The "Shit on the Shoe" scam - Sep 20, 2009

I've been on the end of a number of scams/attempted scams (the gem scam, bus ticket scams, temple scam), but the attached (photo) takes the biscuit. The (brown) "icing on the cake" so to speak.

This scam is written up by Lonely Planet. Basically a guy comes up to you asking if you want a shoe shine. You say no as you know that your shoes are clean - then you look down and find a newly placed blob of excrement on your shoe. Which the guy offers to clean off at an exhorbitant cost.

I was in Connaught Place in Delhi - where this is apparently a favourite practice. It was hot, crowded, very sunny, and after being asked if I wanted a shoe shine (to which I said, politely, No thanks), the next thing I knew I had the attached "gift". As it was so crowded and sunny I couldn't see very well, and the scam artist had disappeared before I could do anything.

I was more bemused than anything - that I had been caught out on a scam I had so recently read about. Whatever, a good story to tell. And I was wearing sandals, not even shoes - how can you polish sandals? I had some tissues on me, and a wet wipe, so I did a quick clean up (it was real shit), then went to McDonalds. I couldn't use the sink in the bathroom as it was out in the open, so I went into a toilet cubicle and used the flushing water in the toilet to wash my sandal - and my foot. My sandals have velcro straps - so that was a fingernail job to get everything out. Most pleasant. Anyway, thanks to McDonalds, I was clean and on with my sight seeing.....