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catman
Joined: 18 Jul 2004
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 Posted: Thu Feb 26, 2009 10:22 pm Post subject: Travel warning for Mexico |
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PHOENIX - The U.S. State Department and universities around the country are warning college students headed for Mexico for some spring-break partying of a surge in drug-related murder and mayhem south of the border.
"We're not necessarily telling students not to go, but we're going to certainly alert them," said Tom Dougan, vice president for student affairs at the University of Rhode Island. "There have been Americans kidnapped, and if you go you need to be very aware and very alert to this fact."
More than 100,000 high school- and college-age Americans travel to Mexican resort areas during spring break each year. Much of the drug violence is happening in border towns, and tourists have generally not been targeted, though there have been killings in the big spring-break resorts of Acapulco and Cancun, well away from the border.
The University of Arizona in Tucson is urging its approximately 37,000 students not to go to Mexico. Other universities � in the Southwest and far beyond, including Penn State, Notre Dame, the University of Colorado and the University at Buffalo � said they would call students' attention to the travel warning issued Feb. 20 by the State Department.
The State Department stopped short of warning spring breakers not to go to Mexico, but advised them to avoid areas of prostitution and drug-dealing and take other commonsense precautions.
'Indiscriminate violence'
"Sage advice," said Tom Mangan, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. "We have had documented violence, attacks, killings, shootouts with the drug cartels involving not only the military but law enforcement personnel. It is indiscriminate violence, and certainly innocent people have been caught up in that collateral damage."
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llj2kll
Joined: 23 Feb 2009
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| Posted: Fri Feb 27, 2009 2:20 pm Post subject: |
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| Thanks for posting this, good to know |
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Bibbitybop
Joined: 22 Feb 2006
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Fri Feb 27, 2009 7:23 pm Post subject: |
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I loved the new list of travel warnings:
Congo
Isreal and Gaza
Mexico
Put the American military on the border, legalize marijuana and focus the drug war on hard drugs coming into the country. Anything else besides "invading" the border towns in Mexico is worthless. |
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Mdvl_lady50
Joined: 22 Oct 2008
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| Posted: Sat Feb 28, 2009 8:47 am Post subject: |
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I am of the opinion that for the most part Mexico is fine as a tourist -- Just be aware of your surroundings -- as in not in a tequila trance. Even when I first started traveling there when dinosaurs roamed in 1968, it was pretty obvious what was acceptable and not. Biggest eyeopener for me as a youngster was in 1972 when I participated in a road trip from Newport Beach, CA to Mexico City. It took awhile in that old VW bus. I learned first hand of the graft, etc., and having to pay off border agents just to get the pleasure of visiting their country. I just sucked it up, as in I spoke relatively good conversational Spanish. It also didn't hurt that I was blonde and blue eyed (amazing how that will get you Korean teaching jobs:)
In the 80's, I'd take my daughters into Baja with no problem to the Rosarito Beach hotels. It was only when my eldest turned about 12, and the comments from the street became obnoxious, that we switched vacationland to the beach in California.
I take the current warning very seriously about visiting Mexico. After a 3 year hiatus in England, I relocated to Arizona after living in southern Califormia most of my life. One of my parents' close friend is a Mexican native born, who has since become an Ameican citizen. Actually, he's a Yaqui Indian (but that's another story). He's very confident, does well in this country work wise, and has just stopped going into Mexico to visit his relatives. Until things get better, he says, "It's just not worth it." He is apprehensive.
Like the previous poster, I wish pot could be legalized and just really crack (no pun intended) down on the hard stuff. |
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Don Mario
Joined: 28 Jun 2007
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| Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2009 9:01 pm Post subject: Mexican Tourist Warning |
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 Ola to you going to Mexico!
I have travelled to Mexico since I was 21.
I did it without the aid of Lonley Planet, Rough Guide
books. I took trains, buses, hitchiked, stayed in
brothels, cockroach hotels, drank in cantinas
hung out on the beach and...I am here to this day
thirty years later!
Never spend any time in
a border town. Get on the nearest form of public
transportation and vamos.
Tourist resorts:
For the guys, dont act like the stud from
North of the border and hit on the local girls.
The local guys may be relaxed about it for
a few minutes, but the scene can and usually
does turn ugly, real quick.
To the ladies, same advice (in reverse).
The biggest scam going is when a stranger approaches a
foriegner and asks them to a private place (hotel, apartment)
away from the beach or nightclub, restaruant. Trouble
starts as soon as you enter the door. The unsuspecting
gringo may loose thier money or thier life, or both.
Mexico is a live and let live country. Anything goes, and usually
all at the same time. It is a foreign country, even though it
is North America.
Now go and have a fine vacation!
The Don |
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