At first they’re cute. Then after you’ve been in Rio de
Janiero a few days, they’re not so cute.
Now you feel sorry for them; for their tattered clothes; for their grimy
little faces. Before long, though, the
scores of children who follow you through the streets wanting handouts become a
nuisance. On what’s supposed to be an exciting and fun holiday, big, sad eyes
constantly remind you of the social and economic conditions that plague Third
Worlds.
Never mind you’ve scrimped to save money for this first-time
trip abroad, by comparison, you’re the rich American: Anger at the world’s
injustice turns into guilt.
India and Egypt are especially riddled with this army of
baby beggars, but big cities of most underdeveloped countries have their
share. How you handle the street kids
affects your vacation, perhaps more emotionally than it does financially, for
it can slant forever your perspective of, say, Peru, even of the entire
geographical region.
My first encounter with youngsters who wanted money from
tourists was in Mexico City in the early 1970s.
These children are not to be confused with most of the shy, rural kids
who followed me out of curiosity through their village streets.
The Big City kids were on a mission, and some – usually the
older ones – were downright menacing: “Protect your car, senorita?”
Although I didn’t appreciate the entrepreneurial spirit at
the time, I grudgingly agreed to pay a few pesos for a car intact upon
return. Sometimes the kids were still
there, waiting for their hard earned cash; sometimes, they weren’t. In all but one instance my car was safe, and
even then only the aerial was broken off.
Initially, I resented paying them; it was, after all, more
threat than service. But in some places
gangs were going to follow me, begging for money anyway, so why not “hire” one
of them and get the rest off my back? In fact, somewhere during that three
month tour of Mexico I learned a significant lesson from the children—I cannot
save the world single-handedly, but I can shape a philosophy for developing
young entrepreneurs wherever I travel.
So rather than facilitate bad begging habits, I decided it
was incumbent upon me to practice three disciplines that can help educate
children. At times it was hard to do, but now it’s second-nature to me: (1) I never just hand out money, even to the
very young. (2) I always select one
child in the bunch, and always insist that he or she do something to earn the money
asked for—help me find a park, for instance.
And (3) I always tell the kids why I picked that particular child. She’s
the tidiest; he’s the most polite, or speaks English.
Kids need explanations to understand choices; to benefit
beyond the few cents I give them. Plus, I don’t feel guilty about ignoring
impoverished children. If at all possible, I accompany the child to buy food or
clothing just to make sure the kid is the beneficiary, not the parent or the pimp.
Of course, kids are far more creative today. Caribbean boat
boys are all over this fluid paradise, and only the most remote islands are
free of the entrepreneurial group. Yachties are the targets here. And while sailboat or power boat vacations
suggest we can get away from it all, common sense dictates that the world’s too
much into tourism for real obscurity. Eager to be of service in Jamaica or
maybe, in the Bahamas, boat boys show up in the harbor before your anchor is
set. In their competitive frenzy for a
new customer, they have been known to get in the way of anchoring, which is
frequently a tricky activity in a crowded harbor.
I had this unenviable experience in Dominica. And while the
captain of the sailboat wasn’t too concerned, the already anchored yachtsmen
were in an uproar. Upset with us and our boat skills? Maybe. More likely, they
were nervous that the boat boys encircling us like sharks would interfere with
the anchoring process and cause us to swing into their boats.
Any time of day, boat boys appear at your bow on surfboards,
in dinghies, on floating Styrofoam. They
want to be your shore-link, and they’ll bring you ice or fresh lobster or
frozen drinks. They will arrange taxis and tours. They will do almost anything
within reason for a fee, much like one interesting young man on Virgin Gorda in
the BVI. He taught me how to clean and
cook conch.
But boat boys can be especially frustrating because they
can’t be dealt with in a group like children in big cities; hiring one won’t
rid you of others. One comes, he
goes. Another one comes, he goes. Even when you say “Riggio is our boat boy”,
this aggressive lot is undeterred. In some harbors, boat boys keep coming, they
don’t respect customer loyalty and they must be firmly rejected before they
finally get the picture…and you get some peace.
These young, Caribbean boys have found an honest, though
pesky, way to make money in the lucrative tourism industry. Instead of being cursed, I think they’re to
be applauded. Things could be
worse: Like many youths in the United States,
they could tote guns.
