Rome pickpockets
 

My wife and I will be in Rome the week after next. I have read all the travel books and each and every one of them mentions the possibility of runing into pick pockets. Of course my wife is now thinking about hiring a Brinks Truck to protect her pocketbook from these attacks but I have travelled extensively in areas that were supposed to include these scoundrels and have never run into any. So I'm asking all the seasoned travelers who have ventured into Rome: what should I look out for?;where should I avoid?;are there any precautions that you have taken to thwart off any attempts on your valuables?I also welcome any and all suggestions.Thanks.

Let's see if we can get some good answers from our readers of our Travel->Italy forum. Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz

Thank you.

When I was planning my trip to Italy this summer I to noticed all the pickpocket warnings. I used a money belt for my wallet and room key. At first it was annoying but I soon got used to it. I was in Rome, Florence, and Venice and the only time I felt like was being violated was by the Coliseum. There are some steps across the street we went up and I was carrying a stroller. Suddenly about 3 Gypsy girls came up to me and started to grab my arms begging for money. I am sure they were checking out my pockets. I carried all of the money when we went out, my wife left her bag and wallet in the hotel room.

Thankfully I've never had a problem with pickpockets in Rome and I used to go there every few months for a couple of years or so (both business and leisure). I always keep my money in a front jeans pocket along with my wallet - would never put anything in a back pocket. Leave your passport and spare cash / cards at the hotel in a safe.

The real advice I would give you is to watch out around the Termini Railway station and major tourist attractions. Just be watchful but don't let it ruin your holiday.

The other critical advice is taxis. Don't take them unless they have been ordered for you by the hotel or someone you trust. Hailing a taxi at Termini or the airport is almost certainly going to get you ripped-off! Double, tripple or even more than the standard fare.

Regards

lme ff etc etc

I've been a few times, and always kept loose cash and cards on me in my front pocket. It's just a case of being wary and being vigilant when in certain areas like on the Metro or around very busy sights such as the Trevi Fountain - don't worry about it too much, it's not as bad as they make out.

The area around Termini Station is notorious as are the metros. This is where the gypsy groups congregate. They will try to get your attention - usually through shock (i.e., holding a dead pigeon on a newspaper in front of you) and you become so focused on the object you forget your pocket/purse and they grab it.

Use common sense and you'll be fine. For example, if your hotel provides room safes - then use them.

Well, let me count the ways. will probably miss a few. over the past 30 or so years,

Rome rail station. Grab from top of wife's carry-on. she was getting out her prescription sun glasses. lost them.

Rome via condatti 2 small girls one threw confetti at us, the other tried to grab wife's purse. nothing lost.

Marseille france. wife was making a phone call. put 2 coins worth about $1 on top of the pay phone. someone charged into her back and grabbed the coins.

paris. a strong youth ran rammed into the back of me at a Metro turnstyle. the turnstyle locked, he picked my right FRONT pocket. note that, all you front pocket guys.

venice wife had a new backpack with drawstrings. someone flipped it over while on a crowded vaperetto. she had so much junk in there , maybe something was missing, maybe not.

florence. woman of group of 3 had doll that looked like baby. jammed it into wife's chest and tried to grab purse.

paris train station group tried to grab over the shoulder bags while we were dragging suitcases from someplace to other place. wife dropped suitcases and went for them with an umbrella and they scattered.

paris in front of maurice hotel. large contingent of youths surrounded us. jack nickleson entourage came walking up the street, and they scattered.

had 2 agressive car breakins also.

get under clothing wallets. keep everything you want to keep in them. If carrying a purse, carry only replaceables in it. get a decent point and shoot camera and use it, not a million dollar slr with 20 lenses.

those sport coats with 50 million buried zip pockets are nice to hide stuff. I just cannot find anything in them, once it goes in there.

I take an opposite approach to pickpockets. Give them what they want!

When traveling, I keep my wallet and ID in a secure place such as a money belt. However, in my back pocket, I have an old wallet filled with sample credit cards that come in the mail. Of course, I only use the cards that do not have my name on them. Additionally, my son had some play money that looked perfectly real on the front but was blank on the reverse. I stuffed a couple hundred dollars of this fake stuff in my wallet too.

Ironically, this wallet has gone on many trips with me... just begging to be picked yet it never has! If it ever does get picked, I would pay real money to see the look on the gypsy kid as they run around the corner and into an alley to check out their prize. :D

The day after we landed in Rome we were in the subway and my husband's wallet was stolen. It was in his back pocket. This is a man endowed with ample common sense who lived in NYC for years. All I can do is chalk it up to jet lag. Fortunately, it was mostly credit cards and his driver's license, all replaceable with a little effort. AE's office is in a nice area near the Spanish Steps so we got to do a little extra sightseeing. (A couple days later he felt someone in the subway groping his back pocket again.) He also got his front pocket picked of about $200 in rubles after being rushed by a group of gypsies in St. Petersburg- we think they may have followed us from the ATM.

