Jump to content

Bbc News - Tourists Warned Of Thailand Airport Scam


Fiery Jack
 Share

Recommended Posts

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8154497.stm

 

Ho hum.

 

 

Nicking stuff. My kind of thing. Jap bookstores are about the easiest type of store from which to shoplift. I haven't bought a book for years. You'd have to be daft to waste your money on books when you can pinch them so easily.

 

Here's how. If your pockets are small or you're a bit bervous of stuffing stuff down your trousers or inside your jumper, go in carrying a stack of 2 or 3 books or A4 folders/magazines under your arm and looking like a 'bookish' type. Select the book you want to nick, stand and flick through it while you make sure no c*nt's watching you and you're not in the direct line of a security camera (up on the ceiling, usually near the wall or in a corner: if one's trained on you, carry the book somewhere else where a camera isn't snooping or a shop assistant loitering), then, once all's clear, swiftly and blithely — naturally — add the new book to the pile under your arm (slip it between two other books), browse a bit more (again to make sure no store detective c*nt or assistant is on your tail) then pretend your keitai's gone off. Get it out of your pocket, flip it open and start speaking English into it: stroll out of the shop pointedly while talking on the blower like you own the f*cking place. If any c*nt comes flying out of the shop and stops you (or a security alarm goes off, which it won't), just act stupid or pished, go back into the store and say you had to take that important call and reception was better outside, forgot to go to the cash register (make sure you've enough money to pay for it in your wallet just in case you get huckled, soft lad). I picked up the Oxford History of English Literature from a bookstore in Shibuya last week, and that's a hefty piece of wood. I nicked the Rough Guide to Thailand, too, a few months ago. Why not? They're asking for it.

 

Shoplifting books from the massive bookshop on three floors of the same building that Muji is in in central Kyoto is as easy as taking f*cking candy off a bairn. Just get in there with a big coat on, pet, and you'll be walking out with reading materials for a few months and not a penny poorer. Large selection of English language paperbacks (though not as large a selection as it was before your uncle Deke waltzed out of there with bulging pockets last weekend, trivia fans). They've got security cameras but they're obvious and all pointing away from the decent nicking spots. And the staff are loopy-lou, useless as a chocolate kettle, standing there gassing with one another at the cash tills mostly, the soft c*nts. Game on.

 

99% of store detectives ("stoa gee-manu" the japs confusingly call the c*nts) employed by jap stores are obaachan old bags. They look scruffy, one step up from homeless c*nts, wrecked faces and sad-shit permed hairstyles, wear jeans or slacks and tatty jacket coats, look very like the old f*cked-mess birds that hang about near knocking shops in Kabukicho/Shinsaibashi trying to snag punters to shag the Chinkie tarts upstairs. They are always carrying a carrier bag. They're obvious as snow. If one's on you, ditch your swag and f*ck off. Don't risk it. If you're huckled with goods over 1,000 yen, they will call the fuzz. Under 1,000 sheets, you'll get a warning, but they'll take your name and address and you won't be able to nick from that shop again for a long while as the bastards will be all over you like a Star of Light employee on a punter's cock as soon as you set foot inside the store for months after.

 

When I went back to the UK last summer for a fortnight of boozing and blawing, I was amused to note that, in most supermarkets now, batteries and razor blades are no longer displayed on the open shelves. Instead, there's just a wee card thing that you take to the register and the bird exchanges it for the batteries or blades that are now kept in a drawer under the till. The reason for this: ‘if they're on open display, every c*nt just nicks them’, I was told by a comatose-looking assistant bird I asked in Boots. They're expensive, and easy to pocket, so no need to pay for them unless you're daft or have more money than sense.

 

Thankfully, jap supermarkets haven't cottoned on to that very reaonable line of thinking yet, and I have never, so far as I recall, paid for a razor blade in this country in 2 decades of living here. Batteries I pinch from the stock cupboard at work. In fact, I enjoy nicking stuff. I can sympathise with that bird Winona Ryder. It's a thrill, fills in the dead hours.

 

Things I have shoplifted recently in japan: razor blades, toothpaste, tins of anchovies and kani-miso (f*cking outrageously expensive), a pair of nice shoes from Daiei (just left my old skis on the shelf and walked out with the new ones on LOL), a belt and numerous pairs of socks from Uniqlo, a pair of nice expensive cufflinks from a Paul Smith outlet in Tokyo, a swiss army knife, an official jap national team soccer shirt from a sports shop (just put it on under my shirt in the changing room: it had no electronic tag on it and was 10,000 yen f*ck that), a leatherbound diary, a silver ring, chewing gum from convenience stores (straight in the pocket with that shit, you just spit it out anyway), novels from bookstores, designer spectacle frames that I get lenses put in in Thailand for tuppence, sunglasses, a leather wallet from some poncey GAP shop, loads of fruit and vegetables from wee roadside stalls in the countryside where they trust you to put 100 yen in the wee box. :doah:

 

Things I swipe from work: batteries, a coffee maker, blank CDs/video tapes/MDs, arse wipe, pens, trash bags, air freshener things out of the bogs, a nice set of ramen bowls with kanji on them from the staff kitchen, washing up liquid, a DVD-video deck that some c*nt had ordered but was waiting in the corridor outside his office one weekend, a telephone/fax machine out of the main office, just unplugged the c*nt and took it home after my own blower conked out.

 

I don't think I'm a kleptomaniac because I only nick things when I need them (bog roll, shoes) or, if nicking wasn't an option, if they're things I would definitely buy (the cufflinks, the jap soccer shirt that I wanted to send home to a mate). I definitely get a buzz out of it, but I don't pinch things I don't need or wouldn't otherwise buy. No point in that. :nono:

 

Scud mags? Actually, I've never nicked any porn in japan. Convenience stores have loads of security cameras so apart from easily-pocketed items such as chewing gum or fag lighters, I don't chance my arm when I'm in that type of joint. I tend to buy saucy mags only when I'm pished out of my box and rolling home at 3AM feeling rather sorry for myself, which has the ‘two birds with one stone’ effect of simultaneously letting the cute female staff of the conbeni (at least one of whom I will have soberly chatted up and been charming in the presence of in the past) know I'm both a pisshead and a filthy old loser if truth be told.

 

Anyone else got light fingers? It's great fun, like.

 

jack :help:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

30 years ago, when I went to Japan, shoplifting was unknown, the locals just didn't do it.

 

A seaman acquaintance of mine, told me once that his crew, whenever they were in a Japanese port, would just take stuff from shops and walk. The Japanese, too horrified to do anything about them.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...