Forums > Areas > Jalisco's Lake Chapala Region

Hound Dog

Oct 2, 2009, 3:46 PM

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Ripped Off. Read My story

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OK, this has never happened to me before at least since 1969 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in the town plaza, a notorious place for thieves and whores and drunks and an expected place for criminal activity . Hear me out.

On September, 22nd, I was the victim of pickpockets in the WalMart parking lot in Ajijic and lost my wallet. The details later but let´s keep it brief here.

I was the victim of a middle aged man and his youthful accomplice who lifted my wallet in an artful manner while pretending to assist me in unloading my groceries and returning my grocery cart to the cart area during which time these thieves distracted me and stole my wallet and I am normally an attentive shopper who refuses assistance of any kind in the parking lot of any boxstore. I tell you this to warn you that we are all vulnerable and you should never - EVER - accept any sort of assistance whatsoever in this parking lot which is the bailiwick of thieves and a cesspool of mismanagement by the Ajijic WalMart´s incompetent staff. I tell you this as a victim of these thieves and blunderers and I will provide details later. For now, here is what happened:

My wallet was stolen from my right front bluejeans pocket in that parking lot by two accomplished thieves pretending to aid me in loading the trunk of my car and returning my shopping cart to the shopping cart bin. Later, I had some interesting experiences in replacing my Jalisco driver´s license and some credit cards and I will tell you what happened there later but for now I warn you to avoid even the most innocent appearing assistance in the parking lot of the relatively new Ajijic Walmart as you may seriously regret your decision to come even near anyone offering to help you in any way in that parking lot.

Personally, I will never pull into that parking lot again and I will never shop in that boxstore again under any circumstances but you do whatever pleases you. I am not encouraging you to do anything but please understand that I have been bleeding from every pore in my body for three weeks after what was done to me in the parking lot of that store which I wish to God had never landed in our village.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 2, 2009, 4:44 PM)

Zorba

Oct 2, 2009, 4:15 PM

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How did they get into your front pocket? I personally can just not understand how this happens? I cant imagine anyone getting my wallet out of my front pocket.

Hound Dog

Oct 2, 2009, 4:21 PM

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How did they get into your front pocket? I personally can just not understand how this happens? I cant imagine anyone getting my wallet out of my front pocket.

That is my problem as well, Zorba. We both call the right front pocket "the safe" because it seems much more secure than that right back pocket yet those bastards took that wallet out of there as easily as catching scurrying blue crabs on the shallows of Mobile Bay at 6:00AM with a net. I´ll tell you that had I stayed around there another 15 minutes they would today have my stuffed penis on the wall of some fishing shack in Honduras not that that would have proven much of a catch like Johnny "The Wad" Holmes but that is another story.

Now, I used to know folks who could get into my right front pocket with alacrity and steal my personality temporarily but they always left the goods where they found them stealing only the replacable contents . Today they probably all look like Susan Atkins on her death bed and if they squeezed my you-know-what it would be strictly for scientific reseach or I´d slap them cross the head.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 2, 2009, 4:28 PM)

Hound Dog

Oct 2, 2009, 4:34 PM

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In all seriousness despite the light banter betwen Zorba and Bubba. These people are once again twice as fast as you are at your fastest. They know you better than you know them. Distraction is easily achieved. Why is WalMart in Ajijic allowing their parking lot to be a festering schoolyard for miscreants? It is a local disgrace. This store is seriously mismanaged. The day will not dawn that I darken their door ever again. That does not mean that you should not. Do as you please.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 2, 2009, 4:53 PM)

TlxcalaClaudia

Oct 2, 2009, 5:00 PM

Post #5 of 21 (10172 views)

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I agree...let NO ONE (stranger) help you.

Peter

Oct 3, 2009, 1:50 PM

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If you are unsure how it was done that leaves at least a little room for doubt. Little doubt that you were indeed ripped-off but it is fitting to relate my incident.

Also using the front-pocket safe as a lifelong habit because my wallet has always been so over-stuffed with money that in the rear pocket it would cause me to list dramatically to the left as I sit. Unbeknownst to me at that moment I had dropped my wallet just after leaving Farmacia Guadalajara check stand in Centro Morelia which was about two more steps to the sidewalk outdoors. A lady called to me and as I turned to look she bent down, picked up my wallet and handed it to me. I think that happened on my very first trip here.

As unbelieveable as it was to you that you could permit such a thing to occur it was at least equally unbelievable to me I could do such a thing.

