YOUR LUCKY DAY SCAM

We got a bit of money changed at the airport, the rate wasn't that good so we got only enough exchanged to pay for the bus to get us into the middle of Paris and another bit of money for some food.

After getting off the bus and exchanging more money we stood on the street trying to decide which of the directions we had been given would most likely be the right way to go and that was when we had the most curious encounter.

A man, who appeared to be walking passed us, stopped, stooped down and picked something up off of the sidewalk. He handed it to Steve and said, “Sir, you dropped this.” It was a gold wedding band.

Steve looked at the ring and said, “It’s not mine. You found it, you keep it.”

“Oh, no, I cannot keep the ring, I am a Muslim. You must keep the ring. It is your lucky day. Look, sir, it is 18 carrots. You are very lucky.”

Steve tried to give the ring back, but the man insisted that the ring was really ours to keep. The man bowed politely and then hurried off to the street corner. It wasn’t but a few seconds later that he came back and said, “Could you give me some money?"

We were groggy from our travel, the lack of sleep and our bellies were beginning to grumble from hunger, but we were not that out of it and realized at that point that we were being scammed. Steve said, “No, take the ring back.”

The man was very insistent. He wanted money and not the ring. Then the man turned to me. With his nose nearly touching mine he said, “Madam, give me money for food.”

“Take the ring back,” Steve said and then reached into his pocket. The man waited to be handed some money. But Steve put the ring in the fellow’s outstretched hand and we hurried away up the street. The man followed us for about a half block and then gave up and walked away.

In the last two days we have seen this scam being played out on other street corners. Once a man tried to hand us a ring from the sidewalk and another time we saw a man try to entice a woman carrying many shopping bag into a game of “Madam, this is your lucky day”. She looked at him with hardly any notice, and we just kept walking. The man shrugged his shoulders, turned and headed off toward a more crowded street most likely looking for an other pigeon to pluck.