11/1 Pick Pocket in Training

Kate had her first pickpocket attempt yesterday. The guy was the Artful Dodger in training. We were walking our bikes through a crowded street downtown because Kate’s not comfortable weaving in and out of pedestrians, avoiding cars backing out from the lots on the left and vehicle traffic on the right. Safety is number one priority if you are not comfortable on bike, so I support walking whenever she wants. However, when you walk on a crowded street with a bike, your hands are engaged on the bike and not guarding your pockets. No one picks your pocket when you ride –if they attempt, they’ll have a fat tire over them.

Anyways, a guy brushed by me as I parted the crowd in front of Kate. I did not realize he then purposefully bumped into Kate’s left thigh pocket. It’s a trick pickpockets do to see where you keep your stash. They note if you checked your pocket (or which pocket you checked) after first contact so they know where to target. Once this guy was sure, he returned minutes later, waved a plastic bag in front of Kate’s face and slipped his hand into her pocket. Fortunately he was so clumsy that Kate noticed everything and she slapped his hand, shouted so loud that it scared him off just as I turned around.

We were very lucky.

Another thing I’ve noticed here is that if you are white, young, and female in Lusaka, you get a lot of crap from men on the street. This comes in the form of physical and verbal sexual harassment as well as financial harassment. This really annoys me when I see the guys giving Kate a hard time.

It hasn’t taken us long to work out “best practices” when it comes to the high-traffic, high-risk environments. Whenever we walk our bikes through crowded areas, I make Kate take point so I can watch her and the pedestrian traffic coming our way. We also have rear view mirrors on our bikes to help with awareness. And I have learned to keep my Kryptonite U-Lock at hand to remind unethical Zambians it can be painful to mess with “Muzungus”.