Mexico is labor intensive. This is a good thing for an aspiring country (developing nation). For some months now the Mexican government has had a work force remodeling building fronts along Hildalgo street. Calle Miguel Hidalgo is the main drag heading one way (west to east) through the town of Xico.
A week or so ago a project to place electrical wires underground was started along Hildalgo and a few other main roadways in town. How nice it will be to have those webs of wires removed from view. Signs of progress.
The other morning it was rainy and foggy; generally miserable. I was reading. I heard shrill whistling that silenced the birds and interrupted my moment. Across the way I spied a propane truck – common around here. But, when I saw what the two workers were up to I had to get a picture or two.
The big truck carried an extension ladder and rope. In the miserable weather one hombre climbed the fully extended ladder to the roof top of the two story casa across the way from us. He then dropped a rope down to the other hombre. He secured the heavy filling hose and nozzle to the rope. It was hauled topside in order to fill a 300 liter tank on the roof top.
The hombre aloft had whistled to his partner to secure the line and then release hose from the spool on the rear of the truck. As the tank was filling he continued to whistle while he worked.
I, like most U.S. laborers, might have been grumbling about having to be doing this in cold rainy weather; and adding the question out to the air and anyone within listening range, “WHY would anyone install a gas tank atop their house?”
Lot sizes are typically narrow and small in Mexico pueblos. Every square meter of property is utilized. Often a casa will cover every square centimeter of land space. Naturally building up – placing propane tanks, drying laundry, storing furniture and things you might find in a metal shed in the U.S. and walking the dog rooftop is common practice.
Propane gas is about half the cost typical in the U.S. There is no extra charge for hefting large tanks of gas or filling tanks on rooftops – just part of the job.
Occasionally when I see many hombres out doing work that might be more easily done with heavy equipment I scoff at the inefficiency; the labor intensiveness. But then I see that Mexico, a developing nation, has half the unemployment of the first world nation hovering a top their land. I think maybe those people up there have outsmarted themselves.
Today is beginning sunny. Dogs will be warming themselves at roofs edge. Clothes will be hung on rooftops to bask in the sun and propane hombres will climb to rooftops sans yellow rain gear. It will be a good day here reaching to the 70’s.
That hombre will still be whistling as he works I am sure. He has a job and happy for that. Stay Tuned!
The other day we drove into Xico to pay our property taxes, check on our rental and have lunch at our favorite cocina economica, The Tias. During the drive and subsequent moving about the town of Xico we noticed a lot of new graffiti markings. I even saw a truck with the canopy marked by paint can graffiti.
It looks as if graffiti is endemic to Mexico, but then the U.S. certainly has its share. Here in our area I would suggest that graffiti is now at an epidemic level. This quite simply boggles my mind. In the latter part of the 20th and now into the 21st Century the earth is scorched with the markings of restless, mindless youth. The billions of dollars spent on education are doing what for society?
Across the street at our Casita in Ursulo Galvan a block wall and a wood door have been marked by the pubescent nina that lives there. The apparent plan is soon the door is to be replaced and the wall stucco’d. But in the mean time these areas have been tagged to provide entertainment for the restless young girl – all in good fun.
We know the circumstances because when we started to commiserate for the travesty the mother explained it is all in good fun. But do all the youth and parents for that matter here in the Colonia of 1700 know this is just good fun, or do the children see inroads to this trashy barrio identity crisis and their parents accept yet another insult to respectable living?
Why would a parent allow this activity as some sort of release because it will be covered one day – and perhaps not too soon as the wheels of construction over there run very slow? There are two casas in various stages of construction, and have been for the last five years. Is it not a training ground for future tagging?
Until they do get that wall and door covered we will be entertained by these barrio markings, as will the rest of the Hood. We and the neighbor to our east have long walls directly across from this barrio blackboard – ours are bigger and certainly more inviting.
Six months ago if you turned off the main road between Coatepec and Xico to head up to our Colonia and further in you would have noticed a distinct lack of barrio markings; but it started creeping up from the turn then and is now there in the Hood.
Have we adults all gone nuts? Have we given up on our neighborhoods to our children? Apparently the repercussions for such behavior are in no way a deterrent.
I know trying to reason with teenagers is often a lost cause, but has anyone suggested some mass media programs to let these taggers know they are ruining their own inheritance. That the buildings and neighborhoods that they are defacing will one day belong to them; that the costs involved in cleaning up their mess eventually gets passed back to them via higher taxes and parents who have to buy $45.00 gallons of paint instead of those $300.00 sneakers they are wanting.
