these girls actually brought the victim to their own house or even someone they know's house? The girls have neighbors who could witness this. What if a friend stopped by to say Hello,. Have you ever heard of something like that before? It is amazing what people believe.

[QUOTE=Medclubber;2846681]Sorry this is just a bunch of nonsense. There's a huge amount of videos on youtube of the centro girls. If you can point me out some really hotties, 8-9-10's I'll buy you a beer LOL. 98% of those girls are just frikking ugly in my book. There are some doables there for sure but for hot girls you just need to go to different venues like Loutron or La Isla and pay up.[/QUOTE]I am not familiar with Colombia, I go to Tijuana. The difference you see between the girls you see in HK to other clubs and those to the streets is remarkable. You just can't compare the women you see in clubs like Hong Kong in Tijuana and club Aquah in Puerto Vallarta to any club in the world in my book, certainly to what I have seen in the US and Thailand. My opinion.

[QUOTE=TjBrazil;2880774]Now that Medellin is getting more dangerous, have you guys ever thought of having two wallets. One with a little money with no ids you give to robbers and your real small wallet with your money you put in your sock. When you need to pay for your meal, you go to the bathroom and take your cash out.[/QUOTE]When I am overseas I do not carry 1 wallet, why would I need to carry 2. Money, ID, and 1 credit card. What are you guys trying to show pictures of your family like this is the 1970's?

Be safe you all medallin is getting dangerous and whacky.

[URL]https://youtu.be/fGEznkzORCo?si=NGfzbc8u9kWAxUBB[/URL]

[QUOTE=SavePros321;2880978]Oh boy.

[B]Colombia - How I was Almost Taken & Kidnapped in the Colombian Mountains [/B]

[URL]https://youtu.be/5ULF1Qt7LaQ?si=ctry4291_BekKeva[/URL]

At least he was bold enough to speak up about it.[/QUOTE]Guys, F any Hollywood blockbuster you've ever seen in your life up until today 😮 The stuff this guy talked about having to do two days hidden in a dirty bathroom stall would cause anyone to cancel their flight! Wow. Not to mention this guy almost also got himself killed by the owner of a home he entered in and grabbed a knife from the kitchen!

[QUOTE=DoomBringer321;2881005]Be safe you all medallin is getting dangerous and whacky.

[URL]https://youtu.be/fGEznkzORCo?si=NGfzbc8u9kWAxUBB[/URL][/QUOTE]In Tijuana, usually in December and mostly after the 15th of Dec, robberies, muggings and killings tick up. You guys think this is what is happening in Medellin or has it always been as such this year entirely?

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[QUOTE=SavePros321;2880978]Oh boy.

[B]Colombia - How I was Almost Taken & Kidnapped in the Colombian Mountains [/B]

[URL]https://youtu.be/5ULF1Qt7LaQ?si=ctry4291_BekKeva[/URL]

At least he was bold enough to speak up about it.[/QUOTE]Are you kidding? Thinking some tour guide dude he just met is his friend because he is giving him money and paying his abuela triple for nail polish? How can anyone be that naive.

You don't bring thousands of dollars of electronics into Colombia and let people know you have them unless it's someone you've actually known for a while.

I'm not saying what happened isn't unfortunate, because it is, but most of this can be avoided.

Also the dude that got drugged because he went to some girls' house. Again, why!? Why go someone's house you don't know?

For the dude that just simply got mugged with his friends by the taxi driver in Laureles. It does sound like an unfortunate situation. But it was 10:30 at night and I'm sure they're all speaking English to each other and probably in a "solo" area.

Most of these situations can be avoided by simply not trusting anyone unless you've known them for months. And even then, don't go to mountaintops with them on a motorcycle at night. Don't go to anyone's house you haven't known for a while. Don't walk around late at night with your friends speaking English.

I know Colombia can be dangerous, I almost got robbed myself. But, I was in a stupid situation as well (walking around late at night next to a bad neighborhood) and I recognized it and learned from it.

[QUOTE=TjBrazil;2880774]Now that Medellin is getting more dangerous, have you guys ever thought of having two wallets. One with a little money with no ids you give to robbers and your real small wallet with your money you put in your sock. When you need to pay for your meal, you go to the bathroom and take your cash out.[/QUOTE]It's not "getting more dangerous". It's ALWAYS been dangerous. The difference is everyone on YouTube taunting it as some paradise that is less dangerous than everyone claims it to be and thus people being to let their guard down.

Anyone from Colombia or any Latin American country in general will give you and would have always given you the advice to never take much cash out with you when you go out and "nunca dar papaya". No watches, no jewelry, no fancy clothing, no man buns or an unbuttoned shirt that immediately scream "tourist". Carry a credit card and a small amount of cash and ideally cheap burner phone. Blend the fuck in.

