where do you draw the line?

I’ve heard that conflict makes good stories, and so with that in mind, here are two stories for you.

As you’ve read in culture part II or don't go to Marrakesh, Morocco was a bit of a shock for us in terms of how aggressively people pursue potential customers.  Because of this and the general fluidity of unmarked prices, we have started to think that we might be being cheated every time we make a purchase.  Therefore, after a few weeks in such a climate, when we encounter situations where we knew we were being cheated, we vehemently stuck to our guns, for better or worse.

The first such situation was at about 6:30 in the morning when we left our hostel in Essaouira, Morocco.  We had stayed there several nights and paid 900 dirham ($117) dollars at the beginning.  The night clerk was an older man who had been friendly, but who didn’t speak a word of English or French.  How someone could get a job in a touristy hostel in Morocco without speaking any French is beyond me.  Anyway, the hostel was in the warren-like medina and there was only one door out, which was locked for the night.  Like many of the doors we have encountered, it didn’t have a door knob, meaning that it was impossible to open without the key.  As we had already paid, we walked downstairs to the door quietly and were dismayed to find that the key wasn’t in the lock.  The clerk came over and spent about five minutes miming that we should give him 100 dirham ($13).  Eventually we insisted that he open the door and he walked out with us to the shop of another man who did speak French.  We went with him, thinking there was a slim chance that there was some plausible reason why we should give him extra money.  However there was no such explanation and when we told the mediator that we already paid 900 on our first day, he quickly sided with us and dismissed the clerk.  If I’d been by myself, I might have been nervous enough and worried enough about catching the bus that I would have paid.  How many people has the clerk scammed like this?

The second such situation happened on Christmas Eve.  For context, four shekels are worth one dollar.  This story is about embarrassingly small amounts of money and we’ve been discussing what the moral course of action would have been in this situation.  Don’t judge us too much.

We walked a dark and rainy three km back from Bethlehem to the check point between the West Bank and Jerusalem.  We planned to take a taxi the five km from there to Jerusalem.  Based on what we read, we were hoping to pay between 20 and 35 shekels.  We expected there to be lots of available taxis because it was only 6:30 pm and the party (ie church services) was just getting started in Bethlehem so there were lots of people still arriving at the check point, going the opposite direction from us.  There were, in fact, lots of taxis waiting for the thin trickle of people bowing out of the celebration early.

There was also a minibus.  The driver said “It’s five shekels. Go ahead and sit down,” implying that we would pay later.  We sat.  About six seats were still empty and it seemed like we would wait until they were full before leaving.  Then a group of about 15 Japanese people showed up and there was discussion of how they wouldn’t all fit.  Then they all piled on the minibus, leaving several of them standing in the aisle.  Though the bus was clearly beyond capacity, we still did not leave.

Then a full sized bus pulled up and they said “Everyone move to the big bus.”  As we walked to it, I said to the minibus assistant, “Is it still five shekels?”  He very clearly said “Yes, it’s still five shekels.” so we happily got on the bus.

We drove along and after a few minutes the assistant started to collect the fare.  He said “10 shekels.”  Everyone, from all over the bus exclaimed, “No it’s five shekels!”  As the assistant was laughing a bit, it was unclear whether he was joking about the doubling the price.  The man next to me said “Well I’m only paying five!”

The assistant conferred with the driver and then announced “eight shekels.”  Again everyone cried out “five shekels!”  Then they paid eight.  We were in the middle of the bus and when he came to us, we argued, “No, you said it was five shekels, so here’s 10 for the two of us.”   We ended up paying two more shekels thinking he would leave it that, but he insisted on four more (the inflated eight shekel price).  We refused.  He went and collected eight shekels out of everyone else on the bus and then came back to demand four shekels from us.  I called him a liar.  Jack argued.  We didn’t’ pay.  I was embarrassed a bit.  We both felt conflicted.
The bus arrived by the Damascus Gate of Jerusalem (though they said it would go to the Jaffa Gate).  As I expected, they closed the doors to prevent us from getting off.  The assistant and the driver demanded four shekels and threatened to call the police.  We said to do it.  The other passengers trapped behind us said, “Let us off the bus, we paid.”  The owner came over and the other people were let off through the back door.

The owner who was much more calm boarded the bus.  We were still locked on.  We argued.  Then one of the Japanese tourists came back on the bus through the back door and said “Look, it’s Christmas, here’s six shekels to pay for them.”  The money was accepted and the doors were opened.  We felt foolish and tried to pay the peacemaker, but he refused politely and said “Merry Christmas.”

Now, an hour or so later, we both feel stupid for making a stink about a dollar, but certain that they were wrong to extort another $25 dollars out of a bus load of tourists. 

Because it’s Christmas and we’re in Jerusalem, we also wonder what the moral or Christian thing to do would be.  We didn’t swear or yell, but we did stand up for what we thought was right.  It seems like it was all about the money, but it wasn’t because if they had initially said it cost eight shekels we would have obediently paid up.

The people we dealt with were not particularly poor. 

We can’t afford to not pay attention to prices and in so many cases we suspect that we’re being overcharged.  For example, we went to a busy market yesterday and bought a lot of food in about nine or ten different transactions with different merchants.  It seemed like every other purchase we thought, “wow that was a bargain” and “wow that seems too expensive" depending on the scruples of the merchant. 
Just how much of this are we expected to tolerate?  Is this the price of traveling?  Is standing up against people that are cheating you supposed to make you feel like such a jerk?  When very generous people travel, how much money to they hand out to all of the people who try to get a piece of them?  At what point will tourist economies implode because the people who work in them treat visitors so terribly?

Even though this post is one big complaint, please don’t think we’re not enjoying this trip.  We are.  It is certainly expanding our horizons, and of course, we’ve also dealt with plenty of honest and polite people. I would say that the less someone interacts with tourists, the less likely they are to rip you off.

We really are curious to know what you think we should have done.