Hound Dog

Oct 3, 2009, 2:22 PM

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Peter:

It took me some time to believe that these slimeballs were so slick and I was so stupid that they could steal my wallet from that right front blue jean pocket without my having noticed the theft. Remember that, as is usual, we had two thieves working in tandem; a middle-aged guy throwing a large number of grocery bags into my car trunk and a young boy offering to return my shopping cart to the shopping cart bin. All of this happened simultaneously and I was clearly duped. The jeans I was wearing were loose fitting with front pockets not tightly fitted and, while I still find it hard to believe how easily I was set up here is why I know for a fact that this is what happened.

In what I thought was my right front pocket safe, I carried only two things. That wallet and a remote control for a new household alarm system we have just purchased at great expense to protect our home in a poor neighborhood in West Ajijic from burglary as there has been a recent huge increase in home burglaries in West Ajijic. When I arrived home I discovered that the remote control which I had kept under my wallet was under the driver´s seat where I was sitting to drive my car home. At first I had thought that that device was also gone but there it was where it could only have been had my wallet been lifted by a pickpocket. My wallet was picked from my pocket in the WalMart parking lot in Ajijic and there is no question about that but I can prove nothing. Ignore my posting about this at your peril. I won´t ever be back there for sure. Ever!

By the way, I walk my dogs through La Floresta every day and today I stopped to speak with a Mexican friend who works on a yard on that street that runs in front of the Real de Chapala Hotel and while we were chatting an obviously well-to-do Tapatia who is a homeowner there pulled up to discuss neighborhood crime in the area and when she left my friend and I talked of crime and he told me that La Floresta is under siege and that there had been numerous burglaries on that street alone and that things were out of hand. That´s La Floresta in the vicinity of the Real de Chapala folks. Things are spinning out of control.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 3, 2009, 2:27 PM)

wendy devlin

Oct 3, 2009, 3:17 PM

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Hound Dog

Oct 3, 2009, 3:53 PM

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Bubba,
You used to wax on, on various foras, about Thorntree Mexico Branch, where people shared up to date travel information/ scams with the greatest of scorn.

And offer your advise as definitive to the Mexican experience.

Has something changed? Or is a new dog, learning new tricks?

Wendy:

Maybe I´nm just getting old but here is one take on the story.

Mexiconnect is, at present, the only intellectually challenging forum board serving the expat community at Lakeside and elsewhere in Mexico with a facility to talk of other interesting parts of Mexico where English based forums are at best scarce and that doesn´t mean that they are that good just the only game in town. Try to find a serious English based opinion or information board in Chiapas or in most other places down where my interests now center and you will be unsuccessful I promise you.

Now, David (the webjefe here ) and I have had our serious disagreements but this fellow who invested in this product has not only put up with me but has invited me back after numerous transgressions on my part to sound off here thanks almost certainly to the occasional intercession of Tony Burton and if you look beyond the normal evolution of these webboards you will find that this one has evolved rather than devolved and I like being a part of that evolution.

Now, I don´t want you to think that I am sucking up to these clowns but why don´t you tell me a better place these days for my comments? Chapala.Com? Expatforum? GayTuscaloosa.Com? Give me a break.

I believe Mexconnect will become a primary forum for Mexico in the future and I am investing my personal input there. I may be wrong but I promise you this. It won´t be the first or last time.
Meanwhile, let´s go with somebody who has the balls to try rather than some moron who is just trying to sell real estate.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 3, 2009, 4:27 PM)

wendy devlin

Oct 3, 2009, 4:25 PM

Post #10 of 21 (9934 views)

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HD,
Hopefully you know me, enough, by now. To know.
Always listen. At least,a little. To the most truth=speaking person in the room.
Even if. That person is socially unacceptable to the accepted company in question.

Mexican tradition dating back tothe Aztec poet-king, Nezahualcóyot, completely disguised, who legend, has it, wandered among his people, listening to what they said.

Not that I'm any Neza.
Just a person, who talks with anyone, who talks with me about their perceptions. And thinks, acts about those perceptions.

In historical context.

So shoot me dead, Hound Dog! With some caustic rebuttal.

However. There must be some God/Goddess that will rise from the dead:)

tashby

Oct 3, 2009, 4:39 PM

Post #11 of 21 (9931 views)

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Absolutely agree that MexConnect is the best thing going for discussion. That said....

In Reply To

Remember that, as is usual, we had two thieves working in tandem; a middle-aged guy throwing a large number of grocery bags into my car trunk and a young boy offering to return my shopping cart to the shopping cart bin. All of this happened simultaneously and I was clearly duped.

