Self defense sprays have come a long way in 30 years, and they can stop a bear. In fact a person using bear spray to stop a bear attack is less likely to be injured than a person using a gun. http://www.bearsmart.com/docs/BearSprayVsBullets.pdf
Well, there are no bears or dangerous wildlife in my country (except maybe for some bulls), but there are a lot of "planchas" which is the local brand of ghetto people, and drunk aggressive homeless people, and I've come close to getting hurt twice already this year.
I should look into a self-defense spray though :), with the added benefit of them being much cheaper.