Might we suggest that by turning their neighborhoods into trashy looking slums might reduce the support and investment made by government and business? The houses they live in lose value as they convert their middle class neighborhood into the likes of a low end barrio.
It would seem that even if you have not yet enough sense to come out of the rain that you might be able to do the math that equals defecating in one’s own nest as not smart.
Here in Mexico they haven’t been able to stop littering – it also is at epidemic proportions here. We are enough generations into littering here that quite simply the adults seem to have no care to stop it – soon there will be second and third generation taggers. There seems to be no stopping any of this.
There are a whole lot of people on this planet now and seemingly few that care about the future of it. People here in Mexico are starting to go to the gym and exercise – they are running and buying jogging outfits – getting real first world ideas. But, they won’t do any deep knee bends, squats or toe touching to pick up the trash in their neighborhood; and they surely aren’t going to disrupt the happy family unit by beating the tar out of little Jose or Mary for defacing the neighborhood.
What do we do when we find something wrong, when someone is acting against what we believe is right, moral or ethical? More often, the answer is – nothing. And here in passive Mexico that is written in stone.
How long this can go on is anyone’s guess. Graffiti has increased by a magnitude in the short few years we have been here – there is no end in sight; quite the opposite. Now when I say this is paradise to a future resident I qualify it with when you look past the litter and graffiti. Stay Tuned!
We have been looking at real estate of late. Before I start getting email from family and friends as to WHY we would be looking for more real estate, let me remind and state right off that I simply enjoy looking. I am a real estate junky.
The activity of going through people’s ‘for sale’ homes and traveling streets and hidden corners of one’s own area can be quite telling.
Even though we have been looking at properties and buying a couple in the last five years of being in this area we had never focused our attention or even titillated our fantasies with much attention to the city of Xico – mind you we own two properties in the Municipal of Xico. However now that we live in the city of Xico we have been looking there.
Five years ago I connected with what a New Orleans expatriate coined as a ‘Bird Dog’. This is a loosely titled buyer’s real estate agent. The bird dog scours the area for available real estate. ‘Our’ bird dog actual sports a business card now: Jorge Cervantes Lozada’s card reads, “VENDEDOR DE TERRENOS Y CASAS.” Roughly translated the hombre will find you land or a house.
When I first met Jorge (Hor Hey) buyer’s agents were just coming into vogue in the U.S. Yet another layer of complication and expenditure.
Lest you be confused you should know that here in the wild wild south of the border the real estate process is far less organized. You might find a casa listed on the Internet by 5 or more different ‘real estate agents’; usually with 5 or more different listing prices and a vast array of details or lack thereof.
You should keep in mind that most likely none of these agents actually has a contract to sell the property. So bird dog seems a very appropriate title for these folks.
Jorge has other jobs. He teaches construction to mentally challenged young people and cleans out water tanks. Obviously bird dogging Mexican style isn’t as of yet a sustaining career; at least not for our spotter.
Jorge has been bringing us for sale properties of late; quite a few. We have seen both raw land and mostly homes. We have looked from one end of Xico to the other (about a mile and a half from east to west and a half mile north to south.
Jorge Shows Anita the View from a Deck
Xico really is a charming little town of about 15,000 inhabitants including the near surrounding area. In as much as it is principally a tourist town the Mexican Government is currently pouring quite a few pesos into developing and arguably maintaining its charm (more on this in the days to come).
Within the city proper Jorge tells me on his good authority that raw land is going for 1000 pesos a square meter. It should be mentioned that there is not a lot of available raw land in this little area – but this figure is Jorge’s rule of thumb sort of speak.
When I tell you rule’s of thumbs are really needed you must realize that people here will price the sale of their property on some very strange bases. Not enough word room today to go into the details but you shouldn’t be surprised if a property’s value was set by the cost to build a casa for a son or daughter with little regard for what the sale property might actually be worth.
You should also know that in most small Mexican cities the properties are severely narrow. In the city of Xico seven meters or 23 feet is an average width for a lot. The depth or length of lots can vary greatly but in almost all instances the width will be quite narrow compared to what you might be used to in the United States.
I would characterize a 50 to 70 foot wide lot in the United States as on the small side; half that would be an average lot here in Xico.
