Mark Twain once said, "Golf was a good walk spoiled". Well a robbery along your walk can do that too.On our second trip to Guatemala City we decided to take a nice mid-day walk to the Archeological Museum. This would bring us from Zone 10, through Zone 9, and into Zone 13 - about a 30 min walk. Many zones of the city are considered unsafe for tourist after dark, but it was the middle of the day and we intended to stick to the main streets.
We were about 10 minutes from the museum when the sidewalk veered away from the main road to go around several overpasses. You can see the curve on the map at the top right of the green patch labeled Zoologico (with a blue duck). We saw a young man walking towards us, but no different than many others, until he stopped a few feet away from us. He lifted his shirt to reveal the butt end of a pistol stuffed in the front end of his pants. Well, it wasn't too hard to figure out his intentions and we knew that we were not very visible from the road at this moment. He was quite casual about it all and neither one of us felt like our lives were in immediate danger, but he was the one with the gun tucked into his pants.
I took out my wallet and pulled all of the money I had (the equivalent of $135 in the local currency of quetzals) and handed it over. Then he wanted a cell phone, but "no tengo" - I don't have. Our camera, though was in a holster on my belt, ready for a good picture at a moments notice. I tried to say it was really old, but I guess he wanted to judge for himself. After I passed the camera over, I turned to Caroline and said "Lets go", and so we and our robber parted ways.
Right about 300 feet around the corner we found a security guard at a university, who could not help us and did not have a phone, but did point to a pay phone and tell us the number to dial for the police. The pay phone was broken, so we went to another, which would not connect. A nice man at the second phone used his cell phone to call the police, but he could not get though either. We went back out to the main street and we able to flag down a police truck with 4 very friendly (and well armed) guys in uniform. They quickly returned to the scene with us in the truck (4 seater cab with 2 guys in the back bed). They questioned 2 guys and searched the area, but our friend was long gone.
After that they dropped us off at the museum and advised that the area where we were robbed was very dangerous. That may be why there was no one else walking on that curve and we were definitely the only tourists around.
We feel lucky though, as the loss amounted to an older camera and some cash that can be replaced. He did not take the backpack (Caroline's wallet, medical records and our ATM card were in the pack), our wedding rings, my watch, or my whole wallet which had my ID and credit card. We were not threatened or touched (aside from him briefly showing us the gun). We did not resist and we are glad we didn't. $130 and a camera is nothing worth getting hurt over.
Is Guatemala City dangerous? Probably no more so than many large cities around the world, including many in the US we have visited. But, here we are not as familiar, and, perhaps not cautious enough. We are grateful it was a brief and simple lesson, next time we'll take a taxi!
PS: The damn museum is closed on Mondays anyway!
map link: http://www.larutamayaonline.com/guatemala/maps/guatemala_city_map.php
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