Hacker News Reader

Comment by nikanj | Hacker News Reader

On what power? ”We are big and have money. You are small and have no money”.

This has been a reliable source of power for at least a century

I meant on what official authority.

I understand what you meant to say, but realize that this is like some random bully stopping cars on the highway and issuing speeding tickets. Victims might play along for a while, but when actual law enforcement shows up, the bully is going to have a very bad time.

> this is like some random bully stopping cars on the highway and issuing speeding tickets

LOL, I've paid that exact "fine", the "bullies" were official, uniformed Mexican police. They were literally just flagging everyone on vacation at a specific resort, along the only road from that resort into town (with a big chain across the road to collect everyone) and taking $200 to be allowed to continue on. Nice work if you can get it I guess.

I've also paid bribes to bullies in Yugoslavia ("people with machine guns standing in the road") in order to pass by. I don't think they were official though.

Yes, rental cars stick out like a sore thumb so keep some cash on you. It is usually easy to negotiate them down by 50% though!

You can tell them, "dame la multa" (give me my fine) and most of the time they'll wave you on.

I don't know if this is still true, but years ago if you wanted to board your plane in La Paz, Bolivia everyone had to hand the police officer at the gate $20 USD cash (no substitutions) to board the plane. It didn't matter your nationality or where the plane was headed, just hand over $20 bucks or GTFO.

I had to pay an extra $90 when crossing the border into Zimbabwe. I was a little slow and asked all innocently why I had to pay more then the official entry tax when the guy in front of me paid the normal amount. The guy just shifted his AK-47 a bit and repeated the request. I figured it out at that point and forked it over.

Longer than that.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com