Sense of Security

This past week I had to go to San Francisco for some paperwork for the visa issue. The State building is located on Golden Gate Ave - for those of you unfamiliar with the area it's not a nice one. It's sorta verging on the Tenderloin which is exactly the kind of area you want to not walk through, ever.

Anyway, I wasn't crazy about the drive and then the parking was a hassle, but when I realized where I was I was even less thrilled. I finally, after much circling, found a space to park - right at an intersection that had four police cars within a block's radius - two on each street.

In the few minutes it took for me to park, cross the street to the donut shop for change - twice - and cross the street to my car again I was more uncomfortable than I I have been the entire time I've been in Prague. Think of it like this - I am more comfortable walking by myself through a strange city with well over a million inhabitants at 2 am, in a country where I don't speak the language than I am walking three blocks in San Francisco, an area I am quite familiar with, in the middle of the day with a visible police presence. (OK, the police were already occupied, on each block, with large problems... just reinforcing my discomfort.)

My sense of security has changed. I can expect pick pockets in Prague but I am not face to face with the threatening crazed drug addicts you find on the streets here - the potential for violent crime is much much higher over here. Unlike Coca-Cola this is one instance where the new is a definitive improvement of the old.