just had a little fun with this freak, who claims to be a woman but clearly can't remember what sex he is supposed to be. he says his name is Maximo Jans, then he says his sourname - yes, he wrote sourname twice - is Maximo or Johns and his name is Jans. he started off saying he's in botswana, suddenly discovered he's in vicenza in italy, and will be going home to oakland, CA in 2 weeks.

the scam comes in this way: he claims to be an artist, and has a terracotta and bronze antique he wants me to sell for him. it seems all i need to do to get hold of it is pay some trivial license and storage fees, and no doubt shipping and insurance... and then he'll send me artworks to sell too, and for those, all i need to pay is shipping and insurance, and then take a handsome commission when i get rid of them.

the trouble with this guy is that if you don't speak english too well, you could well get suckered. if you do, you can tell just from the profile that this person is as comfortable in english as i would be in a hair shirt with thumbtacks for buttons...