Good points, BBD. Google Street View is part of the ‘due diligence’ of some recruiters, but in this case the street view showed a leafy suburban street, not what greeted me ‘round back’.

Feeling conspicuous is not a red flag in itself, but I guess your senses work overtime when you feel you may not be safe.

Visiting unfamiliar environments is part of the job if you want to include a representative breadth of the community you’re studying, but from my own and other’s experience, feeling unsafe can happen in any part of any town.

So having ‘safety in numbers’ is a good rule of thumb, wherever you, or your taxi is headed.

I’ve edited the article to be clearer on these points. Thanks for the feedback.