Before moving to Guatemala for Costa Rica I traveled there and it was a race against time to get as much accomplished as possible. We wanted to make this transition for our son as smooth as possible, which usually involves gifts of some sorts in the middle of all the running.
That day we were going to get him a bicycle. The way this worked is that we bought him stuff and told him that it would be waiting for him when we arrive, so he’ll be excited to come back and would forget about leaving his life behind in Costa Rica. I was thinking of how well this worked I remembered that at every store you arrive to in Guatemala you must leave your bags at the counter. Not purses, but stuff like shopping bags and back packs.
One day while shopping we entered into an empty where store it was only us. Regardless, my husband had to leave his bag at the front desk. Thirty minutes after entering the store and walking around we came out of the store and bought nothing (there was a good reason why it was so empty). When my husband got his things back we realized his phone was gone. And the only explanation we could think of was that it was stolen at the counter.
This taught me 2 lessons: first don’t bring anything valuable to Guatemala unless you want to keep it in your hotel’s room and the second one was make sure you have all the phone numbers saved elsewhere, not just on your cell phone. You don’t want to be like my husband freaked out about how he’ll contact any of his friends and co-workers again.
However, the stealing of the phone was not what impressed me the most but the ultimate fear he had about the new and somewhat creative way criminals are taking advantage of people here in Guatemala these days from which I had no idea until that day. Apparently the new thing for thieves to do in Guatemala is that they will be calling everyone in your phone book and extorting money from them by saying that they have kidnapped you and they want money. NICE!
So as you can imagine we spent the afternoon running around contacting his family members and whatever numbers he could remember of his friends to tell them that he’s alright and if they get any calls from an extortionist to ignore it.
S I started wondering do I really want to live here? However, I’ve been assured for the billionth time Antigua is completely different. And from my experience so far, I’d say it is.
Marina K. Villatoro, lives in Central America – Costa Rica and Guatemala for the past decade. She has traveled all over these areas with her family and now she loves to organize vacations to Costa Rica and Guatemala. Contact her for advice and to plan your perfect trip! Also published at Phone Napping In Guatemala.
