‘Dangerous Places’ Witty, Informative

There it sits on the “Travel” shelf in your local bookstore, “The World’s Most Dangerous Places,” a hefty, 1,000-page volume. It looks like a travel guide, but with that title is it some kind of joke?

Nope, not a joke at all, even if its emblem is a laughing skull. Although certainly an offbeat guide, it actually is quite serious and surprisingly informative and useful. More than 50,000 copies of the first edition, which appeared quietly a year ago, have been sold. The second edition ($19.95), updated and including much new material, has just been published.

The guide’s aim is to provide travelers with an accurate and comprehensive look at the world’s worst trouble spots. You can use it to stay out of these places - or if you must visit them, it could help you avoid hassles or even save your life. One fascinating section provides details on the tricky art of bribing your way out of minor traffic infractions, fake arrests or other tight spots. The book should be of special interest to business travelers, embassy workers, archaeologists and foreign correspondents, whose jobs take them to the unlikeliest places, and to adventurers, who pop in simply for the thrill of it.

Brash, opinionated and darkly witty, the guide cites these particular worsts:

The world’s most dangerous place for foreigners these days is Algeria, where more than 100 foreigners have been killed since 1992. Their deaths are attributed to fundamentalist militants seeking to rid the country of non-Islamic influences.

The most dangerous form of travel in the world is “the fabled minibus.” In the Third World, the vehicles are used primarily “for rush-hour transportation of poor people,” the guide says, and are “run by entrepreneurs who make their money by carrying as many people as many times as they can.” The result is “a deadly driving style,” endangering passengers and pedestrians alike.

Aboard Europe’s trains, the threat of thievery is worst in Eastern Europe, especially on night trains. Thieves are known to inject sleeping gas into train compartments and then methodically rob passengers, the guide reports.

Banditry is “a very real danger” in parts of Kenya, Somalia, India, Cambodia, Pakistan, Burma and southern regions of Russia. “Imagine a naked man walking down the street with $100 bills taped to his body,” the guide says. “That’s what the typical tourist looks like to the residents of most Third World countries.”

Business travel is more dangerous than adventure travel because “one becomes a target for most of the world’s terrorists simply by representing an American company.” As a business traveler, “you tend to frequent establishments and locations where thieves, terrorists and opportunists seek victims - luxury hotels, expensive restaurants, expat (expatriate) compounds, airports, embassies, etc.”

The most dangerous flights are on local airlines in China, North Korea, Colombia, all countries in central Africa and all countries in the former Soviet Union. Flights inside India and through the Andes of South America also are riskier than flights in the United States.

Pelton’s guide divides the world’s dangerous places into three broad categories: “Dangerous Places” - 32 countries, such as Afghanistan, Cambodia, India (Kashmir), Israel and Colombia, where wars or other possibly deadly conflicts are being waged; “Criminal Places” - seven countries, including the United States, Haiti and Russia, where crime is a significant problem; and “Forbidden Places” - eight countries (Iran, Iraq and Libya among them) where it is illegal or politically incorrect for Americans to visit.