Using a 70’ X 100’ average lot, we arrive at 7000 square feet or about 650 square meters of land. That 650 square meter lot in Xico using Jorge’s rule of thumb of 1000 pesos per meter comes to 650,000 Mexican pesos or $50,000.00 U.S. at the current rate of exchange.
While a postage stamp sized lot in Xico, Veracruz, Mexico will cost that. At the same time you can rent a very nice two bedroom house for 3,000 to 5,000 pesos or $230 US to $385 US.
You can see that most expatriates rent here rather than buy, You can count the foreigners that own houses in Xico on one hand, and there are but a few more in the entire municipal (county more or less).
A year or so back a young middle aged couple from Texas was renting a place on a hectare and a half of land (about 3 acres). It included a small two story cottage in a lovely setting along a clean river. This rental property located on the outskirts of Coatepec was also for sale at that time for about $80,000 U.S.
The couple told us they had been considering buying the place but were still undecided. I suggested 80k was an attractive asking price. The woman corrected me, “You mean $8,000.00 U.S. don’t you?
“Well no said I. It is $80,000.00 U.S.” She retrieved a calculator and began figuring. I assured her I knew the conversion and that wasn’t necessary. It turned out they had computed the exchange with an errant decimal place and had been thinking the property and the cottage were $8,000.00 U.S. dollars.
Be sure to get your conversions straight before heading down to Mexico for that good buy. Stay Tuned!
Friday November 13th 2009, 8:10 am
Filed under: building
One of many favorite lines in Hemingway’s “The Old Man in the Sea” is “Old age is my alarm clock.” I am an early morning riser. The fair young damsel that lost her mind and married me is not.
Early morning in Mexico is very special compared to the rest of the day and night in that it is most often quiet save an occasional rooster or braying burro.
It won’t be until after six that we hear the oft blared tortilla vendor’s melody from Scott Joplin’s piano rag “The Entertainer”, or the banging of propane tanks carted around by stake bed trucks, and oh so much more. By seven the little pueblo of Xico will be alive and nosiy to prove it.
But right now it is me with my thoughts.
I grabbed my trusty Canon and hurried to the roof top to show you dawn’s light here at Casa Campanas.
It looks to be a lovely day. The sky is clear just since the BIG dipper disappeared from view in the back yard – looking north. This morning for some unknown reason that celestial ladle loomed large? Perhaps it was other stars that I pieced together? But I think not. Did you happen to see it?
Friday the thirteenth. I am not a superstitious type. My first Blog of the morning was some rather heart wrenching news from one of my favorite Blogger’s on Mexico – Bliss. Sad news.
On a morning like this how I wish I could wax poetic, lyrically, eloquently, and philosophically like my amigo Felipe. Instead I will flip over to his Blog for that. In the mean time you have settled for my pedestrian rantings.
In any case we are going to go out and make it a good day as sunshine is always welcome and when it appears no matter the date or life’s circumstances we feel better for it. Stay Tuned!
The American dream of retiring to Mexico and having a maid and gardener is alive and well albeit perhaps a bit tarnished. If there was a simple answer for hiring people in Mexico for these services the discussions would have ended long ago – a simple solution isn’t going to happen. Like the discussions on the ‘dangers of living in Mexico’, controversy about employing of maids and gardeners is ongoing.
Heard in a coffee shop near you, “You can move to Mexico, have a maid and a gardener while living on social security!”
My Amigo Steve brought the issue up as it relates to him over there on the sunny beach of Melaque.
Steve wrote in part, “I am purposely generous on the maid cost; she needs it.”
Steve being the consummate nice guy would be in that camp. But, if we look at this beyond the surface Steve comments, “The maid issue is a ticklish one.”
Ticklish Maid Issue
If we were to hire a maid in the United States for $60.00 US a day or more we probably wouldn’t be taking into account the maids living condition beyond that business relationship. But, somehow in Mexico we consider the helps life style as it compares to our own to the point of modifying compensation – perhaps because the gap between ‘the haves’ and ‘the haves not’ is widening?
The other side of that coin is “The gringos come down here and distort the economy. We cannot afford to hire these laborers at the rate of pay the gringos provide.”
In our part of Mexico there are few foreigners – thus the distortion of the economy is barely perceptible. However in areas where there is a large expatriate population the unbalancing of the economy can create wide spread hard feelings, widening the gap between locals and foreigners.
