For someone as adventurous as yourself Latvia is pretty safe.

Is your internet love a scam?

That’s what I don’t know. That’s why I want to know the statistics on scams that occur in Latvia. If you can, please find the statistics for the city Liepaja. I know Riga is the most dangerous.

Have they asked you for money, airline tickets, cash via Western Union, copy of your passport picture page, etc.? Google the email address, as well as lines that they have repeated in correspondance. Scammers quite often copy and paste to save time.

Nope, they haven’t asked for any of those things, except one time I remember her parents said that if I want to sleep over their house, I would have to pay for the night (like in hotel/hostel conditions). But after that, they claimed that they wouldn’t charge me.

I’ve googled the mail address, and found nothing to do with scamming (and believe me, I’m very good with search strings).

Anyway, I hope I haven’t caused a mess with this thread. Sorry if I have.

Thanks for all help so far.

Don, of all people I would not expect you to steer the conversation in this direction. So what if none of these signs is presents? So what if the other party genuinely feels she is in love?

Love is a wonderful thing, as they say, but IMHO anyone (especially a 17 y.o.) should ask oneself very seriously about going half way around the globe just to see someone they only met over the internet.

Of course if the answer is still “yes” then going to Latvia is no more dangerous then going anywhere else in the “western” world.

Ikas,

First of all: your concerns for Latvia the country itself are paranoid.  Yes, Latvia is relatively poor (technically a “middle-income country” by international standards, but poor by EU standards) and has its share of social problems, but it’s not the chaotic shithole you’re imagining.  It’s a stable country, and: no, “ransom” (I assume you mean kidnappings) of tourists is not a common problem in Latvia.  You’re not going to Colombia.

However, this whole bit about meeting some girl over the internet, and paying to stay with her parents, I find shady. 
 
You’re 17.  You met some chick over the internet.  You don’t know anything about her, yet you “fell in love with her”.  And now you’re flying half-way across the world to meet her.  Her parents are totally okay with her internet boyfriend visiting and staying with them (which in itself is odd), and you have to pay to stay there on top of that.  This could be totally legit, and I’m sure there’s possible logical explanations (maybe the parents are poor, and the possibility of an Australian tourist staying there for a night will give them some extra income? although unless you stay more nights, or they’re running a B&B, I don’t see how you staying there one night could put that much money in their pocket.)  Also, another question that pops up in my mind is: when you talk with her online, does she tell you she’s at an internet cafe?  Or does she claim she has internet access at home? 

This could be totally legit, but personally, I don’t think you should take that chance, no matter what country it takes place in.  It just seems shady.

Feel perfectly free to visit Latvia on your own (without meeting up with anyone from the internet), and staying at a hostel.

Originally i thought this post was a joke.  However, everyone seems to be taking this seriously. If that is the case, you need to do a lot more homework before you fly anywhere.  Tell her to come to you.  I would certainly delay until your friends and family can talk some sense into you.  What have your parents said?

Sorry, I should have mentioned that I’m going to Greece tomorrow to visit my family. Anyway, Latvia isn’t too far from Greece, so this is a pretty good opportunity to meet her. I’m staying in Greece for a very long time (a year or longer). And when I go to Latvia, if her parents asked me to pay to stay for a few nights, I would pay, but later they changed their minds and said they wouldn’t charge me anyway.

And she does has the internet at home. I know her personal details, as well as some of her parents’ details. I know the address, and I know it’s a real address because I’ve sent letters there by mail, and I’ve seen her receive it as she showed me the letter on webcam.



My parents gave pretty useless advice, really:

“If you go to Latvia you’re gonna get held for ransom, die, etc.”

They also suggested her to come to me, rather than me go to her (She’ll meet me in Greece, I mean), but if she objects, or her parents object, does that mean there’s something fishy going on?

Ikas,

I can’t say if this is legit or not, because I honestly don’t know.  However, there is that possibility.  Is Latvia known for kidnappings, and scamming people to come over, only to hold them for ransom?  No, Latvia is not known for this.  However, All of us here at Eurotrip would have given you the same advice, whether this was Latvia, Australia, Japan, Canada, Monaco, or Mali:  it just seems a little fishy.  The reason I brought up the internet is because: I found it odd that her parents were too poor to host you for one night (and were thus asking you pay), but they can afford internet at home?  Don’t be one of those teens we hear about on the news…the ones that run away from home to meet the love of their lives from the internet, and then everything goes horribly wrong.  Yeah, it’s possible that she’s legit, but we really don’t know.

Aside from the fact that this might be a scam…this could be totally legit, but the girl might be psycho.  Who knows? 

I could be overanalyzing this, but if you want our honest opinion: you’re only 17.  There is absolutely NO rush to find your lifetime partner, and I know you may feel differently at this point in your life, but trust us: one day you’ll look back at this and laugh about it.  If you’re gonna be in Greece for a year, you might meet someone there.  And/or you’ll eventually meet someone when you get back home to Australia.  Slightly more than half of the world’s population is women…and the same goes for almost all individual countries: Australia, Greece, and Latvia included.

But as we all said: feel free to visit Latvia on your own, without meeting someone from the internet.

BTW, I’m looking at orbitz.com for November round-trip airfares from Athens or Thessaloníki to Riga (no direct flights…they’re all either via Vienna, Prague, Warsaw, Frankfurt, Kiev, or Zurich)…and the cheapest is 792 USD (taxes included), which comes to 541 EUR, or 900 AUD!!!!  (And I’m looking at Athens Airport website, and it doesn’t seem like any LCCs cover Athens-Riga this time of the year..nor does the easyJet website let me search for flights from Athens to Riga via any of its hubs, like Milan…maybe because easyJet doesn’t fly to Riga?).  There is one airline AirBaltic that flies directly Riga-Athens, but it’s a seasonal route…meaning you’d have to wait probably until April or May.  OR even better she can come visit you in May.  Greece has a much better climate anyways.

Your parents concerns sound like the typical responses when junior flies the nest for the first time. When it’s to a foreign country then it usually smacks of ignorance. (Have they ever been to Latvia? Then how do they know?)
 
I’ve lived in Latvia for two years, so I can tell you having researched this recently that you are four times more likely to fall victim to a crime in the UK than Latvia, twice as likely to be robbed in the UK, twice as likely to be assaulted in the UK. The homicide rates here are higher, but no higher than the world average and there hasn’t been a single tourist murdered  yet that I know of and Latvia had the biggest increase in the EU in growth in the number of tourists in 2005-6.
 
Scams are more likely in Riga than Liepaja and usually involve gullible tourists, usually stag parties, being enticed into dodgy strip bars with promises of free drinks and then being charged 100 euro per drink. Aside from that the most common scam involves money changing. Someone asks you for change and gives you Lithuanian money (which is worth a fifth of Latvian currency.) 
 
 

Latvia is fine and there’s lots to see. Riga is a real fun city, albeit much of the night time entertainment leans towards ‘adult’! Check out the place on a really informative new website from TravelSavvy-Riga