Natalie Holloway new info

[maxaroni]

I agree with @Pea-n-Me in regards to parenting and saying yes, to our adult child to go on the trip.

When I was in my early 20's, I traveled to some of the Caribbean islands with my girlfriend. Aruba happened to be one of the places we went, but what I am about to say, happened all over, not just Aruba. We were 2 single women, young and traveling. We would go to happy hour and enjoy the atmosphere. The hotel staff always seemed to "cozy up" to the young women. We experienced some pick up lines and seeing how others interacted with them. On the trip to Aruba, we got friendly with 2 other young women, traveling with parents, however, being the age that they were, they were more on their own and meeting up for meals. I remember we all spoke about how these guys were hitting on the young women and how easy it would be to make a wrong decision. Being hit on and made to feel special and the next night, its someone else. My point is, we do not know exactly what happened with Natalee, but she was a legal adult, on a trip with many classmates & chaperones. If she was drugged, she would be out of control in this situation. If not, she may have been flattered by the attention of a young man and she could have made a fatal decision.
The Caribbean, IMO, tends to be very romantic and who knows what she was thinking.

With all of that said, she was an 18 year old, who graduated HS and would be off to college in several months. As scary as this trip turned out to be, it can happen anywhere, anytime. Being in the wrong place at the wrong time. These date rape drugs are deadly and many people have fallen victim. How many of us have met guys/gals in a bar? When I was 18, that was the legal drinking age in NJ and my group of friends did meet guys in bars. There are sickos all over the place and fortunately, for my group we were all lucky.

 

[moon]

sigh...uk, this parenting issue goes on and on...I will just say that I stand by my statement that I would NOT pay for the trip. Yes, I know that people when faced with the reality of having kids allow stuff they say they wouldn't, but we're not talking about stuff like "I will never let her dress like that" " Ice cream before supper? no way!" "They will never be allowed to listen to THAT kind of music!". This is something major, and I completely agree that they need to learn independence...gradually, IMO. Going right out of high school on a vacation to a place chosen because they could drink without restrictions is really extreme. She was 18, and if she was going on her on dime, I'd strongly advise her against it, but I wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

But there is no way that I would pay so she could go to what is really nothing more than a drunken orgy. This group was so wild that hotel banned them from returning.

I feel very strongly about this, and I don't see how upon having a child I'd look at him/her and saying "Oh, I was SO wrong about Aruba!

ETA: The group consisted on 124 kids and 7 or eight chaperons. That's not "a lot of chaperons"

 

[Pea-n-Me]

sigh...uk, this parenting issue goes on and on...I will just say that I stand by my statement that I would NOT pay for the trip. Yes, I know that people when faced with the reality of having kids allow stuff they say they wouldn't, but we're not talking about stuff like "I will never let her dress like that" " Ice cream before supper? no way!" "They will never be allowed to listen to THAT kind of music!". This is something major, and I completely agree that they need to learn independence...gradually, IMO. Going right out of high school on a vacation to a place chosen because they could drink without restrictions is really extreme. She was 18, and if she was going on her on dime, I'd strongly advise her against it, but I wouldn't be able to do anything about it.

But there is no way that I would pay so she could go to what is really nothing more than a drunken orgy. This group was so wild that hotel banned them from returning.

I feel very strongly about this, and I don't see how upon having a child I'd look at him/her and saying "Oh, I was SO wrong about Aruba!

ETA: The group consisted on 124 kids and 7 or eight chaperons. That's not "a lot of chaperons"

Eighteeen kids per chaperone. (Or 17.8, to be exact.) That's like a small HS classroom size per chaperone. I don't think that's too bad.

I also think "drunken orgy" is extreme. She was cognizant enough to be already packed and prepared for her trip home that day. Had she been drunk all week, that likely wouldn't have happened.

Bottom line is probably that none of us could say exactly what we'd do because none of us were in that exact situation. But I won't judge, because Mr. Holloway seems extremely average to me, just like the rest of us. If you think you'd say no, I won't judge you, either.

