How not to behave in a foreign country

[DoughDoe]

So matey here www.facebook.com/dr.emil.kaminski climbs a mountain in a foreign land, like so many backpackers before him.

And he persuades fellow members of the group climbing that it's a good idea to pose naked, piss on the sacred mountain top (you are supposed to 'ask for permission' of the spirits before doing this), and then plaster it all over your public Facebook pages of your half-assed travel-the-world-and-make-crappy-Youtube-videos venture www.facebook.com/Monkeetime?fref=ts

While you are still in said foreign country, in a small town where white people will stick out like a sore thumb.

And then an earthquake killed 18 people on the mountain, which was ascribed to the wrath of the mountain following their behaviour.

Then the others in the group were arrested, while he attempted to hide out

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3117940/British-woman-four-tourists-arrested-stripping-naked-mountain-Malaysia-locals-say-angered-tribal-spirits-caused-deadly-earthquake.html

Now he has been arrested as well....

[Isitmebut]

The Netherlands cited, not Majorca or Ibiza, how very convenient - is anyone saying what goes on there or even our main city high streets at closing time having enjoyed an evening of our "cafe society", does not offend the majority of locals?

Having watched 'The Good Wife' tonight and flicking channels to find something before This Week, I didn't get far (Four Music Channel/Freeview 18) before I found 'What Happens in Sunny Beach..' which is in Bulgaria.

Now it takes a lot to disgust me, as many, many moon ago due to cancelled bookings (and needing to leave within days for an alternative) I even ended up on a Club 18-30's holiday and had the time of my life - and even relate to what happens after arriving back from a boozy day time boat trips - but what happened on that programme made me totally despair for the future/livers of our youth.

So several young people in Malaysia got nude and was disrespectful x-thousand feet up a mountain, the dilemma is what should be an acceptable punishment there, when those armchair critics saying ‘serves you right’ don’t bat an eyelid when the flower of our youth to go to European countries, often simulating sex acts outdoors and in, and are drinking for most of the day until laying in the gutter spewing, with legs akimbo.

It is no more acceptable being street to street disrespectful to the locals in Magaluf, Ibiza, Bulgaria, Newcastle, Manchester or London, than to the people/mountain where you previously had to sacrifice 7 chickens before journeying – but we not only accept it, we are prepared to judge and disregard a young English girl, who having did voluntary work in Botswana and raised money for charity, she is clearly a better person than most of our young clubbing Neanderthals.

As a society, we are so fucked up.

[jazzsyncopation]

ACTUALLY, I DONT Think she's better than them :lady bountiful: private school: sense of superiority to their beliefs : they were TOLD by guides to show respect but 'we know better' /'what do they know' attitude prevailed...bet they wouldn't have done it at buckingham palace....!/her school's 'founder's day',say,or memorial stuff, here...........

+btw how do you know the "armchair critics dont bat an eyelid" about other tourists' bad behaviour?

+WHY DO YOU ASSUME THE OTHER TOURISTS DONT DO "VOLUNTARY WORK IN BOTSWANA/OTHER ? WOULD THAT MAKE IT ALRIGHT LIKE?

[DoughDoe]

The young English girl having had the benefit of private education and done voluntary work in Botswana should know better than the clubbing Neanderthals.

And there is the basic fact that while vomiting and shagging in the street in Magaluf isn't a very nice thing to do, people do it knowing basically that there are no legal penalties for that. You might smoke a spliff in Amsterdam but you would be daft to do so in Singapore - the behaviour is the same, but it's basic common sense, that if you must behave disrepectfully you don't do it somewhere where they might chop your hands off as punishment.

[Isitmebut]

Watch 'What Happens in Sunny Beach...' next week and then tell me those people don't KNOW what they are doing it totally anti social, or that if they were TOLD while being hit around the head with used arse wipes, that THEY would moderate their behaviour.

Oh, and most of them would think "BOTSWANA" is an alcho-pop.

[DoughDoe]

She did the Botswana trip as a jolly from her expensive school when she was 16.

[Isitmebut]

DoughDoe ..... re your "but it's basic common sense, that if you must behave disrepectfully you don't do it somewhere where they might chop your hands off as punishment."

Surely the jury is still out that if no one had died in the earthquake allegedly caused by those 'flashing' to their mountain gods, the level of complaints by the surrounding villagers would not have forced the police to act by popular demand.

You show me any Malaysian law that sez they'll chop anything off for causing an earthquake?

Of course stealing/flashing in the Middle East or drug trafficking in the Far East could end up with 'bits' getting chopped off, but causing a fucking earthquake, Duh.

[Isitmebut]

Botswana-by-the-sea, what a school trip that was, how many Comprehensives offer that, and how many would go if they do?

[Isitmebut]

Now we know she's posh, let 'the people's court' hang the bitch. Pathetic.

[DoughDoe]

"Now we know she's posh, let 'the people's court' hang the bitch. Pathetic."

Eh, you were the one who tried bringing class into it by comparing it to chav holidays to Magaluf.

[Isitmebut]

....yeah and didn't the 'class warriors' jump on it?

[Isitmebut]

The point was whether learning about Botswana or raising money for charity, she is unlikely to be a generally bad/disrespectful person, but no doubt if she was, we'll now hear about.