Now I carry most of the money and credit cards! They go in a purse under my clothes. I carry a cloth tote bag with food and whatever souvenirs we've picked up- nothing it would be heartbreaking to lose.

On subway trains be wary of the people closest to the doors- people who are planning to grab and run like to be close to the exit. Also be aware of any odd moves- my husband noticed 3 guys who got onto a train and one deliberately moved in between the 2 of us. He thought that it might have been to block my view of whatever his accomplice was planning to do. We moved back together. Paranoid? Maybe, but we have reason to be!

Baiting, I like that.

I had a friend in college, he was kind of small, but a wrestler. He was walking through Denver suburb one night when a mugger jumped him from behind and demanded his wallet. He put a reversal move on him, pinned him, and demanded the money he had him. Only got about $7 but it sounds like the same satisfaction you hope to get.

On our last trip, my husband may have come close to having his wallet taken. We had just gotten onto a crowded metro, having barely made it on. We were standing at the door. I noticed a well-dressed man in his twenties about two-to-three feet to my left and a well-dressed woman, also in her twenties, just at my left side. My husband was in front, with his back turned to me. The man and woman did not appear to be together, but I noticed that he made eye contact with her and almost imperceptibly nodded.

She moved to between my husband (specifically to behind his back pocket) and myself. I noticed she was carrying, not a shawl, but something fairly largish which hid her right arm--an arm which was closing the inches to my husband's back pocket.

It was at that moment that it finally occured to me--be alert! @:-) Until then, I had just been thinking how relieved I was that DH and I had made it onto the metro.

I said something like "Watch it!" to DH. A number of people turned around and stared. (The youngish man and woman never changed facial expressions. They might have been thinking of the moon, for all their faces indicated.) I moved so that I came between the young woman and my husband's back pocket.

Who knows if she had intended to pick his pocket? It could have been quite innocent. The two youngish people seemed quite innocent. Still--.

On a previous visit, while we were walking through Termini, I noticed a middle-aged man coming up behind us with his gaze fixed on my husband's back pocket. I made eye contact (think a smiling female Clint Eastwood attitude :D ) and we had no more trouble.

This time we also got ripped off by a cab from Termini. But that wasn't major. I actually felt sorry for the cabdriver. The cabdriver's boss at Termini had pursued us through the station arguing that their cab had a meter, etc., etc. He actually had pointed to something in the cab that he said was a meter. Well, it wasn't. And when we got to the Cavalieri, the cabdriver made an excuse not to go into the Cavalieri driveway but rather dropped us off at the front, presumably because his type of cab wouldn't be allowed in there. Anyhow--even if the cabdrivers were crooks, they weren't successful crooks. The overcharge was something like an extra 20 euros. Annoying, of course, but not anything like losing a wallet.

But yes, cabs at Termini can be a real problem unless they are metered.

And on subways, especially if you are near the doors and are distracted--you should be very watchful.

Brilliant! You gotta love Jack. He certainly knows how to make an entrance.

tried the fake wallet thing too
 

have long been a proponent of putting the real money, passport etc in a hidden waist wallet, so in Italy last month, I had one of my kids wallets with monopoly money in my back pocket... no takers. But in Rome, watched as a gypsy picked the back pocket of a girl not five feet from me! there's pickpockets everywhere but it does seem generally the further south you go in Italy, the more aggressive they are. just use common sense and have fun-its just part of travel

These replies covered almost everything that I came across, but here are a few repeats and one more.

Beware of a group of kids near you on any metro station or bus stop, especially with the "what time is it question". (for us.....it was the Paris Metro, and I felt the hand in my front pocket, and stopped it)

When walking down the streets, window shopping, pay attention to what is behind you. If you happen to notice the same person window shopping every time that you stop and look into a window, it's time to go the other way, or stop for a coffee. (Paris and Rome, for us) With cell phones, you can be passed down the line to an accomplice. In Paris, (Mouffetard St), every time that we stopped, we stopped hearing the clicking of high heels not far behind us. She had a cell phone to her ear all of the time. We went a different way, and lo and behold, were followed by a guy with a cell phone for a short distance, until we stopped, looked at him, and let him walk past us. He knew that we knew.

The crowded lines in McDonalds are prime spots. They watch you reaching to a certain pocket as you approach the counters. They know tourists and Americans, especially with kids, will probably go there. I know people that lost their wallets in Rome and Siena. Luckily for us, we stayed away from McD, except for their well priced expresso at separate front counters. ^