 

[moon]

Eighteeen kids per chaperone. (Or 17.8, to be exact.) That's like a small HS classroom size per chaperone. I don't think that's too bad.

I also think "drunken orgy" is extreme. She was cognizant enough to be already packed and prepared for her trip home that day. Had she been drunk all week, that likely wouldn't have happened.

Bottom line is probably that none of us could say exactly what we'd do because none of us were in that exact situation. But I won't judge, because Mr. Holloway seems extremely average to me, just like the rest of us. If you think you'd say no, I won't judge you, either.

Again, Aruba was chosen because there was no drinking restrictions and they could drink all they wanted, and the Hotel refuses to take those groups because of their wild behavior. The fact that a hotel would rather lose business than deal with that kind of behavior says a lot.

ETA: IRC, the Lifetime movie approved by Mrs. Tweet showed some pretty wild behavior. I'm sure that Mrs. Twetty thought that Natalee would be safe. And who knows, maybe Natalee thought she'd have a crazy fun week before entering college - teen-ages think they are immortal- and things got out of hand.

But to me, that kind of trip is not worth the risk.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

^ Idk. There are lots of reasons why a group of 130 might be asked not to come back to a hotel besides "wild partying". Aruba is a "party island", after all. That many in a group can overwhelm a lobby or pool. (Heck, my DS's 12yo sister-sports team was asked not to return to a hotel one time because some of the kids were running in hallways and riding the luggage carts!) Looking at articles just now, there were reports that some in the group were switching rooms and I imagine that got a little chaotic, too. But I'm not sure we really know with absolute certainty that the reason they weren't going to be asked back was solely because of their partying. (DS's sister team DID go back to the same hotel the next year, so hotel managers sometimes say this, but it doesn't mean that's what actually happens, necessarily.)

I am also seeing reports that what most in the group did during the day was go to beaches and take part in water activities like surfing and boating, and they went to dance clubs and casinos at night as well as talked (apparently even coherently) about their futures. (No different than many who vacation in Aruba.) This report, from girls on the trip with Natalee, was that she'd gone to a concert that night, and then to the dance club. Hardly in a drunken stupor!

"That moment on May 30 was the last Holloway’s friends saw of her – and the start of a compelling drama that has haunted friends and family and stymied police.

“The million-dollar question is why she got in the car,” McVay told The Post from her Mountain Brook, Ala., home. “It’s the biggest mystery ever.”

EACH day since then, McVay and Holloway’s other high- school friends – refusing to believe the worst – have racked their brains for something, anything, they could have done to stop her that night.

There is only what came before: days filled with friends and sun and beach, and nights of music and casinos – and a charming stranger.

“We would stay up talking, we talked about college. She was going to the University of Alabama on a full scholarship,” McVay told The Post. “She wanted to be a doctor, and we talked about that. She was going to visit me at my college.”

On one of their nights out, Holloway met Joran van der Sloot, a tall, smooth-talking gambler son of a prominent local judge-in-waiting and the last person to see Holloway alive.

“Nat met him in the hotel casino called Excelsior,” McVay said. “She talked to him for a matter of five minutes when we were playing blackjack.”

McVay, who was interrogated by the FBI, said the group of girls with Holloway told van der Sloot they would be at Carlos ‘N Charlie’s the following night.

“I found it weird because he mentioned earlier that no one went out on Sunday nights, that it was a bad night,” McVay recalled.

“And then he showed up at the place,” she said.

Before those last hours at the hot spot – the last night of the teens’ vacation on the Dutch Caribbean Island – Holloway went to a Boyz II Men and Lauryn Hill concert on Surfside Beach, McVay said. Then she headed for Carlos ‘N Charlie’s; van der Sloot showed up around midnight.

McVay said she left soon after.

“I was tired,” she said.

But van der Sloot and Holloway were seen dancing and drinking until the bar closed about 1:30 a.m. May 30.