[jazzsyncopation]

nobody said she was "generally bad/disrespectful"...but you were implying it about the 'other type' of tourist?....prob completely unfairly, as lots of them prob do 'worthwhile 'jobs just as much as she does
WHY WOULD THEY THINK BOTSWANA'S AN ALCOPOP EXACTLY??????

[FastWindow]

Think the point was that girl was provably sensible and intelligent so this was actually more of a lapse of judgment on her (and presumably all the others') part...

I did read somewhere today that hikers to this sacred mountain are warned of its sacredness (is that a word?)

A bit like visiting Auschwitz and having yourself a little picnic inside. Ill-advised, inappropriate, insensitive. But criminal? Sure... Depending on the country. And back to the intelligent traveller... Should know better.

I covered my shoulders in Dubai airport when I went. That's what they expect - that's what I did. It's a cardigan vs possible arrest. I prefer woolly safety.

[jazzsyncopation]

You're right : if someone from another country behaved like that at the cenitaph/auschwitz/princess diana memorial there'd be hell to pay -whether they'd volunteered in Botswana or not(wondering how folk from Botswana might feel about this......grateful???)

[sanfairyanne]

or its more like if someone stripped off on the top of snowdonia at a time when noone else could see them, then posted the pics on fb

its a mountain

[exLtEveDallasNoBollocks]

In 1993 I had a shower under a natural waterfall at the base of Mt Kinabalu, following the climb to the top. A friend and I had run back down the mountain because walking it was too hard on the knees. When we got to the waterfall platform we didn't really think, stripped off our T Shirts and went under the water in our bras and shorts.

A guide quickly come over and explained how disrespectful it was.

We were mortified. We didn't rant and rave and complain, we apologised, profusely and covered up. By the time the rest of our group got to us the guide (and his boss) had invited us all to a celebratory dinner that evening.

That's how you do it. Not like these idiots. No sympathy for any of them.

[sanfairyanne]

is it some variant of godwins law to invoke auschwitz btw? genocide is not the same you know.

[Isitmebut]

On the 'if a tree fell in a forest and no body heard it...' theme, it was indeed on top of a mountain, not a busy national monument to a lost but loved person, fallen armed services, or scene of mass social cleansing/murder.

If someone flashed on top of a sacred mountain and wasn't put on social media, did it happen, was an actual criminal offense caused?

For Eleanor Hawkins the danger is with no national Malaysian law about flashing in front a guide x-thousand feet and thereby cited as causing an earthquake, it then gets referred to a local Tribal Court in the area where locals, including children, died.

When Eleanor comes back here, if she keeps her clothes on, drinks herself legless and becomes one of the what, 70% of total 'emergencies' at our NHS A&E's, it will not only be socially acceptable, she will obtain bragging rights and a badge of honour, via that same social media.

[Isitmebut]

"We didn't rant and rave and complain,"

Pray tell, WHO ranted, raved and complain in this Malaysian case?

[BarbarianMum]

sanefairy can you explain to me why auschwitz should be inherently sacred to a group of young people from the Malayan hinterland (I'm not arguing that it isn't, or shouldn't be, sacred to Europeans and Jewish people? I don't see any reason, but if a group of young Malayans found themselves there and decided to piss on the ground and post footage of themselves doing it on the internet there would be a huge reaction, and quite rightly so -. because it matters to us.

The Mountain was sacred. It doesn't matter if we can't understand why that would be so. No stranger than attaching sanctity to a pile of bricks like St Pauls, or a piece of bread, if you think about it.

[ItsAllGoingToBeFine]

The guy who was "leading" the group - did you not see his YouTube video?....

[chocolateyay]

Yes he did have a bit of a rant didn't he? Great idea - insult a whole nation and call the tourism minister a regressive prick. Oh yes, that will certainly endear him.

[sanfairyanne]

you know, i almost didnt post about the auschwitz comments because it is just too depressingly awful to have to then try to explain the difference between a site of mass murder and genocide and a religious/imaginary god site. humanity often depresses me, but never more than when people cant distinguish between a place where a million actual living children women and men were led to their deaths and which stands as a public memorial to over six million people murdered because of their ethnic origin, religious beliefs, sexual orientation, political activism, or just for no reason at all, and a mountain with religious significance. i can never ever ever ever ever understand the moral equivalence some people have between real actual lives and deaths and religious beliefs. mumsnet never depresses me more than when posters genuinely dont think that a memorial to the largest genocide in history is any different to a site of religious significance.

[sanfairyanne]

on a different topic, i thought that youtube guy was not one of the 'strippers'

[Isitmebut]

ItsAllGoingToBeFine .... thank you for answering, and I no I didn't.

In fact I have never been YouTubed, on Twitter or Facebook, partially because I still don't have sound on my old computer and secondly, to me, they all seem to be an excuse for dumb entertainment, selfies, and one-upmanship - which I suspect goes some way to explaining the social 'need' to flash bits on top of mountains no one else has been to - and post them.

Methinks if I did, watch all that 'stuff', maybe I'd have not been so tight and replaced my old whirley-gig. Hmmm.

Back to the subject, the 'leader' of the group who probably though he was smart coming up with a way to see nude girls, I agree that he was stupid in lashing out, but the others shouldn't be found guilty of (rant) association. IMO.