A thoughtful person who I know Steve is must carefully weigh these issues. Charity begins at home. Our home is in Xico, Mexico. We want to be a good neighbor and fair with the people we live amongst. But combining the hiring of a local service with charity is a problem.
If there was a simple answer we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Compensation, local economy and responsible behavior towards hired help have been issues since we first moved to Mexico.
The Calypso family doesn’t have a maid or gardener. We do occasionally hire some yard work service.
We tend to lean towards not disrupting the natural flow of the economy (read pay local rates). I don’t have any special insight or answers. What I do suggest is to not be too judgmental about what others might be doing and to thoughtfully consider the many angles of this very complex issue. Stay Tuned!
A major asset to any Mexican household here in the Hood is the 19 liter (5-gallon) plastic bucket. Most of these containers are spent lard buckets – the poor use a lot of lard apparently. The containers come with lids and cost 8 pesos (about 60 cents US) with lard remnants and 15 pesos ($1.10 US) cleaned – both a bargain. Last time I checked they were about $6.00 US at Home Depot.
I am known far and wide for my thriftiness so if you guessed we buy the to-be-cleaned buckets you were right.
I set them in the sun until the thin veil of lard on the inner sides melts some, making them easier to wash out. We use them for our several compost toilets as well as containers for tools, topsoil, coffee bean chard’s, tools and even as planters.
They are hard to keep around as my neighbors often borrow them – never to be seen again. When you own a dozen of something that most hoard at one or two you just scream, “Get your Buckets here!”
The buckets are the most common tote; sand, gravel and cement unit of measure, and hauler; step ladder, suitcase and tool box in the Hood.
When an hombre gets on the job and empties his bucket of tools, it then becomes a step ladder; often in conjunction with a straight back wooden chair. Some of these fellows look like they are practicing a balancing act for the Ed Sullivan Show – and if you remember that show you are old like me.
I wrote a few entries back about the collapse of the front apron of our local Alcoholics Anonymous building. The 4 meter by 4 meter room with a few pew like benches and encouraging quotes and photographs on the walls is actually the front room of our neighbors sprawling property – where there are seven casas and currently five families living as well as the AA oficina.
I thought perhaps tearing down and starting anew would be the ticket as there was some question as to the viability of the balance of the structure. That not being the Mexican way, it was decided to shore up the building with cement post and beams and reconstruct the apron with reinforcement beams. No small project.
A Complex Fix for the Small AA Building
Our next-door neighbor and another hombre commenced to working a couple of weeks ago. I check in on the progress regularly being that I am retired and often wander aimlessly around the Hood. Well the truth is I am watching this fascinating process for my readers.
A couple of days ago peaking in I noticed my neighbor and friend Emilio perched on one of the aforementioned buckets resting on a small wooden chair – wobbling as he greeted me. He calls me Yanni – I assume for Johnny. I have no idea where he came up with that? For many years he called me Señor. But, in recent time we have become friendlier and now I am YAWN-EE.
I was disturbed to see that bucket swaying on that rickety wooden chair. I forcefully said, “Alta hombre!” I walked over the 200 yards to my house and got my trusty yellow step-ladder. Upon returning I explained what he was doing was tantamount to hanging himself without the rope and that he must use this ladder.
Emilio’s Turn on our Step Ladder in the AA Building
Hours later during another wandering spell I check-in; Emilio is still on the chair and bucket, and his work associate is using the ladder. The other hombre after all was the Jefe (boss). I blurted out that I brought that ladder to protect my neighbor’s life and he remains risking limb and life? The Jefe started to dismount the ladder taking me quite seriously.
I smiled and said, “No, it is OK” – at least one life will be spared. I had, sort of, loaned them the ladder to use with their best judgment (seldom a good idea actually). They continued on. Emilio returns the ladder at the end of each work day – that being something novel here a bouts – returning things.
Anita Warns One of Our Clever Workers Incorporating the Ubiquitous Bucket with Our Ladder
When Anita heard that I had loaned the ladder to Emilio she gave me that stern wifely look, reminding me that loaning my stuff has been less than successful. I thought for a moment. I explained that particular excellent ladder was obtained from a dumpster dive in the back of Sam’s Club in Pueblo, Colorado. A great find actually. Replacement value $100 US.
