My heart goes out to those Secret Service agents who got caught whoring in Colombia. Okay, that’s an overstatement. But I hear this is the kind of thorny predicament that can happen to anyone who is overpaid and possesses a top secret security clearance.<\/p>\n
I have pretty well avoided both those albatrosses, but I did have a slightly similar experience when I was travelling illegally in communist Romania in 1987. I was there on a tourist visa while researching articles that would later pop up in Readers Digest and the New York Times. <\/p>\n
I arrived in Bucharest on the Orient Express from Budapest, Hungary. I learned that the Hotel Intercontinental was the only place westerners were allowed to stay. <\/p>\n
After I checked in, a beefy 30ish woman with bad eye makeup came flat-footing up. She asked in a gravely three-pack-a-day voice: \u201cWould you like to have some company?\u201d <\/p>\n
\t\u201cDo what?\u201d <\/p>\n
\t\u201cWould you like some company – in your room?\u201d She smiled and pointed upstairs. <\/p>\n
\t\u201cUh… no, I\u2019m doing fine.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cWhy are you here in Bucharest?\u201d She cooed gutturally.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cI\u2019m a tourist.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\u201cBut it is so cold outside. Let\u2019s stay inside. Aren\u2019t you lonely?\u201d<\/p>\n
\tThere were several reasons I demurred, including my strict rule to never tussle with any woman who had a better mustache than I did. <\/p>\n
\tThe Romanian government was famous for using intelligence agents as prostitutes. Instead of a simple honest hooker, she was probably a spook-whore. Seeing how badly everything else in that country functioned, I had no itch to learn the Romanian standard for \u201cgood enough for government work\u201d gamahooching.<\/p>\n