I got an email from the folks who run The FraudWatcher network. They've linked one of my blog entries (What Prevents Crime?) to one of their pages, and have asked me to link back to them. OK, here goes:

Fraud - Crime In Aruba
Description: Fraud Prevention, Information and News about Fraud Online

The page I'm linking to has some formatting issues at best, and at worst reads like it's written for search engines to find rather than humans (lots of half sentences, no line breaks, etc.). My links is one of 81 links listed at the bottom of the page as "Other Websites." Also, they want me to "register" my reciprocal link, or they'll de-link me from their site. On the upside, the e-mail claims they get 1,000 hits a day, and at this point, I'm basically a traffic whore, so I'll take whatever I can find. If you're reading this and you came from that site, do me a favor? Drop me a comment on this post & tell me what you think of their site (and mine, if you like). I'm curious if this is a scam or a legitimate operation.

And for the record: I've been to Aruba four times in the last five years. The horrible events concerning Natalee Holloway aside, I've never seen anything on the island that even comes close to crime, let alone the crime waves and drug problems referenced on the FraudWatcher site. Then again, I spend 100% of my time going from resort complex to resort complex (beach, casinos, restaurants, etc.), so maybe I'd have worse (better?) luck with crime if I strayed off the beaten path a little.

Also, my parents, my wife and I took our kids to Carlos and Charlie's last year to celebrate Brandon's second birthday (pictures here - check out the last two for the birthday festivities). We had a great time. And although the restaurant is where Ms. Holloway was before she encountered trouble, and nothing unusual or illegal happened at the restaurant, I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to hear that some percentage of people now consider it unsafe. Such is life on the perception/reality continuum.