I suggested that perhaps the reason that fine ladder was in that dumpster to be found by me was God’s intention; He provided it so I would loan it out to my poor neighbors, perhaps saving their lives or at least prevent a few broken arms or legs. Anita moved on without saying anything. In my head I smiled thinking we former Americans have too much stuff anyway. Stay Tuned!
I don’t borrow things, I buy them. When I was a boy I loved to fiddle with cars. After one particularly rewarding adventure into rebuilding a carburetor or some such thing I remarked to my father that one day I will be smart enough about cars to fix them entirely myself.
My father quickly replied, “I hope one day you will be smart enough to earn enough money to have someone else fix your cars.” I have always remembered that. And for a time I managed to make that happen.
Even when for a time I could afford to have someone fix my things I saw logic in buying the tools and doing it myself; the money saved on labor would pay for the tools to do it myself. That thinking got me a lot of tools traveling along life’s highway. But, now many things have gotten way too complicated for me to fix, yet the tools remain.
John the tool man, your host here, has offered up many a tool to friends and neighbors. The results have not always been pretty. I mean this always starts out with the good feelings of helping another. Then there is the recognition of being the guy with the tool. In the United States there were other neighbors and friends that had tools too, but not here in Mexico. I am nearly unique in that regard.
It can be said honestly that loaning stuff out usually does not pay. I didn’t have to move to Mexico with truck loads of tools to learn that getting stuff back in good condition or at all is dicey at best. Before I had the language and cultural barriers I spent time hunting down a tool or complaining about the returned condition or lack thereof. On occasion I had to borrow my tool back, promising to return it when I was through. As ludicrous as that sounds, it is true.
The hombres you pay 200 pesos (about $15 U.S.) a day seldom come with tools, nor do their 125 peso a day helpers. Often those hombres become amigos or were to begin with, so when they need a tool to do a job other than mine they know where to find them. I am sponsoring a couple guys careers here as they now can offer services they can do with my tools.
Many times I have thought about a community tool shed. All my neighbors didn’t need to own the same tools, rather we could amass a good collection of collective tools. Now there is a Utopian idea if I ever had one. Having bounced that lofty concept off the lovely Senora Vivaz more than a few times, she always pulls my feet back down to earth saying, “Do you remember how many tools you have loaned out that come back beaten and broken or not at all?” Yup – forget that communal concept.
OK so my compromise has been to keep loaning out my many tools. We had a long and heated discussion on the Forum back in 2007 about a battery charger I loaned to a couple homeboys up the street here in the Hood. The charger came back with a broken case and marginal functionality being as it obviously met the pavement in a brutal way.
In that discussion there was a lot of talk about cultural differences. I took the position that common courtesy is a universal quality. I took a lot of flak for that, and now having a couple more years of living here under my belt, I have weakened on that former stand.
Through time I have come to realize that here they abuse their own kind just as much as they do me, although with less frequency because I have more stuff to loan out. Even La Senora experiences the no return policy as she scours the Hood looking for containers, pans and other assorted kitchen tools (of which she has or had a lot).
Comparatively the Calypso family has been greatly spoiled in life. The Bible reminds us “to whom much is given, much is expected“. The main idea here is that we are accountable for the knowledge, abilities and resources that we have been blessed with, even earned by opportunity and effort.
None of this rambling is going to change my habit of loaning out tools in any cultural circumstance. I gotta go. I need to hunt down my contractors shovel and level. Stay Tuned!
Before seven, just after daylight, it started. My daybreak concert performed by a myriad of birds was interrupted by the edgy tones of steel bashing rock – not music to my ears.
Directly across the street are two joined casas that have been under construction for the entire time we have lived here. A mass of rock and dirt raise the casas 20 feet or so above street level. They lord over us on the other side of the road.
Up to now there have been some crude rock stairways to get up there. Now with finer houses in the making, fancier cement walkups are wanted – Some HUGE boulders needed to go.
A number of years ago our next-door neighbor at the time had a boulder problem. They were in their way. The neighbors drilled holes in the boulders; they placed dynamite in the holes and proceeded to ignite the tube encased powder.
The rock split into many. Some landing a crushing blow to the roof top of their mobile home. Obviously a miscalculation had occurred. The mobile home was essentially destroyed – a lesson had been learned the hard rock way.
Thankfully no dynamite here – what they do is call in an expert; a man that knows his rocks and how to get them off. I didn’t even know such persons existed.