Then Holloway did something that shocked her friends: She jumped into a car with van der Sloot and Surinamese brothers, Satish Kalpoe, 18, and Deepak Kalpoe, 21.

It just didn’t make sense, McVay said. “I know that Natalee is responsible enough to leave on her own,” McVay said.

Later that morning, when McVay woke up, Holloway wasn’t next to her like she’d been every other night during their stay at the Holiday Inn.

“We thought she slept in another room so as not to wake us up,” she said. “We thought she was being polite.” With Holloway’s packed bags and passport untouched and departure time looming, McVay and the group began to panic.

“We started walking down the halls knocking on all the doors,” she said. “We told the chaperone, ‘There’s a problem, she’s not here.’

http://nypost.com/2005/07/17/natalee-pals-racked-with-guilt-over-the-day-they-saw-her-slip-away/

 

[MrsPete]

You're not a parent? Oh boy. Before I was a parent, I had a whole list of things I would/would not do "if I had children." Life has a way of slapping you upside the head when you say stuff like this.

For what it's worth, I did not experience a "slap upside the head". My parenting plans did not change significantly when they hit the reality test, and my kids are young adults now.

I'm a parent. I'd never allow my child to go on a similar trip.

I'm a parent, and I have said no to similar trips.

With all of that said, she was an 18 year old, who graduated HS and would be off to college in several months.

Off to college, where she probably would have lived in a dorm that would've provided some support and security for young people not yet accustomed to being "on their own". A dorm, which would've sported posters about date rape drugs, evening programs on self-defense, and a safe-ride program programmed into her phone. Also, there's a world of difference between about-to-graduate-from-high-school and in-college.

 

[Hikergirl]

Off to college, where she probably would have lived in a dorm that would've provided some support and security for young people not yet accustomed to being "on their own". A dorm, which would've sported posters about date rape drugs, evening programs on self-defense, and a safe-ride program programmed into her phone. Also, there's a world of difference between about-to-graduate-from-high-school and in-college.

And yet college girls still make the wrong decisions every day concerning alcohol and partying.
None of that stuff is a guarantee that Natalee would not have left with those 3 men, and it could have just as easily happened in her own college town.
She was a young adult, and at some point a parent does have to let go. My dd has never given me a reason to not trust her, I would have paid for a trip like that for her. Maybe Natalee's parents felt the same way.

FTR, she already graduated, and she was almost 19 years old, same age as many already in college.

 

[MrsDuck]

Off to college, where she probably would have lived in a dorm that would've provided some support and security for young people not yet accustomed to being "on their own". A dorm, which would've sported posters about date rape drugs, evening programs on self-defense, and a safe-ride program programmed into her phone. Also, there's a world of difference between about-to-graduate-from-high-school and in-college.

Do you really think posters protect college girls or teach them anything?

 

[asta]

Just a reminder that all of this talk about whether she should have gone on this trip could very well be immaterial to what happened. I know as a parent we seek to put a safety shield around our children by saying we would never allow this or that. My daughters never left our house without a please be careful, don't be alone comment from me. They never went on a trip like this. Instead they went out here at home with three friends who were all home for holiday break from college. A group of 21 to 24 year olds. Three of them were drugged and they became separated. We never found out who or how (even though I have my suspicion). My daughters could have easily ended up like Natalie. They have zero memory from the time of their second drink so anything could have happened except for good strangers who acted as their 'angels' to get them home safely. Sometimes evil happens no matter what the situation.

 

[mi*vida*loca]

For her parents sake I hope it's her. They deserve closure.

As for the parenting aspect....My son is almost 18. If we were faced with this trip I would probably send him. I don't think a drinking age of 18 is bad at all. My son could easily sign up for the military, go and die for his country but not have a legal drink here in the US? I've never agreed with it.

He's going to WDW for his senior trip and he will be 18. I'm not worried about chaperones. I have no idea the chaperone to student ratio. I don't know their meet up rules or times, etc. IMO he will be 18 and needs to learn to do things on his own.

