When you arrive at Bajaras International Airport in Madrid, there are no open-bag inspections or hard-nosed, stiff-eyed questions.  There is only one thing you will encounter again and again and again: “Watch out for pickpockets.  Keep an eye on your belongings.  They are everywhere here.”

            The advice was so common that for my first two days in Madrid I thought it prudent to spend most of my free time in the room, sleeping off jet lag and not getting robbed.  When, on the eve of my second night in the country, I finally ventured towards the Plaza Mayor, an orange-brick enclosed square block of the city with patio tables lining the perimeter and a graying statue of military genius adorning the center, I believed everyone I passed on the street was a thief.  They wanted my money, they wanted my passport, they did not want me here.

            In the hostels, too, among the frugal travelers who nomadically toured Europe—a night in Milan, four nights in Brussels, a fortnight in the cities of Spain—stories of handbags discovered missing and chasing Arab boys down the street for a wallet were oft-repeated topics of conversation.  But a few days in the country was enough to prove that the people were kind and non-violent, and not everyone on the street was eyeing your imitation silver watch.

            In Granada, home to the impossible Moorish castle Alhambra, the narrow, dark, grey cobble stone streets wind through the ancient city that was once capitol of Arabic Spain.   Here, we were again told, watch out.  Don’t wander alone at night.  Beware of daily muggings.  Ok, Ok, we had heard it before.  Which way to the tapas bars?  In Granada, when you order a drink, the food is free.

            At the end of a late-afternoon October siesta, with the Sierra Nevada mountain air lightly breezing through and the tall Judas trees above casting thin shadows over an outdoor blue plastic table, five souls from three different countries drank tintos de verano and munched on fresh green olives.  The conversation, switching unnoticed between Spanish and English, was mostly of travel experience.  A girl from Holland had been chased through a German alley by a wino with a needle who threatened that the syringe contained the AIDS virus.  An American from Texas with a long scar from the cheek-bone of the right side of his face down to the chin confessed that it came from an angry, beer-drenched Mexican in a Forth Worth bar seeking a fight.  The talk was thick but the mood was serene; after all, here we were in Spain, drinking red wine and sprite in the crisp fall sun, all about to begin working in Spanish schools for a year teaching our native language.  Twelve hours a week, 630 euros a month in Andalucia, Western Europe’s cheapest region, where a bottle of wine in the grocery store costs 60 cents.  We were rich in both money and time.

            Like most tourist destinations and large cities throughout the world, it is common in Granada for paupers to approach the table at which you eat and try to sell you things: CDs, flowers, hand-carved wooden giraffes, cheap silver.  Two teenage boys approached our table that afternoon, speaking too quickly in Spanish for any of us non-native speakers to understand.  They waved newspapers in front of our faces, and asked if we wanted to buy them. 

            “No, no, gracias,” I said, along with my four new friends.  But the boys did not leave.  They kept waving the newspapers and speaking ever more rapidly.  In the midst of the confusion they created, one of the boys lowered his newspaper pile onto the lap of an Austrian girl seated at our table. 

            “Stop!  Stop!” cried the Dutch girl among us, pushing away the hand of the Spanish boy.  The wallet of the Austrian girl fell out of his hand and onto the cobble stone sidewalk.  We had become targets for theft because the Austrian girl sat with her purse opened in her lap, exactly the posture these young thieves were searching for.  Were it not for the street-wise Dutch girl savvy enough to foil their plan, we would have very quickly become just another number in the day’s robbery tally.

            “Lo siento,” said the boy, smiling, as he walked off.

            “Yea, you have a good day,” said the garish Texan.  The Spanish boys laughed and continued their innocent, lazy stroll away from the table.