Posted on 06/11/2005 11:05:50 AM PDT by kcvl
Per Fox News...
What some of us are saying however is that there are time-tested ways to avoid things like this...
Thanks for letting me know Aruba hasn't changed all that much as far as crime goes.
I agree with you about people who say they wouldn't let their children go to a place like this is kidding themselves. The Aruba I remember was much safer than some of the places parents let their kids go for spring break or even just taking a day trip with friends to places like Corpus Christi, Galveston and numerous places up and down the Texas Gulf Coast.
People don't realize just how small Aruba is and how much is known by the local authorities about some of the "bad" elements like the drug dealers. Shoot, the last night we were there we met what seemed to be a very nice man with what we took to be his wife or girlfriend. The concierge at our hotel pulled aside and let us know the "nice" was a dealer and her pimp. The poor girl was trying to find a better life than the one she knew on Haiti. Anyway, my point being, the island is so small that the concierge, the maids, the waiters all got to know a little about you and tended to watch out over you.
More interesting to me were the wealthy Venezualans who thought nothing about dropping 10,000.00 USD on one number at the roulette table. I had never imagined such riches where one could waste money like that.
Again, I apologize for going off topic. I suppose I'm having a difficult time in associating murder and Aruba in the same sentence.
I think I'll go call my son now just to touch base. Again, I offer my prayers, thoughts and hope for justice for Natalee. Her poor parents!
That's what I've been thinking
happened, for a long time.
Those guys are predators.
This girl didn't want to
put-out & they weren't
having it.
Sounds like a good plan to me!
Where's the fun in that? It's much more fun for people to point out how they handle things so much better with their own children. Never mind the fact that with 99% of them, when their kid walks out the door they're in a statistically more dangerous place than Aruba.
In just a few weeks Natalee was going to be in Tuscaloosa, which has a much higher rate of violent crimes (still below the national avg.) and where it's NO trouble at all for an 18 year old to find all the alcohol she wants.
again , we don't know it was murder , she could've slipped on rocks out at the lighthouse , they tried to walk away from this
I believe they did.
I agree. Too many on these threads are expecting an out-of -the-way, small-town police department to react like a big-city department used to operating in a media fishbowl.
"Chaperones or parents or whomever, there is WAYYYY to much stuff for an 18 yr old to get into in another country."
"My kid will NOT be going out of the country right around his/her HS graduation...."
Sadly, tragic events such as this one can happen anywhere, and even more often it seems within our own country. A graduation trip can turn deadly no matter where they go. A parent just has to pray and hope that all of their warnings about such things did not fall on deaf ears.
I agree; I gave similar advice to my own son.
I was surprised, when attending the parents' portion of his college orientation, to see a rabid anti-male stance from one of the campus safety organizations. We were told that the incoming female students were being told during their orientation that all men were potential rapists, etc.
I told my son to be wary of time alone with girls because it appeared the cards were stacked against him, administratively. If the girl wanted to bring charges, she would be supported before he would. Best just to keep to group activities.
Fortunately, he selected a dorm where students agreed not to smoke, drink, or do drugs (yes, I know these are all illegal in some degree for the under 21 crowd, but you know kids still engage in these activities). It cut down on a lot of the shenanigans that young people away from home for the first time can get in to.
I saw same when I lived in Malaysia. I saw one guy (Chinese), drop over $50,000USD, in a few minutes at a black jack table. And he kept playing. I couldn't watch any longer. Turned my stomach. Things I could have done w/that kind of $.
I have to say that's just awful. It appears she had a bright life ahead of her. Does anyone know of any way in which we can contact the family? It may help to know that the whole country feels thier pain and shares in their loss.
You are a wise mama to your kiddos! A lot of people have a hard time understanding that other countries just don't do things the way we do. When kids get in trouble abroad, sometimes it's very difficult to extricate them; and when it's something as awful as this, justice is hard-won, if it's achieved at all. In my opinion, had it not been for the FBI being down there to prod them a bit, there wouldn't have been much of an investigation. In fact, were it not for the need for tourism money, even then there might not have been.
She was on vaction for goodness sakes. I hope you two aren't serious in actually blaming the girl?????
You know, I was going to express shock, but I'm on the UWashington campus and I think I saw convicts a year or so ago. They were doing landscaping/concrete work in a fenced-in area, but yeah, convicts on campus. The ones I saw were all women, but that's just the group I saw that day. Hmmm.
'Tis better to be overprotective than underprotective.
BTW, I am very overprotective
when looking after my grandsons,
too.
Now Fox is saying blood evidence was found in their car.
You have Freepmail.
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