In other words, these were professionals.

They're in the parking lot of Walmart in Ajijic.....and on the subway in Paris. Same tricks. No?

It's a great warning, and thank you. I've also heard that the Walmart parking lot in Ajijic is active with various types of thieves. You're not the first victim, for sure.

It sucks. But wherever there are people coming and going with money.....

Thanks for the reminder. I'm a "front pocket guy", too, and was asked if I wanted help just the other day.

Hound Dog

Oct 3, 2009, 6:29 PM

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and on the subway in Paris. Same tricks. No?

I have ridden the metro in Paris until the end of dawn. Hitchhiked through wild pricincts in East Africa, walked through the mean strets of the San Francsco tenderloin. Sat across the desk from Huey Newton in Central Oakland and I´ll tell you what. I had to end up in this place in a crappy WalMart to be robbed as if I were some yokel just out of Mobile on my first road trip to the Big Easy. Tell me that is not where I do not wish to be . I dislike this town at best.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 3, 2009, 6:30 PM)

chinagringo

Oct 3, 2009, 6:39 PM

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Bob:

As you know, I have lived all over the world and traveled extensively, my experience happened in NYC. Back in 1979, I was staying at the Barbezon (sp?) Plaza Hotel on Central Park. A customer told me stay in your hotel and eat dinner there as it had a decent restaurant and was SAFE! I went down to the restaurant and complied with their dress code that sportcoats were required. Inside my left chest pocket, I had my wallet which included my Passport. Had a decent dinner and decided on an after dinner drink in the bar - just one! When I got up the next morning, my wallet was gone - Passport and credit cards and all. It can happen anywhere!

I reported the cards immediately and they were used the first day in NYC and the second day on LA. The investigators from VISA and AMEX explained that they paid stewardesses to carry them across country on the flights. Amazingly, the wallet with Passport was dropped in a mail box and was returned to me along with my drivers license about two weeks latter by USPS. Way before identity theft and such.
Regards,
Neil
Albuquerque, NM

(This post was edited by chinagringo on Oct 3, 2009, 6:43 PM)

tashby

Oct 3, 2009, 6:49 PM

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I guess your number was up?

If you replace East Africa with some sketchy mercados in Zimbabwe, and swap out Hewey Newton for Hewey Lewis, I've been to all those other places, too. (And actually, I find the meanstreets of the Tenderloin in S.F. quite friendly. Maybe it's my pretty smile?)

Kidding aside.....it really DOES suck to be ripped off at a store like that in a town like this.

I get it.

Thanks again for the reminder about not falling into the "too comfortable anywhere" trap. And that's what really sucks.

Hound Dog

Oct 3, 2009, 7:41 PM

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I made what I thought were good friends in Addis Ababa´s main plaza in 1969 and together we watched the U.S. moon landing in a celebratory mood and then I took a combi to an ancient coptic cathedral in the middle of nowhere about 100 kilometers outside of Addis Ababa and the Ethiopian driver of that van got progressively looped as he drove toward this wilderness destination and he kept insisting that I drink with him at every rural bar we passed while the Ethiopan folks with us waited interminably in the van while we became more and more inebriated and once we got out into the middle of the wilderness which. in Ethiopia in 1969 was truly wilderness, he told me that he was a Mau Mau (Jomo Kenyatas´s "terrorist" movement dedicated to assasinating British colonialists in adjacent Kenya) out there in the middle of nowhere, to cut my white throat and leave my corpse as offal for birds of prey and I told him that he had better be fast because before he could do that I would be disembowelling him right there on the road back to Addis and he told me that perhaps we should return to Addis without harming each other and we did that while, no doubt, scaring the hell out of locals who had not signed on to this unexpected adventure but anyway we got back to where we started and my wallet was gone and if you think losing a wallet in 2009 in Ajijic is a problem, try losing one in Addis Ababa in 1969.

And all these years later some buntbrain and his assistant steal my wallet in the WalMart parking lot in Ajijic.

cristalhombre

Oct 3, 2009, 8:06 PM

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tashby

Oct 3, 2009, 9:03 PM

Post #17 of 21 (9823 views)

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In Reply To

And all these years later some buntbrain and his assistant steal my wallet in the WalMart parking lot in Ajijic.

That's the worst part, isn't it? In the parking lot of Walmart.....in Ajijic! Lawdy, the humiliation!

