>>Nepal is part of India? Must be a different Nepal than the one with a certain king being armed to the teeth by powers far and near then. <<

Guwonder where on earth did you see that I said that Nepal was part of India?

<<The main tourist locations in the Indian state of Kashmir are fine (as of now); <<

As of now? Sharm El Sheik was also fine up to last week. There are many places in the world that are unlikely to be attacked by terrorism. Some just get a "high" from going to these places. Good for them.

Here is what I did see in your prior post:

Would you also just as well say: "As to Egypt I would not be so foolish as to visit Taba or Israel where there is a war going on"? A bit of mixing of countries and then some.

I cannot think of a single foreign tourist who has been killed by terrorism in the Jammu or Ladakh parts of the state of Kashmir. Not one in 16 years. No war there in the major tourist centers. Even in the Kashmir valley itself, at the tourist centers, not one foreigner has been killed in the past 5 years. More people with American and European passports have found themselves victims of terrorism in the US, the UK or Israel than in Kashmir these past years.

If you asked most people a few years ago (or even many today), they would not think of Copenhagen as a likely place to be hit by terrorism in the next few years. Sadly, I am increasingly confident it too inevitably will be. Should I avoid CPH now too?

[QUOTE=Bretteee]I agree. The sticky wicket is: what do you do when "logic" says something is safe but your gut says otherwise. (BTW, The New York Times just had an interesting Op-Ed on this topic: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/24/opinion/24taleb.html) Me, I go, but it's hard to argue with a loved one's nerves.

I lived in Egypt for a year and felt incredibly safe. (Except for taxi rides -- yikes!) If one wanted to absolutely minimize the odds of getting whacked, I wouldn't go as part of a tour group (big groups seem to attract terrorists' attention), but even then, what are the odds?

Along with the NYTimes Op-Ed piece:

Actually due to the geography, it is much easier to stop this type of terrorism in Sharm than most anywhere else in the world. My guess is the security forces either got too lazy or someone in the security force was a sympathizer or got paid. In any case I believe that Sharm is now much safer than NYC or London.

[QUOTE=GUWonder]Here is what I did see in your prior post:

Guwonder people have been kidnapped in Kashmir in the past 16 years. As to Nepal, I think it's clear that it is a country.

[QUOTE=GUWonder]Here is what I did see in your prior post:<<

Should you avoid Copenhagen? It's totally up to you, how safe you feel.

The recent attacks in Egypt are a continuation of the previous ones -- they are specifically directed at tourists. This is qualitatively different than most of the major terrorist incidents in the past few years (but similar to Bali). For whatever reason, the strategy of the terrorists there is to starve the government of much needed tourism revenue.

I'm still not saying that Egypt is unreasonably dangerous for tourists, just that when one assesses the risk of visiting a country, it's important to know the targets of previous attacks.

Indians (including Indian Kashmiris) have been kidnapped in the past 16 years. Foreign tourists in at least two incidents, including a highly brutal one involving a beheading. Those incidents occurred outside the tourist centers .... in the mountainous zone of a particular valley that they were explicilty warned about by local authorities upon arrival in Kashmir.

The following is absolutely correct:

"I cannot think of a single foreign tourist who has been killed by terrorism in the Jammu or Ladakh parts of the state of Kashmir. Not one in 16 years. No war there in the major tourist centers. Even in the Kashmir valley itself, at the tourist centers, not one foreigner has been killed in the past 5 years. More people with American and European passports have found themselves victims of terrorism in the US, the UK or Israel than in Kashmir these past years."

If you knew the geography of India and where incidents occurred and did not occur there like I do, then you would know the above is absolutely correct. (Jammu and Ladakh parts of the Indian state of Kashmir have had no foreign tourists kidnapped. None. The Kashmir valley part has not had one foreigner (read: tourist) killed in the tourist centers there these last 5 years either.

Glad to see you state that Nepal is a separate country. Your following statement before seemed a bit confused:

The clarification is probably appreciated by those who don't want to see even more territorial disputes in the world arise from wrongful (implicit or explicit) irredentist claims.

Kashmir is a trouble spot. There is always a "first time" where there is trouble. People were kidnapped in Kashmir; I could not care less if it was in the mountains or wherever. Going there is still playing with fire.

However it's a question of "gut feeling." And one is "free" to travel where one wants to. To each his own.

I must admit that the Eqyptian terrorists' targeting of toursits makes me less likely to travel there. For me, safety is not just about statistical risk. If my risk of dying in countries A and B is equal, but the risk in A is by accident and in B by murder, I would feel much less safe in B. It's very disturbing to me on a human level that I'm in a subgroup of people (tourists) that others are specifically trying to kill.

All things being equal, your position makes sense... But I think this isn't the proper comparison. The risk of "A" at home is much, MUCH greater than the risk of "B" in Egypt. Furthermore, the risk of "A" in Egypt is remarkably low, and virtually nil if you avoid intercity buses, which are the cause of most accidents. There's practically no violent crime of any kind, especially against foreigners; in my experience (having talked to Egyptians about this), Egyptians know better than to attack foreigners...it gets them BIG prison sentences or worse.

There is responding out of fear, and there is responding to risk:

http://flyertalk.com/forum/showpost....0&postcount=79

Animals cannot calculate risks in the way people more uniquely can; but that greater human ability doesn't necessarily preclude people from responding to fear in fearfully-responsive ways of which even animals are incapable.

Just the latest targeting of tourists in Egypt (at least 10 dead, 70 wounded):

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/...sts/index.html

Have lots of tourists to DC been murdered in the past year? If so, it's not getting much press.

Make that 30 dead, 100 wounded. Add this to the 60 tourists killed last July.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060424/...plosions_dc_13