Hitchhiker's Guide To the Gullixy

Sometimes, in playing a fool who's trying to play you for a bigger one, you plant a seed.

A bad one.

The following exchange involves my latest received effort to give me the business from yet another Nigerian email scamster who imagines me to be as uninformably dense as any of his heretofore victims have been.

And apparently has no worth-a-sh** proofreader.

In my reply, you'll note I made a suggestion to this individual of dubious antecedence and limited ingenuity in scam propagation. A suggestion regarding another interesting series of emails going around, offering plots of land on the Moon. On Mars. Even on Uranus. More on that in a mo', but first, the exchange:

From the Desk of Dr. Musa Sani
Standard Trust Bank Plc,
South Regional,
Headquaters,
No. 22 Bode Thomas Street,
Surulere-Lagos.

Attn: I am Dr. Musa Sani of Standard Trust Bank of Nigeria PLC. I am the Account Officer to Mr. Paul Lewis, a foreigner, who used to work with Mobil Oil Explorations Company here in Nigeria. On the 27th of April 1999, Mr. Lewis, his wife and their only child were involved in a car accident along Eket express road, KM 36 in which my clinet and the whole family were died. Since then, I have made Conscientious inquiries to locate any of my client's relations and this has proved not successful. Since then the account has be domant in my Bank.

After these several unsuccessfilled attempts, what I need from you is to Use you as the next of kin to Mr. Paul the original account owner so that the both of us will cliam the fund and be less assure that there is no problem in this transaction because I have all the necessary documents to back this cliam up and the only thing I need from you, is your total support and honest to make this transaction a successful.

Mr. Paul died intestate leaving valuable properties as well as some Money in
Standard Trust Bank plc here. I have therefore, contacted you to cooperate with me to clam this money.

To be precise, my diseased client had $6.0m (Six Million, United States Dollars) in the bank account. I have necessary information and Documents to this deposit. All we need to do is to move this money from his account to a bank account to be nominated by you. Upon completion of this transaction which will last a few days, you Will be intitled to 40% ($2,400,000) while I will take the balance.

Reply me by sending your full names, address, phone and fax number for easy communication immediately you receive this mail.

In terms of the amounts of money purportedly involved, this is the puniest effort to give me the business I've received (only $6.0 million? And I only get $2.4 million?). It hardly warranted a reply.

But reply I did:

Dear Dr. Sani Flush:

Your email simply confirms a personal belief I've held for years: life in Nigeria SUCKS. Especially for foreigners, who seem to die there in calamitous windrows, from car crashes, plane crashes, train crashes, elephant stampedes, outhouse explosions and having illicit sex with mad-cow-diseased water buffalo.

It tends to make your effort to give me this business most unlikely to have the incentives necessary to lure me in, I must honestly say to you.

But I am not totally heartless in the compassion department: with this being the case, I must say to you in all concern that you might want to consider moving to another country. Another continent. Hell, you might want to consider moving off the planet.

No, I am not making that up. Moving off the planet is quite the internet business these days. I recently received an email that offered spacious, very affordable plots of land on the Moon, Mars, and even Uranus. The plots on Uranus were especially affordable and spacious (thousands of acres for a few hundred US Dollars, BYOO*), with cosmic views rarely seen by our Earth-bound eyes. And what an opportunity: vast lands without development regulations. No environmental activisits. No animal rights activists. No ELF or other ecoterrorists. Develop your land as you see fit.

What a concept.

Apparently, this is a booming Internet business -- cosmic real estate -- and perhaps you should consider getting in on the ground floor. After all, it apparently is most lucrative, and doesn't involve trying to find foreigners to play next-of-kin for the plethora of dead and dying foreigners who travel to/in Nigeria, only to have their 'terminal destination' prove to be prophetic in a chronological sense.

This is my genuine and fauxsincere advice to you, Dr. Sani Flush. As for your offer to give me the heretofore business, I am not interested; if I wish to travel to such a hazardous place, I need look no further than my annual trip to the US, and driving to Newark, NJ.

DR. U. R. Phulovit,

Research Analyst,

International Crustacean Obedience Training Institute, Vaduz, Liechtenstein

I don't anticipate a reply. Then again, I didn't on the 'pot at the end of the rainbow' series, either.

At the same time, I'll apologize in advance now. Just in case Dr. Sani Flush takes heed of my suggestion, and you start getting a flurry of email offers for buying a piece of Uranus.

* Bring Your Own Oxygen