[QUOTE] I want bring up a topic on crime in poor countries. People keep bringing up excuses why people steal in third world countries. When I was in Manila there was just as much poverty, if not more than Medellin, and no one was robbing people, and there weren't reports of any scoping. I never felt safer, even in the dump areas. Isn't it more cultural, that Asians have more morals than Hispanics overall. Why aren't Philippinos robbing people left and right. Why is it when a bunch of Hispanics come to America, a large portion of them become gang bangers and are up to no good, but when Asians come here they generally contribute, and aren't starting their own ms13.

Aren't some cultures just morally bankrupt and it's how they are raised, does anyone really believe that these millions of migrants that have come in to America aren't going to have a huge affect on crime in America. Some will work but the rest will be criminals. What do you guys think. Am I being xenophobic or is it the truth.[/QUOTE]Corruption means there are no consequences for crime. The police are young, don't care, and don't do anything. A lot of this came from the fact that most of the world's coca is grown in Latin America and specifically, Colombia. Guess what happens when you have a highly valuable drug in a poor country situated within spitting distance of the world's superpower? Well you get greed, cartels, corruption, etc. They're still suffering from it even if people say Medellin is a paradise for foreigners and the narcos are gone.

I can tell you there are plenty of Colombians with very good morals. Maybe to a fault. Most of them are very religious.

[QUOTE=DoomBringer321;2881005]Be safe you all medallin is getting dangerous and whacky.

[URL]https://youtu.be/fGEznkzORCo?si=NGfzbc8u9kWAxUBB[/URL][/QUOTE]That was about the same ATTEMPTED "kidnapping" incident that was reported by SavePros321 several posts earlier, except your link was by a different brother referencing the incident reported by the original poster and in his title the incident had grown from an attempted kidnapping to an actual one. This kind of shows how these reports can quickly grow into something more dramatic than what actually happened.

Now, the last thing I want to do is imply that Medellin is completely safe. Far from it and as of late it has been getting worse. HOWEVER, the hysteria over recent incidents has been leading many to believe its somehow so much worse than its actually been all along. What was true before and is even more true now is that, yes it can be very dangerous, but one just has to be smart about things. Take reasonable precautions and don't so readily trust people you've just met and don't really know all that well. If you do that, sure bad things might still happen to yo, but your odds of those things happening will be drastically reduced.

Case in point what happened to this guy. For one thing, parts of his story just don't add up. Like he says he broke his leg but was still somehow able to run, jump over barbed wire fences and climb up buildings. What was he Superman? Or maybe his "broken leg" was more like a sprained ankle or something. What else did he exaggerate? He also talked about doing some pretty wild things to elude the guys he thought were pursuing him, like cutting off his hair and stripping off his clothes and shoes, but holding on to the $3000 camera he had brought with him (and which was the one thing any pursuer was really after). What is his life worth to him? If he was really fearful for his life and a bunch of guys were chasing him mainly to steal his expensive camera (or any other valuables) and if I was him I'd just let them have it and keep my clothes on. Actually, I would never take an expensive camera like that up into the back alleys of an impoverished mountainside barrio late into the night in the first place (with a "trusted" guide I had just met on that trip or not). In fact, I'd even be very wary of going to an area like that at night even without any camera or other valuables.

My point is, with few exceptions, most of these incidents involved relative newbies to Medellin or, if not, vets who made stupid mistakes like "dar papaya" or bringing someone (or worse more than one) that they just met back to their apartment or leaving a drink unattended. Those are all things that one can avoid doing (or if not done in ways that mitigate risk). For example, I like to have a phone on me at all times, but if I'm going anywhere which could be sketchy, I only bring a cheap burner phone with little to no personal data on it that could get compromised. Also only as much cash as I might need on that outing, which in Colombia is no more than $30-40 and which I would not be so horribly upset losing if I did get robbed, and never ever any jewelry of any kind. If I bring a credit card, I bring only which, along with any excess cash, I keep well hidden somewhere I won't reveal on my body. If I go someplace where I drink, I always wait until I'm done with my drink before I make any trip to the can. My list of precautions go on, but most of these have already been mentioned many times on ISG and, also in most cases, in most of these recent incidents the victim has slipped up on one or more of these rules.

[QUOTE=DoomBringer321;2881005]Be safe you all medallin is getting dangerous and whacky.

[URL]https://youtu.be/fGEznkzORCo?si=NGfzbc8u9kWAxUBB[/URL][/QUOTE]What I would like to see is a video of a guy who observed all the cautions required in being in Medellin and still got scoped / kidnapped / etc.