#901 – The Expat Files: Eddie’s Journey and Cultural Insights in Latin America

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 out to play and now I wonder Hello there all you expat 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 work play 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 All right, you know lots of people have been wondering what happened to expat Eddie He hasn't chimed in a long time and he does when he's got some good stories and man He laid one on me the other day Typical of the wild and crazy stuff that happens to him and many other expats too

[00:45] But it seems like Eddie lives the life of three expats at once now as you longtime listeners Know expat Eddie's a guy who is a true rags-to-riches story He's kind of white trash in Texas when he was younger never graduated from college, you know these days That doesn't mean a thing but way back when man if you weren't a college graduate you were on the fast-track to nothing He had a few failed businesses rang up a letter that's even filed bankruptcy once and I'd already been down here in Latin America For some years and we've been keeping in sporadic Contact and finally he came down to visit slept on my couch about six months That'll happen, right? That was something like 15 years ago and within five years He was a millionaire with sushi restaurants believe it or not In fact, he probably was the first guy to have a real good sushi restaurant in all of Central America

[01:34] Simply because back then there were no sushi restaurants Sure There were a couple of crappy Chinese restaurants that have two or three things on the menu sushi items But they were junk, you know using that fake crab meat Which is really some kind of emulsified fish with red dye number 56 poured over it You did know that right if you look it up on the internet You'll find that probably 80% of all the crab that's in sushi or in the frozen section at Walmart or Costco Isn't really crab at all It's just some kind of emulsified sucker fish that they compress and add fillers to and then dye it a nice bright orange So keep that in mind next time you're picking out the crab chunks at the salad bar Anyway, so expat Eddie even though he has a white trash background had a thing for sushi and there really was none of it down

[02:23] Here so he decided to open a tiny little kiosk in a sort of upper-middle class mall in El Salvador and his rent around 175 bucks a month totally off the gringo tourist trail and believe it or not all the gringos he knew They're all backpackers. They told him he was nuts He was gonna fail because backpackers don't eat sushi. Not normally unless it's free at a wedding buffet It's just too expensive when they go to a Chinese restaurant And yes I said Chinese restaurant because backpackers Generally don't go to Japanese restaurants because they're almost always high-end and more expensive and for backpackers It's all about the price and they order the cheapest thing on the menu, which is usually chicken-flied lice A roast frito con pollo, you know buck 99 all you can eat Cucarachas included so anyway the small trickle of gringos passing through told me was nuts

[03:08] He was gonna lose money There weren't enough gringos around to eat sushi and Latinos certainly weren't clamoring for it in the end He only invested five grand and he said to himself and me Who hasn't lost five grand here and there in their life and who knows it just might take off besides It wasn't Eddie's five grand. Anyway, it was his mother's So the genesis of the sushi restaurant idea was the fact that there were no good sushi Restaurants and Eddie was filling a niche to serve his own interests He wanted sushi good sushi and guess what it only took a few months in already He was making money and who were his clients not gringos and expats because like I said It's way off the tourist trail, but upper middle class and wealthy Latino gringo wannabes the ones who see all the Hollywood movies and are hooked into US cable TV and they see

[03:58] Sushi's a big thing up in the states where at least it was 15 years ago It seems like every movie and TV show coming out of the states had a scene with someone in a sushi restaurant Fumbling with chopsticks and wolf and Donna play to California rolls So Eddie's first little sushi restaurant peck wasn't even a restaurant It was a tiny kiosk with just one employee and four or maybe it was six little bar stools and a stainless steel Countertop and it looked a certain type of gringo wannabe crowd That is Latinos who want to go to Disneyland who actually can afford to go legally Yep, it really took off and Eddie franchised the thing then he wisely sold out before the inferior Competition moved in and these days if you're driving through Latin America, especially Central America

[04:44] You'll see here and there certain little restaurants near upscale malls and nice neighborhoods with the name Mr. Sushi and that's how that chain which is now overpriced and overrated got its start In fact, it follows a kind of a pattern with businesses down here a gringo comes in starts a brand new business that everyone says It's gonna fail it turns into a big success He franchises it out and the new owners are generally lazy ass children of the Latin rich whose daddies Don't want them in the family business because well, they are lazy ass slugs So to distance their kids from the family business and get them out of their hair They buy him a franchise or two I'm not good and then they proceed to turn a good product into a mediocre one and they raise the price It's true. Hey, I've seen that happen dozens of times, especially to restaurants, but back to good old expat Eddie

[05:32] He cashed out made all kinds of money He came down single too So naturally he met all kinds of Latinas and ended up with Claudia a beautiful runway model who attracts bees like honey He's been engaged to her for a couple years now and she of course like any Latina She's around 30 years old now is absolutely dying to have a kid with him or a kid with a gringo You could say because it seems every Latina over 25 has been screwed over and cheated on by a Latino boyfriend As a result most Latinas get to the point where they're soured on Latinos That is guys from their own culture and neighborhood. So yes, you guessed it the gringo advantage rides again However, the fact is there are very few gringos living in Latin America So it's kind of like that unfulfilled dream of going to Disneyland

[06:21] Everybody wants to go but only a small percentage ever make it there But Claudia being a beautiful runway model held out and got her gringo. She hooked Eddie. Well, they're engaged anyway However, Eddie's holding out and refuses to pull the trigger And he tells me every couple of weeks or so or every time it seems her out and about and they run into a couple Of cute kids. She gives him the old tomato. I'm gonna leave you Eddie unless we get married now Because I want to have a kid before I get too old Though there is something unusual about Claudia Some of you who've been to Latin America might be wondering why a 30 year old Latina doesn't have kids Because it's like a one in a thousand chance you run into a Latina of that age Who doesn't have one or more because you see here in Latin America. There's almost no such thing as a family planning

[07:07] I'm not kidding you if you run into a 30 year old Latina who does not have a kid or two or three That means number one There's either something very wrong with her plumbing or like expat Eddie's girlfriend slash fiance She's had a couple of rounds of those Contraceptive arm implants now, I don't think they're very popular up in the States But in Europe they are and here in Latin America for people who can afford them They're just little birth control implant tubes placed in the loose skin under a woman's arm In fact in the case of Eddie's girlfriend Claudia, you can see him They look like three or four little parallel toothpicks right beneath the skin in her arm and believe it or not They're 99 point something percent effective and less three to five years So if you run into a 30 year old Latina and she doesn't have any kids

[07:52] She's either got messed up plumbing a contraceptive implant or she's lying to you then again She might be a nun but still that's no guarantee She's gonna be celibate because in my own family, which is huge by the way I've got 56 first cousins on my mother's side alone The fact is I've got two cousins who were Catholic priests and ended up meeting and marrying nuns Which of course is a big no-no, so they quickly left the order before they got booted out But I digress as usual So what else is new so anyway expat Eddie's fiance is just nuts to have kids and nuts to tie the knot and Eddie's not Ready to pull the trigger and she threatens every couple of weeks that she's gonna leave him But she hasn't because really laying it all out on the line Eddie can provide the kind of lifestyle She could only dream of and Latinas who had gringo boyfriends and vice versa will admit every time

[08:43] Once they've had a gringo or European boyfriend, they never want to go back to a Latin guy again, man I've heard that so many times now Claudia Eddie's fiance even as a top runway model for probably the past 10 years Eddie says when she's working for an agency on a contract She's only making around a thousand bucks a month plus hotel rooms food and expenses sometimes when she's away from town But think of it that's a thousand bucks a month twelve grand a year Which is very good money down here for a Latino or Latina since average wages are three to four hundred a month But it's not enough to buy a decent car and live in a nice apartment either one or the other not both Hey, whoever said the world was fair However enter the gringo advantage which of course works both ways if you're a gringo guy

[09:34] Your Latina girlfriend or wife no matter how educated or where she is in her job or career She'll probably never make a quarter as much as you do even if she's a doctor or university professor Same is true for first-world gringas If you have a Latino boyfriend or husband that is unless his daddy's rich There's no doubt you'll probably make four times or more as much as that guy makes no matter what career he's in But you knew that already, right? Anyway, I wanted to give you a little background on expat Eddie before I go on to his latest wild and crazy story It helps to have a little background before you hear the rest of it now expat Eddie Like all gringos and expats living down here has a bank account or two and has to pop in to the bank every now And again, well, it just so happened about six months ago Eddie was in his bank a small branch bank with probably four teller windows

[10:24] So he says he walked up to the front window to change some dollars Whatever and there was a girl in training there young girl probably 24 first day on the job Very nice-looking and by all accounts way too young for Eddie who is definitely on the wrong side of 50 so when it was Eddie's turn up at the cashier window took about twice as long as Regular manana time because of the new girl in training But Eddie's a laid-back guy and he's been down here long enough to grin and bear it Two weeks later Eddie's back in the bank again The new girl waits on him with a smile like all Latinos do he makes the tiniest little bit of small talk with her And he's on his way now This kind of thing happens every couple weeks as Eddie passes into the bank and he suddenly

[11:09] Realizes that with those four teller counters. He's always ending up with that girl Never with one of the older matronly ladies, you know the Senor's by the way There's something about the word Senorita and Senora You have to understand now those two words are used all the time for ladies, right? Senora or Senorita Senora is a married lady with kids usually and a Senorita a young lady usually unmarried without kids But who knows right? You just have to make a guess and you should always guess on the side of the young lady when you're talking to a woman For example, if you're in a store and you need some help and there's a youngish lady there with a name tag You know, she works there. You should never address her as Senora That would be a kind of an insult even if she is one even she's married has a kid But how you gonna know right if you use the word Senorita

[11:57] They always come at you with a much bigger smile because in their mind That means no matter if they've got kids or a married or look a little older They pulled off looking younger than probably they really are and that works very well too with an older lady that you know Was a Senora if you need her help for anything or want to talk to her for whatever Just say this school pay or the scoop of me, which means excuse me Senorita, which means excuse me young lady Well, you're certainly starting off the conversation on the right foot because if you started out the scoop of me Senora You're kind of saying excuse me old married lady Now, of course if you're in a Walmart standing next to a lady who's got two kids You have to use the Senora thing because it's obvious and it would be a kind of a neutral conversation You're not insulting her nor complimenting her

[12:45] But I think you get the idea try to use it Senorita thing as much as you can unless she's obviously a wrinkled old grandma Ladies of all stripes and ages do appreciate that now the same thing works with men believe it or not I'm sure you know the word ombre means man But many times when a lady's addressing you who doesn't know you were in a bank or grocery store situation Even when you're talking to a lady cop oftentimes she'll say to scoop of a hoven or just hoven which means young man Hoven the word hoven comes from the word hoven dude, which means young So unless you two are wrinkly old grandpa be prepared to be addressed over and over by the word hoven Young man. Oh, and remember just won't be women and ladies that will use the term hoven

[13:31] Latin guys will do that too And the funny thing is even if you're 50 55 60 65 years old people will address you as young man Hoven sure admittedly at first you're gonna think man. This is a put-on. They're doing that on purpose Or they're making fun of me or they're just trying to get on my good side But it's not true Latinas and Latinos sincerely mean that why well over the years I've heard Latinos and Latinas repeat over and over again They have a really difficult time judging the age of gringos and gringas No problem with their own culture, but gringos and gringas In fact, it's a lot like the way Americans describe their trips to China or Japan or India same thing You hear Americans say they have a hard time judging the age of certain people in certain cultures

[14:19] For example a Japanese or Chinese or Indian guy could be 70 years old and in your mind You're thinking he's 40 and vice versa I've been there myself, but the great thing is here in Latin America when the locals judge your age It's almost always in your favor Hey I've been in many conversations with Latinos and Latinas and when the age thing comes up when someone says how old are you? My favorite comeback is take a guess in Spanish Adevina and I can honestly say 95% of the time they undershoot my age by 10 years sometimes 20 Sometimes 25 and believe me, they're not doing it to be nice or to butter me up. They're actually giving it their best shot Oh, and on that note, here's a little trick I learned when somebody really underestimates your age and you might not want them to know how old you really are

[15:10] When they shoot that number out at you and they come out 10 or 15 years shy of your real age You don't have to come to it. You could give them my favorite comeback. You know what? You're a good guesser Good for but you don't say that which turns out to be a very satisfying answer for both of you It's not really a lie. It's just linguistic sleight of hand and in the end everybody's happy or not But back to expat Eddie at the bank So every time Eddie went to the bank every couple of weeks or so somehow he ended up with the same young lady Attending him now What are the odds of that four windows Eddie's in there maybe six or seven times and he always ends up with her waiting on him Oh and one more thing we're way off the tourist trail here

[15:57] So none of the lady cashiers speaks English But Eddie speaks Spanish and he says he's never been in the bank and seen a single gringo Anyway, so Eddie had his suspicions He starts paying attention while he's standing in that long line Which runs at least 20 minutes until he finally ends up at the window Turns out the older ladies the señoras are playing a little game of musical chairs making sure Eddie Always ends up with the young lady at first he could hardly believe it But he couldn't deny it either especially the next time he came into the bank Which is probably the ninth time he'd been there since she started for some reason She was in the office in the next room talking to the manager and Eddie ended up with one of the older Senora's so Eddie changed his money with her then something strange happened