We recently had some large boulders to deal with ourselves. We pounded and pounded on those big rocks. We pushed and pulled them both with manpower and truck and chain power. They finally ended up in the ditch dug for our new front wall.
The two or three mammoth boulders needing to be removed across the street dwarfed our problem stones. A couple mornings ago the rock man showed up with a bag of tools and a lot of determination. It was obvious he had done this before.
His expertise was not wasted on me – I was duly impressed with his methodical process. He would vigorously pound the giant stone. Dust fumed out from the pressure applied to the surface. The huge head of the sledge bounced back at the hombre. He continued to bang away using the kind of force one might imagine required to get water from stone.
After some brutal pounding he gently brushed away the dust with the intensity of an archeologist dusting for ancient pottery remnants or bones. If he spied a possible weakness he would wash a line along the prospective weakness with a bottle of water.
With a chisel that is probably as big as they come, he pounded the head of that chisel with great vigor. If an opening developed he would jam chisels as spacers or even rock chards between the widening crack. Working with a large pry bar and chisels as spacers until finally a chunk of the azul rock separated.
In two days of intense work the boulders were reduced to manageable sized stones. A wall will be constructed from the pieces – it should be a lovely one.
Yesterday we completed the footing for the wall on the other side of the driveway upon which we will mount a gate. The job got complicated because the Colonia’s main water line ran right where the wall is to be. We had to do some metal fabricating and adjust the footing height to accommodate the pipe.
Just a couple days ago we spied a group surveying for new water lines. We checked with an engineer about how we should deal with the pipe. The water hombre (the one who Anita has been getting into it with) advised that the pipe was on our property rather than in the street because of the capilla (small religious shrine). He thought the new pipe that would go around the capilla in the street would be installed in about a month. We opted not to wait and made a cage around the pipe.
Monday and Tuesday we will work on the short wall – I will have photos and the rest of that story.
Some days it just feels good to call in sick. Remember when it was Monday morning and you simply DID NOT want to go to work and you so wanted to call in sick? I had that feeling yesterday; and I’m retired!
My reliably on time boss, the friend I hired to build the wall, showed up at 7 AM; right on time. Now this hombre worked until 11:30 PM Sunday night. He works 28 days out of every thirty for a soft drink distributor. He often moonlights, daylights actually (he works the swing shift) working with me.
I have been the assistant on this job: Hauling buckets of pasta (cement mix); getting block and bricks ready to be laid; screeding wayward cement from block and brick; and just about every other place within a few yards of the project. The list goes on. Meanwhile the head honcho lathers cement on blocks and brick carefully placing them, tapping them to level and waiting for me to do whatever else he needs done.
Wall Up
I’m not complaining about the working relationship – just the working. I am retired. My understanding of that is freedom to do what and when I please.
It seems like this small project has been going on a long time – it has actually. That brings us to another issue. Begrudgingly I set off to work. There were about 6 block and 24 brick to be set for completion of setting blocks/bricks. We screened a half mix of our usual 5 buckets of sand with 1 bag of lime and a half a bag of Portland cement. Then we added water and mixed with shovels until our pasta reached the right consistency. We then laid block and brick.
The Only Sun Up
The final step is to pour two posts to tie it all together. The boss started driving nails through a one inch board that would be the form for the cement post. As he commenced to pounding I noticed the wall heaving and the latest laid bricks and blocks were becoming dislodged and out of level. One block hopped out of its mudded path nearly falling. I shouted, “Stop!”
If you have ever watched or worked with contractors and laborers on a building project you know time is money and it waits for no man – they rush each process. In this case the rush was going to make me unhappy for a very long time to come. I would have to look at block and bricks lined up like hung over soldiers at dawn’s revelry.
I know my help (boss) is impatient for completion. I started complaining to Anita to get her take. She says tell him, emphatically.
I said you tell him, rather whining like. She does. Here I am looking for any sign that this is going to be a problem. Because he is my friend, he complies; just like he complied to my cutting brick and block with an electric cutting wheel rather than chopping at bricks and blocks with a machete often causing misshapen pieces or wasted material. I could go into my whole embedded energy rap and how we shouldn’t waste these high energy created materials, or how I could ill afford a 20% waste factor that is so much a part of U.S. construction.
In this episode of north meets south I have the upper hand because I am paying – or so I think anyway. The boss on the other hand has had his processes handed down from many generations before him and isn’t likely to change those learned techniques once I am out of the picture – even if some of them make better sense. No this is as much about tradition as efficiency.
