BreastBag (Neck Wallet)

Member Name: MALU

Product:	Neck Wallet
Date:	26/06/05 (1146 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: cheap, light, as safe as more expensive and heavier ones

Disadvantages: no problem for an expert pickpocket

When I found this category by chance, I was dumbstruck. Neck wallet? Does anyone wear their wallets at their necks? What I’ve got round my neck is the string, not the wallet, but this verbal inaccuracy was not what dumbstruck me (struck me dumb?).

Yonks ago in Oostende in Belgium when checking in for the ferry to Dover I pulled my breastbag (as we say in German [did you expect an op on a bra?]) from under my shirt out through the collar (I do that unashamedly in public) to get at my identity card when suddenly an American woman pointed at me crying to her husband, “Look, she’s got a pouch!” Then she wanted to know where I had bought this extraordinarily convenient travel accessoire. My answer was, “In Germany you can find it wherever you can buy suitcases.” Was it possible that we were more advanced than the Americans breastbag/pouch/neck-wallet – wise?

Ever since I’ve taught my pupils that kangaroos as well as travellers have pouches and they’ve always loved the word at once. After finding the dooyoo category on neck wallets I checked several online shops for the English speaking world and came across neck wallets and neck pouches. I’ll stick to the term ‘pouch’, I like it.

To store away money when away from home I’ve got a money belt which I don’t use any more (not good, the opening is very small and it can only be used for banknotes), I haven’t got a bum bag (looks silly, can easily be opened from the back and the front by pickpockets when the traveller’s attention is diverted - and three pouches.

When I visited Tate Modern for the first time I felt like buying a souvenir in the museum shop and opted for a pouch but have never used it. How silly can one get? It’s made of three oblong pieces that fold into each other, the thingy is much too thick to be of any use, i.e., to hide my money, it’s so conspicuous under a blouse or a shirt that I could also wear it on my clothes and advertise the fact that I’m carrying money and documents with me.

For years I used a flat leather pouch that can be opened like a wallet to reveal the different compartments and is closed with a press button. It’s perfectly OK, nevertheless I’ve defected to my current pouch, the lightest, simplest and cheapest of my collection. It looks similar to the one in the piccie at the top of the site, it’s made of beige nylon, has an adjustable string, measures 17x14 cm, has only one main pocket and a smaller one in front of it and is closed with a strip of velcro.

I got my pouch as a special offer some years ago when ordering some articles from a catalogue; the online shop www.safariquip.co.uk offers specimen looking like the one in the piccie at the top of the site for 4.99 GBP. You can get more expensive pouches made of silk or leather, but I wouldn’t buy these, an expensive pouch doesn’t mean more safety, and if the pickpocket cuts the string from behind and pulls the whole thingy out of your collar, you’ll lose the expensive pouch together with your money and documents!

I usually put my money in the front pocket and my identity card and credit card(s) in the back one, the pouch doesn’t disturb me at all, when we were on hols the last time I wore it every day for ten days.

I’ve seen (mainly young) people in summer wearing only an undershirt and their pouch openly over it, you’ll agree that this is not very wise; yet, as I think walking around this way when in cities and away from the beach is ugly if not repulsive, I don’t have too much pity with these people if they’re robbed, it serves them right. :-)

So under the undershirt with the pouch?! Not much better if the neck is bare and the string shows. I always wear blouses or shirts with collars so that the string is hidden for the casual observer. It isn’t hidden for the professional pickpocket, of course, looking out for the thingy! If I know that I’ll be somewhere especially crowded where pickpockets abound, I tie the string round the strap of my bra and stuff the pouch under my belt into my knickers. Braless people can wear the pouch shoulder-holster-style to avoid showing the string.

No pickpocket has ever touched my pouch which unfortunately does not mean that I haven’t had any contact with members of this trade, I have, three times in my many years of travelling. I wouldn’t say that I was overly careless, a master pickpocket can get at anything! Using a pouch wisely means only to make it a bit more difficult for the long fingers to get at your valuables, pickpockets must work quickly, so if they can’t get at your money quickly, they’ll try the next person. This is the so-called St. Florian’s principle after the saint from the 3rd century AD (in what is now Austria), the patron of fire brigades (it rhymes in German) “Holy St. Florian, spare my house, burn another!"

Summary: