#1055 – The Expat Files: Vaccines, Government, Accents, and Cultural Nuances

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came up to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you ex-pat wannabes I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America the show that tells you just what it's like to live Workplay and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Okay, let's try not to hurt anybody's feelings today Okay, but first some Covid it vaccination facts you need to know which one are you gonna take? Well, these facts might help you pick your Covid it vaccine poison first the Pfizer vaccine

[00:46] Did you know they paid four point seven billion dollars in fines? That's billion dollars in fines for false claims and drug and medical products safety violations along with taking kickbacks Committing off-label illegalities as well as bribing doctors and government officials now after hearing all that yet Just might want to take the Moderna Covid it packs Although you should know they've never ever brought a vaccine to market. This will be their first Hmm. Didn't your mom and dad ever tell you you should never buy the first of a new product You know why because they haven't worked the bugs out yet So this is their very first shot at it pun intended despite having nine other vaccine candidates None of which made it through phase three clinical trials. Hmm. Yeah, right then that inspire confidence

[01:31] So then maybe you want to select the Johnson and Johnson Covid it facts after what you just heard about Pfizer and Moderna I mean really who wouldn't want a comforting jab from Johnson and Johnson the baby powder people by the way They've also paid billions in fines. In fact right now They're involved in thousands of lawsuits for putting toxic and or dangerous products on the market including drugs Shampoos and medical equipment and most recently as bestest Contaminated baby powder you got that all you mommies out there So then maybe we're just better off taking the Astra Zeneca Covidia jab though don't tell anyone but the use of their VAX has been suspended by two dozen European countries due to severe lethal adverse reactions like blood clots and aneurysms

[02:16] Oh and remember the FDA approved all those products. They're being sued for yeah, right so much for FDA approval They're bought and sold too. Hmm. Then there's always the Chinese Covid effects Just never mind. They've got a terrible history of putting out contaminated food products and dog food that killed countless phytos Then again in China dogs can be man's best friend and man's best meal Now if any of that gives you pause, there's always the Russian Sputnik Covid effects But not to worry Jeffrey Epstein's buddy Bill Gates, dr. Falsy in the who Insists you're in safe hands Oh, and by the way, did you know all pharmaceutical companies that are producing the Covid effects have been given a waiver by the US government It states they cannot be sued or held liable for any deaths or adverse reactions

[03:03] So then who do you sue if grandma dies the US government, of course So the taxpayer that means you take on the burden of any lawsuits So just remember drug companies producing the Covid it vaccines have zero liability for any deaths or adverse reactions man such a deal Wouldn't you like to have a company that had so much leverage in Washington DC? Congress gave you a get-out-of-jail-free card no matter how potentially dangerous your product is course You know what that means don't you they knew all along there were gonna be adverse effects and deaths because if they knew the drugs Were safe. They wouldn't have lobbied so hard for that waiver But you knew that already right by the way, I was talking to expat Eddie the other day He's on the same page as we are all the way. I said Eddie you're gonna get vaccine He said hell No, I said you got a plan to get out of it you do travel so much How you gonna get that so-called Covid it vaccine passport card. He said Johnny. Here's my plan

[03:52] I'm gonna go into one of the clinics down here and when they call my name and I go into that little cubicle Where the nurse is supposed to jab me as she prepares the shot I'll take out a hundred dollar bill and tell her look how'd you like to make a week's salary? Just sign that card and save the shot for someone else and if she walks I'll pull out another hundred and if she's still resisting out it'll come another hundred remember nurses down here only make about 400 bucks a month, so if you're up to 400 bucks, you're giving her a month's vacation pay I said Eddie that's Occam's razor the simplest solution is often the best now of course that can easily be done here in Latin But remember most nurses probably will not speak English So you'll have to know some Spanish, but I'm nearly a hundred percent certain You won't be able to pull that off up in the States nurses would be thinking if they get caught

[04:37] They'll lose their jobs Even if you started out with a big money bribe like 500 bucks even then the nurses might think it's some kind of a trap Besides that up in the States there are cameras all over the place a big deterrent But with luck you might have a nurse that's on board with not getting the VEX and she might look the other way a lot Of nurses and health care professionals are against it. You know bottom line though is everyone has their prize Oh an expat Eddie says the beauty of it is if the nurse doesn't go for it for whatever reason He'll just take a walk and go to the next kovid at Vax clinic anyway He's gonna keep me posted so I'll let you know what happens Oh and one last thing I said to Eddie if other gringos and expats want to use that technique and they don't know Spanish What do you suggest? He said just go into your cell phone translator and type this in English. I don't need the vaccination I had kovit a while back. I test negative now. I have immunity

[05:26] Here's a hundred dollars for filling out the card, but don't give me the VEX It will be our little secret then you translate that into Spanish and when you walk in and sit down and she starts preparing the VEX Yeah, show her your phone and see her reaction But don't forget to waive that hundred dollar bill in her face now Of course said he said that little statement in your phone might be a little white lie, but then again Maybe it isn't look how many of us really know if we've had kovit or not since a huge Percentage the population who get it don't even have any symptoms. And once again, I'm not telling you to do anything illegal I'm just reporting on what so many astute gringos and expats have in mind Regarding the covid effects which brings us to an email from the conundrum kid. Yeah, that's how he signed it The conundrum kid. He says I've got a problem Johnny

[06:12] I want to get out of Dodge in a big way, but my wife just won't go She says it's the kids the grandkids the health clubs the coffee clutches with her friends that stuffs her life And she just will not see the light no matter how terrible things get now my wife and we get along and I love her It's reasonable except on this subject and the US government in general. She's one of those who says the USA has always been a special case Man, I've heard that before she says the US is tough It has a 200 plus year history of facing tough choices and getting things done She's a church-going lady too and says that the USA is God's chosen country and all that drill. I'm stumped What's the guy to do? What am I supposed to do next? He said Johnny She's no dummy and I presented all the facts to her

[06:58] She's getting sick of me talking about her problem is she's a lifelong Democrat and still has faith in the system I've told her the facts that the bottom line on the so-called war on terror was a couple of trillion dollars and counting And we've gotten nowhere. We've made things worse. It's money down an ever flushing toilet She knows we spent a couple trillion on the war on drugs down a forever flushing toilet, too And Johnson's so-called war on poverty another two trillion and counting that money also down a perpetually flushing toilet I told her how the feds in Washington and the Federal Reserve are the real criminal Mismanagers of money and how they are the ones that twisted capitalism into crony capitalism and now we're in economic Uncharted territory, I explained to her how the Federal Reserve which was created in 1913 had only two missions

[07:47] One to stabilize the currency to to stop financial panics instead under their watch It couldn't have gone worse the US dollars lost 97% of its purchasing power since 1913 and when I heard you mentioned Johnny that they've got 200 p brained Economists on the job at the Fed It's just sad how clueless they are a regular broker would have gone to jail if he lost a fraction of that much of his client Stow they make even Bernie Madoff look like a financial genius Incredibly the Federal Reserve has managed to destroy 97% of the US dollars value and yet what a Fed chairman like Powell goes on CNN or the media all the financial Markets hang on every little word He says and then for the next 12 hours every talking head in the media does a replay of sound bite after sound bite treating him

[08:38] Like Moses coming down from the mouth. So Johnny I've explained to my wife that lawmakers are the absolute worst money managers and investors of all time They're like retired adolescents who just won the lottery The question is why are they so bad at money management when that's all they've got to do. That's their job I'm certain it's because they're spending and creating other people's money and not theirs and job number one is to follow the party line So you can not only keep your job But your bosses can retain their license to steal and now Biden wants three trillion more for infrastructure Though three-quarters of it will go for pork as usual even so what congressman would vote against an infrastructure project? Everybody wants their roads and bridges fixed right and we all know the government is so good at fixing things

[09:25] I'll shut up now Johnny. My wife's sick of me talking about it And I don't want to sick and you too My wife's told me that I'm no fun to live with anymore and I'm offering a great solution. Let's get the hell out of dodge So Johnny, that's my dilemma. I want out in the worst way and she doesn't want to go Any advice would be greatly appreciated signed the conundrum kid. All right kid. Thanks for that You know, I've gotten many emails in a similar vein where one person wants to get the hell out of Dutch in a big way And the other doesn't want to go. Well, there is a simple solution besides breaking up the relationship You come on down one or both of you get your foot in the door meet some people get a network going Maybe even get a cheap long-term rental set up get that residency started The clock will be ticking on that then just pop down here for a week or two once or twice a year

[10:12] Just to maintain your network connections and do some exploring then you'll have a nice escape hatch when things get so bad that even your wife Can't take it anymore Just have a plan be in place when that eventuality comes because you know It will and if he or she has objections to even that simple plan because you're significant others so firm about not going anywhere Just tell her it's like an insurance policy. Look, everybody carries fire insurance, right? But almost no one's ever met or known anyone who's had their house burned down Unless you're one of those idiot celebrities in California who live in that forest fire zone man. Talk about stupidity, huh? The house burns they rebuild it burns again. They rebuild the end isn't that one of Einstein's definitions of insanity? You know doing the exact same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome

[10:59] So unless you live in California, I bet you don't know anyone who's had their house burned down either All right moving on now for a crazy boots on the ground story that can only happen here in Latin America Here goes there's a gringo expat friend of mine from New York who's been living down here in Latin America for about two years Now he's part Italian and his dad born in Spain. So he does speak Spanish pretty well So for him that move to Latin America was as easy as could be he's not only got the gringo advantage But his Spanish is perfect. In fact, he's got that high-class Spanish from Spain. Yep. I think I may have mentioned that before It's very easy to detect an accent of a person who learned their Spanish in Spain or comes from Spain It's on par with Americans in Brits We can tell someone from England in a second and even a London Uber driver from Brixton to us Americans sounds upper-class a cut above

[11:46] You know old-world culture and all that it's a strange kind of stereotype, but it's there You know That was one of the reasons back in the 60s the British invasion took off in such a huge way The accent British musicians had is like the gringo advantage for us a British guy or gallon the states Automatically gets two points added to his 10 score just for the accent even though in London like Chicago and New York There's some very terrible neighborhoods. You'd never want to walk through one of them being Brixton That'd be like the district where the Cabrini green projects are in Chicago someplace You'd never want to just take a stroll through day or night So even a guy living in a council flat in Brixton That'd be welfare public housing if he were to come to the states his accent alone could open more doors than

[12:31] Yours your mind ever could just ask any American young lady what she thinks of a guy with a British accent Yeah, I know. I know there are a variety of different British accents, too Just like in the states there are many accents, but Americans we're not very discriminating about British accents at all We just kind of lump them together However, if you live in the UK and I live there for two years You'll hear a dozen different accents by the way the British are very classist about the way a person speaks They'll stereotype and judge you instantly as soon as they hear your accent Anyway, my gringo buddy from New York who's got perfect Spanish from Spain when Latinos hear his accents it opens doors, too It's funny though Latinos here in Latin America will always tell you that people from Spain have an uppity attitude They're snooty superior acting and condescending But when they run into him face to face they deferred to him and sometimes even give him the royal treatment

[13:21] But behind their backs are always dissing him That's the difference between Americans and Brits if you know an actual Brit People are drawn to him because of that accent. There are not many of them around either So that exclusivity is an attraction to thing is though We don't diss him behind their backs like Latin Americans diss Spanish people now That's the kind of thing you only pick up on if you've been living down here a long long time and you speak a little Spanish Anyway, that buddy I was telling you about from New York He used to be a rasta man had real long dreads and apparently he was a martial arts and yoga instructor up in New York So I guess when he was doing his workouts and fighting he tucked those dreads up under a hat Otherwise his dreads were down to his waist now. I first met him down here in Latin America, and he had no dress at all I had no idea he'd just cut those dreads a couple of weeks before I met him down here

[14:06] He's a pretty active businessman. He manages some high-end resort properties And he has a couple of small ladies clothing stores So anyway, we're sitting at a little cafe restaurant yesterday And he was showing me some pictures on his phone of his family up in New York And I said wow who's that guy with the mega dreads and he laughed he said that's me I said no he zoomed in and sure enough. It was I said, but you look so clean cut and straight What's the story on the dreads now? He's a 40 something guy and has a couple of kids up in New York They're adults and on their own and here's what he told me he said a while back One of his kids had some bad health problem. It wasn't looking good They pretty much exhausted all conventional medical effort and he being Italian in Spanish went the entire Catholic school route Like I did though a truly fallen Catholic as an adult like me, too

[14:53] Anyway, since things weren't working with conventional medicine. He said there was only one thing left He went down to the Catholic Cathedral had a sit-down with the big man upstairs and here's how he tells it He said I made a deal with him. I said if you help me out here with my kid I'll cut off these dreadlocks that I love that are my trademark that I've been nurturing for 20 years if you help me out I'll shave my head shave it all and surprise surprise his kid Recovered so to keep his end of the bargain when he heard the good news He cut all those dreads off and put him in a plastic bag got in his car and drove to the Cathedral Unfortunately, though He said he was so excited So amped up that when he was stuck in traffic at a red light with a bunch of motorcycles Weaving and bobbing through traffic in front of him somehow he says and to this day

[15:39] He doesn't know what happened somehow. He lurched forward and rear-ended two cops Patrolling on their police motorcycles. Well, naturally he got the cold sweats and knew he was in big trouble He pulled over to the side. The cops read him the riot act said he committed a grave error He was going to jail. Of course in no time There was a huge Gapers block people crowding around trying to get a peek the one cop rifled through his car and found that hair the other cop frisked him And took his wallet had about 300 bucks in there My friend said the cops stealthily pocketed the whole thing after all even down here Everyone's got cellophones and they're filming everything. So when you bribe cops these days or try to bribe them They're aware someone could be filming so they're ever so cautious to keep the transaction out of camera range Last thing they want is a bribe situation to go viral on YouTube

[16:25] Anyway, only then did my buddy get a chance to open his mouth And when he told his story with that pure Spanish accent The cops had a complete change of heart and guess what they gave him a police Escort to the Cathedral and he walked in note down with his bag of hair completing his end of the bargain He said when he finished the story. I asked him does that mean you're a believer now? He said well I don't know but I am hedging my bets Then he said a true believer just might think there were two miracles performed one for my kid and one for the cops And I said yeah, but what if you hadn't had $300 in your wallet? I guess we'll never know Hmm. So what do you think? Oh, and by the way a couple of shows ago We were talking about all the garbage we humans produce and all the plastic in our water and food supply

[17:12] Mostly due to plastic bags containers and bottled water sodas, etc Where's yet when we microwave food in plastic? Not good The odd thing is that all of these great inventions have secondary consequences that people don't realize until years or decades later Take for example, the first commercially successful mass-produced disposable paper cup invented in 1907 by a guy named Lawrence Wellen a Boston lawyer who was concerned with the spread of germs by people Using shared glasses and dippers at public water stations Turns out back then a lot of modern and forward-thinking cities had public water stations with metal dippers And you just dip in take a drink and throw the dipper back in the bucket Imagine the cross-contamination there you see back before 1910 there were some municipal water systems

[18:02] But they didn't have enough pressure or volume to pressurize a lot of public drinking fountains or bubblers So people would just continuously put a dipper into municipal water tanks and take a sip So in 1907 a Boston lawyer got a patent on a paper cup called you may have guessed it the Dixie Cup Company by the way The Woken BLM crowd wants to have the name changed because you know Even though it had nothing to do with the Civil War slavery or anything the word Dixie is now dissed by the woke crop So the word Dixie and Dixie cups is soon to be relegated to the dustbin of woke stir history Even though there's nothing racist about it same thing happen to Aunt Jemima and and Pocahontas You know around Chicago in the Midwest They have a famous brand called Land O' Lakes butter and and they have a picture of Pocahontas on every box

[18:48] Well, they used to anyhow now, it's considered culturally insensitive Same thing happened to Uncle Ben of converted rice fame, which is by the way whiter than snow white rice, correct? Who are they gonna replace him with Uncle Fester the old bald white guy from the Adams family? It's funny though The only woke people I've ever met here in Latin America are expat gringos not Latinos at all, man You don't be gringos You got to quit bringing that woke stir baggage with you just an obvious tip here the more you're on the gringo tourist trail The more woke lunacy you're gonna run into meanwhile when you're off the gringo tourist trail There are just no pathetic woke stirs to be found They don't even have a word in Spanish yet for a wokeness case in point the Frito Bandito If you're a boomer or Gen Xer, you saw a million of those commercials You might even remember he'd sing a song to the tune of the traditional Mexican song see a little lindo. Aye

[19:39] Aye, aye, aye. I am the Frito Bandito Man, if that ad campaign were around today woke stirs would cancel Frito lay products in a heartbeat Oh, and how about Speedy Gonzales? You remember him? There was even a hit song in the 60s called Speedy Gonzales by none other than white bread 50s heartthrob Pat Boone You know Speedy Gonzales is a Warner Brothers cartoon character depicting the stereotypical lazy siesta-prone Mexican the ironic Speedy moniker is Something I've never heard any Latino south of the border complain about it all nor the Frito Bandito But wokeness up in the States strikes again saying the character was an offensive stereotype Warner Brothers in the States shelved Speedy Gonzales's films funny thing is despite being worried about the woke culture and the controversy over

[20:25] Potentially offensive Characterizations the Speedy Gonzales character is extremely popular in Latin America speaking of how whacked out the woke culture is Did you know that the Hispanic? American rights organization and the League of United Latin American citizens have named Speedy Gonzales a cultural icon with thousands of Latinos registering their support of Speedy Gonzales the character on Hispanic line.com an interactive blog post and messaging forum for Latinos So as the woke culture up in the States bans Speedy Gonzales cartoons fan Campaigns in Latin America have put Speedy back on the air that tells you everything However Warner Brothers Looney Tunes was so worried about Wokester backlash when they put together a boxed Looney Tunes golden collection and you can buy an Amazon, etc

[21:15] It's introduced by a disclaimer that states quote The cartoons you're about to see are products of their time They may depict some of the ethnic and racial prejudices that were commonplace in American society back then These depictions were wrong then and are still wrong today While the following does not represent the Warner Brothers view of society These cartoons are being represented as they were originally created because to do otherwise would be the same as claiming these prejudices never existed Meanwhile the woke stirs up in the States almost all of which are non Latinos go figure out of whore Speedy Gonzales cartoons However, things are completely different south of the border. In fact in March 2021 Los Angeles Times columnist Gustavo

[22:01] Ariana Mexican national by birth wrote I love Speedy so much I keep a large painting of him in my home office his kind smile and brown skin He says it takes me back to my childhood and reminds me of where we as Mexicans came from So bottom line if you want to see Speedy Gonzales cartoons forget about it up in the States The woke stirs have canceled him, but if you come down here to Latin America, no problem. He's an iconic hero Let's see now that would be reason 4,836 why you just have to get the hell out of Dodge Alright, speaking of emails I get emails here and there asking me about racism in Latin America. I'll tell you what They've got all the isms here. They've got racism sexism classism socialism and communism But one thing I've noticed throughout Latin America, there's very very little ageism