What happened to Natalie could have easily happened to her right here in the USA. Girls get drugged, raped and murdered on a daily basis. Sometimes I reminisce with my friend about all of the dumb crap we did and just a few weeks ago we both said "how did we think that was a good idea" when we were talking about certain events. It's a miracle neither one of us was never drugged or sexually assaulted.

 

[Erzengel]

Sometimes I reminisce with my friend about all of the dumb crap we did and just a few weeks ago we both said "how did we think that was a good idea" when we were talking about certain events. It's a miracle neither one of us was never drugged or sexually assaulted.

I met a girl at a local Shore Bar/Dance Club. She was with her friends but rode with me where we all met up at a diner. While her friends insisted that she was going home with them, in hindsight just her getting in a car with someone she just met doesn't sound like the greatest idea.

Anyways, we're married now but that just reminds me of how we think differently when we are in our late teens/early twenties.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Just a reminder that all of this talk about whether she should have gone on this trip could very well be immaterial to what happened. I know as a parent we seek to put a safety shield around our children by saying we would never allow this or that. My daughters never left our house without a please be careful, don't be alone comment from me. They never went on a trip like this. Instead they went out here at home with three friends who were all home for holiday break from college. A group of 21 to 24 year olds. Three of them were drugged and they became separated. We never found out who or how (even though I have my suspicion). My daughters could have easily ended up like Natalie. They have zero memory from the time of their second drink so anything could have happened except for good strangers who acted as their 'angels' to get them home safely. Sometimes evil happens no matter what the situation.

For her parents sake I hope it's her. They deserve closure.

As for the parenting aspect....My son is almost 18. If we were faced with this trip I would probably send him. I don't think a drinking age of 18 is bad at all. My son could easily sign up for the military, go and die for his country but not have a legal drink here in the US? I've never agreed with it.

He's going to WDW for his senior trip and he will be 18. I'm not worried about chaperones. I have no idea the chaperone to student ratio. I don't know their meet up rules or times, etc. IMO he will be 18 and needs to learn to do things on his own.

What happened to Natalie could have easily happened to her right here in the USA. Girls get drugged, raped and murdered on a daily basis. Sometimes I reminisce with my friend about all of the dumb crap we did and just a few weeks ago we both said "how did we think that was a good idea" when we were talking about certain events. It's a miracle neither one of us was never drugged or sexually assaulted.

I had my drink spiked one summer - by seemingly nice guys we had just met. It was a beer. I noticed it tasted funny, and I started feeling sick. I looked in the bottle and could see a pill. I left the cottage we were in and went outside to be sick, then I left. I have the chills just thinking about it now, that someone there had wanted to do me harm. In retrospect, it was a dumb weekend altogether, and my friend and I were lucky we made it home. It happens, and I believe we're mistaken if we think it can't happen to just about any of our kids today, even good/smart kids and even if we think they're relatively safe.

This summer I spent time on a college campus when my DS played on a team there. By where I walked my dog, there was an Emergency Call box. It intrigued me. And made me a little unsettled at the same time. As a matter of fact, I actually hadn't given it a whole lot of thought until just now. But between that and some other things I've become aware of since my own kids and their friends started college, I don't think we should take anything for granted. Things can happen, period. I think that self-defense starts with not putting yourself in a bad situation, first, then knowing how to protect yourself, second. (I started a spin-off thread about it if anyone has additional thoughts they want to share there.) How we teach this to kids, idk. They don't always listen.

 

[Grumpy's Gal]

So did anyone watch the show? Two episodes are on ON DEMAND and I watched them both.

ideas? comments? thoughts? ( about the show)

 

[mummabear]

I don't think a drinking age of 18 is bad at all.

In many other parts of the world it is the legal age. It had been here in NZ for at least 15 years.

I don't understand the reasoning behind a 21 age limit-if you can get married, legally held as an adult for contracts and crimes and can join the army and die for your country at 18 surely you can have a beer

 

[NHdisneylover]

In many other parts of the world it is the legal age. It had been here in NZ for at least 15 years.

