What a well thought out post so very well stated.

One thing you should know about the guards outside restaurants, pharmacies, banks and any number of other locations is they are NOT police and in the event of a serious situation, they are NOT armed, or at least not on the Dutch side for sure and truthfully, I'm uncertain about the French rules about this.

In many cases across the island what we see so prominently today are private security personnel, many of whom have been hired because of past problems.

But my truth is, DH and I have never in forty plus years felt that our personal safety was in doubt. At the same time, as we've gotten older we've also gotten wiser in some of our practices, and some of our habits have changed. We no longer do many of the things or go to many of the places we might have enjoyed while still in our thirties but we still manage to have a wonderful time with every trip. <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" /> <img src="http://www.traveltalkonline.com/forums/images/graemlins/handshake.gif" alt="" />