[22:49] They treat their old people very well And that's because they usually live in the house with the kids and grandkids till the end They're rarely shoved into nursing homes or adult care facilities for reasons of money and tradition They have nursing homes down here. All right, though I don't know a single Latino or Latina that's got their grandma grandma packed up and sent away to one of those places Why would they when there's a tradition of grandma living at home? And if she's too feeble and not quite housebroken people just hire a live-in nurse for her or caretaker the cost generally between two and five Hundred bucks a month depending if you're paying room and board which probably will and if she's a real qualified Graduated diploma tote nurse or just a nice lady whose job it is to take care of old people down here You know, they've got all the various types of nurses. They've got LPN's regular floor nurses cardiac nurses

[23:35] Geriatric nurses or nurses trauma nurses So anyway, people respect their elders and ageism is not much of a problem here at all now as far as racism I've noticed in places like Honduras Dominican Republic and Venezuela a very minimal amount of racism though right next door Costa Rica seems very racist In fact up to the late 70s a person from the mostly black town of Limon Costa Rica had to have a reason even a Written excuse to go to the capital city of San Jose They actually had a roadblock and a guard shack where they'd stop you as you were going on the maiden road to San Jose and ask You what your business was there? You won't read about that and you probably won't be able to look it up on the internet either that kind of info seems to Have been whitewashed But I used to play in a rock and blues band in Costa Rica for a couple years and the lead singer and the guitar player

[24:22] Were both black from that town Limon and they both told me the same story now as for the rest of Latin America There's not much racism when it comes to black and white at all maybe it's because most all black people in Latin America don't consider or even call themselves black if you call them that because They look like blacks up in the States. They'll correct you and say nope. They're Moreno not black That just means tan skin Latino. In fact, that's how they list their skin color on their passports and sedulas Moreno not black or Negro though Latinos will say that Haitians are black because they're very black There's very little actual black and white races It's true that the wealthier classes are whiter and lighter and the poorer class is darker and tanner So it would seem there's educational and institutional racism though You don't see it face to face on the street

[25:07] But a heavy dose of racism does exist between Latinos and indigenous people the original native tribes still 500 years later You'll notice that Latinos that have European mixed ancestry they don't mix or hang out much at all with indigenous people who are definitely the much poorer classes and the ISM that really prevails down here is Classism turns out it's very difficult to break out of the class you were born into unless you're a smart kid and went to college Or started a successful business or if you're lucky enough to be born with great looks Then you can marry on up that can happen now speaking of racist countries recently There have been two big surveys covering different aspects of racism worldwide The findings cover the responses of over 85,000 people from 61 different countries

[25:54] where they ask broad questions like for example Would you like or dislike having people of other races as next-door neighbors? And they asked things like have you seen or experienced racism yourself? This is a huge study that ranked 61 different countries and for all of you who think the US is irredeemably racist You got to hear this country number one on the racism scale the worst India number two, Lebanon number three, Buran number four, Libya number five, Egypt six, Philippines seven, Kuwait eight, Palestine nine South Africa where they've been under complete black rule for the last 25 years Hmm 10 South Korea 11 Malaysia 12, Nigeria 13, Iraq 14 Chrysostom number 15 our first Latin American country

[26:43] Ecuador with its huge population of indigenous people remember what we were talking about number 16 Algeria 17 Pakistan 18 Yemen 19 Hong Kong 20 Russia Thailand 21 22 Cyprus 23 Turkey 24, Morocco Hey, did you notice that not one Western European country showed up in the first 25 and only one Latin American country did Ecuador Neither all you whiners out there did the USA. So listen, here's what I'm gonna do Send me an email the expat files at gmail.com and I'll send you the link to this article Check it out the pictures in the graphs too And the next time you hear some fool whining about racism in the US You can show them these facts based on the responses of 85,000 people from 61 countries Then again, some people don't like facts not when it interferes with their version of the truth

[27:32] You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America If you need some help with your own plan B We can schedule a one-on-one phone or Skype consult Just send me an email the expat files at gmail.com And if you want to get on the waiting list for my next week-long expat Insider seminar in Central America where you're guaranteed to get a two to five year head start on your plan B Send me an email the expat files at gmail.com. No spamos