I don't understand the reasoning behind a 21 age limit-if you can get married, legally held as an adult for contracts and crimes and can join the army and die for your country at 18 surely you can have a beer

I agree it is a strange cut off age.

I actually think it is safer/healthier for peopel to be able to start learning how tehy react to alcohol and how to drink it safely and responsibly while still living at home with that safety net of parents. The age 21 limit doesn't really allow for that.

Where we live, if there is an age for consumption with parents I am not aware of it. Beer/wine/cider can be purchased at 16 and everything else at 18.

 

[Simba's Mom]

So did anyone watch the show? Two episodes are on ON DEMAND and I watched them both.

ideas? comments? thoughts? ( about the show)

I just watched the one on TV last week. Is her mother in any episodes you watched? She wasn't in the one I saw and I was wondering why her mother was never shown. I know her parents are divorced, but her mother was so prevalent on the news early on that it seemed odd to me that she wasn't in this special.

 

[Hikergirl]

In many other parts of the world it is the legal age. It had been here in NZ for at least 15 years.

I don't understand the reasoning behind a 21 age limit-if you can get married, legally held as an adult for contracts and crimes and can join the army and die for your country at 18 surely you can have a beer

I found this pretty interesting.
https://www.boston.com/culture/health/2014/07/17/why-21-a-look-at-our-nations-drinking-age

Late 1960s and 1970s: Drinking age lowered. During the late 1960s and 1970s, nearly all states lowered the drinking age to 18. This led to a huge increase in alcohol-related car accidents and drunk driving was deemed a public health crisis. In the mid-1970s, 60 percent of all traffic fatalities were alcohol related, according to the National Institute of Health(NIH). Over two-thirds of car accidents involving persons aged 16 to 20 were alcohol-related.

1984-2014: National drinking age raised to 21: In response to the drunk driving epidemic of the 1970s, President Ronald Reagan passed the Minimum Drinking Age Act in July 1984, a law that mandated states increase the drinking age to 21.

The law worked, too. According to the NIH, drunk-driving accidents have dropped by 50 percent since the law was passed. The greatest proportion of this decline was among 16 to 20 year olds: approximately 37 percent of traffic fatalities in this age group were alcohol related in 2013 compared to more than 75 percent in the 1970s.

 

[Grumpy's Gal]

I just watched the one on TV last week. Is her mother in any episodes you watched? She wasn't in the one I saw and I was wondering why her mother was never shown. I know her parents are divorced, but her mother was so prevalent on the news early on that it seemed odd to me that she wasn't in this special.

No , only a picture of her mom. But Dave did say he didn't want people close to Natalie to have to go thru disappointment again if it was a dead end. Did her mom even know at that point that he had a lead?

 

[MrsPete]

And yet college girls still make the wrong decisions every day concerning alcohol and partying.
None of that stuff is a guarantee that Natalee would not have left with those 3 men, and it could have just as easily happened in her own college town.

It certainly could have happened in a college town; however, I disagree with "just as easily". Colleges have some protections in place for naive young people; it seems that Aruba had none.

And yet college girls still make the wrong decisions every day concerning alcohol and partying.Do you really think posters protect college girls or teach them anything?

Yeah, I think smart people take a look at PSAs and think, "Hmmm." Coupled with parental admonitions, programs in the freshman dorms, friends who make a pact to stick together when they go out to a club ... yeah, I think it makes some difference.

 

[Hikergirl]

It certainly could have happened in a college town; however, I disagree with "just as easily". Colleges have some protections in place for naive young people; it seems that Aruba had none.


Yeah, I think smart people take a look at PSAs and think, "Hmmm." Coupled with parental admonitions, programs in the freshman dorms, friends who make a pact to stick together when they go out to a club ... yeah, I think it makes some difference.

You can certainly think those things make a difference however I think its naive to think what happened to Natalee couldn't happen just as easily to girls in college towns because those things are in place.