Here's a deal: when this happens to me - and it no doubt will one day - I'll send you a bottle of Tequiza.

Thanks for the entertainment, and the warning.

Hound Dog

Oct 4, 2009, 6:45 AM

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Dawg

Good thing you were not in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Barcelona........... you probably would have been left standing in your "boxers" - sin trousers, without a clue.......those guys are pros. I used to ride the subways there just to observe the pick pockets work on the unsuspected visiting from South Bend. Very slick dudes - these Grifters! You are correct about one thing for sure. They tend to work in teams.

Hopefully they did not get the prized Wal-Mart deli items, Velveeta and Spam outta the grocery bags too.

Sorry it happened to you HD. But a good lesson for everyone - Stay alert!

Great stuff, cristalhombre. Lots of fun comments here but this one hits home. A month or so ago we were walking the streets of Paris and repeatedly riding the metro and I was constantly alert, allowing no one near me and, when rubbing elbows during rush hours on the metro, constantly monitoring my wallet in a thieve´s den and I came home intact only to have my wallet stolen in the Ajijic WalMart parking lot for Christ´s sake.

That is one reason I warn the rest of you. One tends to be less attentive when at home and in Sam Walton´s back yard. That´s when we are all vulnerable and I am trying to warn others that the best possible thing you can do in that WalMart parking lot is keep everyone at bay at all times - period.

Paris, by the way, like Barcelona, is infested with criminals - especially swarming kids. Here it´s not so obvious in the plain vanilla parking lot of downhome WalMart. I remember my wife´s telling me of her misspent youth on the Bay of Arcachon where she spent her summers oystering as a kid. She tells me her friends loved to swarm tourists eating at seaside restaurants from agile craft , stealing food and then running for it on the boats and they were never caught.

I guarantee you that if WalMart Ajijic management gave a damn they could stop this tomorrow. Too bad they don´t seem to care.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 4, 2009, 6:47 AM)

don pedro

Oct 4, 2009, 7:20 AM

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good grief bubba! are you so infirm that ya gotta have somebody help ya with yer bags o' spam and cheeze whiz?

i don't do much shopping at wallymart fer other reasons.
i shop at sorriana and ya get the same thing in their parking lot but i don't need no help wit me bags o' goredmet rib eyes and fresh frizzed shrimp. a simple no gracias does the trick.
http://chapalamexicoinfo.createforumhosting.com
naivete is a chronIc disease and by its very nature;the afflicted never know they have it.-SNORK!

Hound Dog

Oct 4, 2009, 7:44 AM

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good grief bubba! are you so infirm that ya gotta have somebody help ya with yer bags o' spam and cheeze whiz?

That´s a good point, Pedro and worth a comment. I hate to admit this because it makes me feel like a nitwit but, God, I should not admit this; I was trying to be nice to the guy so he could make a buck. I think it is important for the rest of you, including my insolent friend Pedro, to hear this. I was being foolish like some old beanbag from the Alberta Frozen Tundra who thinks Montana is in Europe and that redneck Montreal is Paris.

OK. My mistake. I went through hell for two weeks because I was a sentimental old fool. I´m trying to save the rest of you that embarrassment. It is impossible to embarrass the Dawg who has friends like Pedro and, ipso facto, has no personal pride.

More than anything else, however, I want WalMart management to get the message. If you cannot manage the Ajijic store and prevent these blatant thefts on your store property or, even worse, a lousy credit card promotion- leave or better yet move next to Pedro´s house in Chapala and take over that two bit tienda where he and his thuggish friends hang out . We do not need your store which takes up way too much room to store Velveeta and Spam which are the essential ingredients for romantic candlelit dinners for bikers´ Thursday night Cumbaya Circle Jerks at Pedro´s mansion but not essential for anyone else.

(This post was edited by Hound Dog on Oct 4, 2009, 7:54 AM)

Geos

Oct 4, 2009, 9:13 AM

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I got pick pocketed twice - in Poland and TJ. Never felt a thing, never knew it happened till hours later. Revolting tho they may be let's give credit where it's due - these guys are artists. But it's like anything else - one has to protect oneself from the slings and arrows. I wear my seatbelt, don't smoke, eat healthy, use a water filter and carry a dummy wallet with fake credit cards and funny money whenever I'm in "shady" areas and hope I get pick pocketed. Just imagining the frustration of the thieves when they find out they've been beaten at their own game makes it worth the effort. The only thing more satisfying would be a putting a bullet in each of their heads.