I am happier because the wall is more to my specifications due to my intimate interplay. It is not exact mind you. I made compromises, honestly. I tried not to introduce too many things from the New World – I kept my laser level boxed. We used a minimum of tools that required electricity, and I patiently waited for nails to be straightened without uttering a word.
Straight as an Arrow
I didn’t bring any computer generated drawings, only a scaffold ladder and step ladder to avoid perching on upside down 5 gallon buckets and termite infested, wobbly scaffolding. I took my notes from memory in the confines of my camper rather than jotting things down like a straw boss keeping tabs on his fellow workers.
It was both rainy and Monday yesterday. Paul Williams and the Carpenters said it best:
Talkin’ to myself and feelin’ old
Sometimes I’d like to quit
Nothing ever seems to fit
Hangin’ around
Nothing to do but frown
Rainy Days and Mondays always get me down.
But I’m OK now. ‘Every day is Saturday in our Mexican Paradise’ is back!
Our little Casita property is almost all walled up. All in all this was probably the best project thus far in our Mexican saga. Running interference to affect what I perceive as a more satisfactory outcome paid off. After all that wall should be standing for a long time after I am not – now to keep graffiti off – the next challenge. Stay Tuned!
I don’t think of myself as a harsh person. It takes a lot to make me angry; and at that my temperament has even improved with age. Admittedly I am capable of getting upset, but I honestly like to think no one should be afraid of setting me off. I could be wrong about that?
Anita’s galpal Lidia goes to confession. Apparently the padre no longer sits outside the box with a curtain? She assures Anita he knows her well from their many pew side forgiveness chats. I am not Catholic so I confess directly to God and Anita. They say confession is good for the soul – but to confess to me must be tough?
The construction of 22 feet of block wall began in earnest yesterday. A trench was dug for footings and a couple of columns. The digging included going around the electric column where our service comes in and the city water pipe.
Vicente, who could be characterized as my best friend here in Mexico was working with his 13 year old son. When the son was nearing the area of the city water line, his father warned him to be careful to not damage the water line. Of course he managed to stab the pipe several times with a shovel – later guessing he hit the pipe but not so that water would come out.
Yesterday was not our day for water, fortunately, because the several scrapes had pierced the pipe. The rule here is don’t warn your boy to avoid digging through something – have him dig where pipes and wires aren’t only – because they will hit the obstructions; many a grown boy has as well. But, rest assured your boy and mine will hit the forewarned target. I did it; my son did it and so did yours I venture to guess.
Now if I had taken Anita’s advice and had been sitting in a chair over seeing this scene I would have dispensed this sage advice prior to the infraction – but I was occupied at the computer.
At a point Anita comes to me explaining that Vicente had called her up to the road to explain that he was greatly embarrassed that his son had in fact damaged the water pipe. Further that he would go to the hardware store, buy a new piece of hose and fix the damage. He explained this to her in nervous tones.
Now here I am wondering – this hombre is my friend. I would not get mad because his kid did what kids do. In fact I had a policy with my own son whereby if he did something out of childlike carelessness I would never get angry. I reserved anger for the times he defied rather than did something dumb. This policy would be extended to others.
Now Vicente surely didn’t know my policy in this regard – I understand that – but why…why would he be in fear of how I might react to the situation?
I went up to the work area where Vicente was carefully digging to expose the connection of the main water feed line to the damaged line leading to our property. I questioned whether we could fix this or should we be notifying the water guy (ugh I have previously described our adverse relationship with that water hombre).
Eventually we uncovered the connecting point and removed the 160 cm’s of tubing. Vicente explained that it was fine if we went ahead and repaired it. Further that the particular blue tubing was available at my amigo Andrea’s hardware store located at the entrance to San Marcos.
We scooted down to San Marcos. We ordered all the material for the new wall (which came to 83.00 U.S. dollars). As they were adding everything up I reminded Andrea’s daughter about the piece of blue pipe that she and her dad had cut and that was now in Vicente’s hands. I paid and returned to the scene of the crime. We checked the bill and found that I had not been charged for the replacement blue pipe – perhaps this eased the guilt for Vicente?
It has been decided that we will roll the HUGE boulders left by the inconsiderate road makers into the trench dugout for the new wall. Not exactly your textbook rubble trench foundation – but it is going to work. Stay Tuned!