[16:43] She handed him a post-it note with a phone number on it now remember This is an older lady a señora probably 50 something again. Who knows as Mentioned often we gringos are way off on ages, too Anyway, when she handed him that little yellow post-it note, he gave her a confused look and said is that for me? What is it? Now when all that was going down the young lady had returned to her teller spot in the cashier's window right next to Eddie And when Eddie said what's this the lady waiting on him the señora? Gestured really quickly with her hand and head towards the young lady in the teller position right next to her That's when Eddie got it the older lady had slipped him the phone number of the young one Then it got even more surreal the señora handed Eddie a blank post-it pad and Eddie looked at it

[17:33] She said your phone number, please To nomero por favor and Eddie stuck on the spot right there wrote his number down He didn't want to deep in his head He knew this was not the thing to do, but he did it sort of automatically Then he told me he had no interest at all in this lady He was engaged to Claudia and when he's with a girl he's the faithful type in fact later when he left the bank He thought why didn't I just do what so many girls do up in the states when they're not interested in a guy? Give him a number, but the wrong number Well, he'd had too many tequilas the night before and wasn't at the top of his game Oh, and while he was at the counter right before he turned around to walk out the señora said to him aya is so data She's single Now Eddie knew the weeds were getting deep the old ladies in the bank were on a mission to hook up their new young friend

[18:25] Now you might be thinking they singled him out for his bank book You know rich gringo and all that But he says he doesn't keep more than a grand or two in that account though. I guess in Latin America That's big money. I have to tell you none of this stuff is really out of the ordinary here in Latin America Remember my old pal John called now He was in his late 60s out of shape carrying around a nice big spare tire But he was a blonde blue eyed guy and he used to call me up every once in a while and say Johnny You're not gonna believe what happened to me today, and he was no guy to exaggerate He says every time I go into a government building to renew my driver's license Residency sign up for a tax number pay a parking ticket Whatever the older ladies the over 40 señoras will hit on me In fact, he'd be up at a service or cashier's window

[19:13] He'd catch him right in the act staring at his fingers looking for a wedding ring or lack thereof Also looking for telltale signs that a wedding ring was recently removed You know like a little groove around the finger or a ring-sized missing tan line Because you know, that's a game a lot of Latinos play down here They take that wedding ring off when they're out and about to hit on the ladies because you know, that's the way of life here In Latin America, it's a macho society and they call those guys Mujeregos Mujere means woman and Eggo added to that means womanizer That's Mujerego not an easy word for a gringo to pronounce when you're just starting out with your Spanish Mujerego By the way, when Latinas throw that word around it's always done in a very derogatory sense

[19:59] Except funny enough when they're talking about their own brothers, then somehow it seems to be forgiven In fact, I have a very good Latino friend who cheated on his wife two weeks after they were married And he bragged or at least admitted it to his buddies, man I don't get these guys and I don't understand why more of them aren't bumped off by their pissed off wives In fact, it almost always turns out when there's a crime of passion and you see it in the news more than 95% of the time It's a guy killing both his wife or girlfriend and the guy she's screwing with and believe it or not Those crimes of passion are almost always with the middle and lower middle classes You rarely see that happen with Latinos who have money. It's a mystery. I've yet to figure out Maybe it's because with the upper middle classes and wealthy They've got a lot more to lose if they take care of business with a gun or a machete

[20:47] That's right a machete see that out in the compo or in the boonies once in a while shades of Lorena Bobbitt, huh? So anyway expat Eddie's got himself a little problem The girl that has a big crush on him or that the senior is at the bank of China hook him up with He's got his phone number and Eddie says his girlfriend or compromiso Claudia That means the woman here engaged to compromiso. Oh, and by the way Novia means girlfriend Novio means boyfriend and if you're engaged the word is compromiso Which is a lot stronger word than Novio or Novia Anyway, Eddie's girlfriend is so jealous and it's not only her it's true of almost every Latina The jealousy gene runs so deep that she on occasion hands Eddie her smartphone and says I want you to look at all

[21:39] My contacts and all my what's up messages. I want to prove to you. I'm faithful, but now you have to give me your phone And Eddie says and this is true of most all Latinas when she checks his contacts If there's a woman's name She doesn't know or a phone number without a picture or a name You've got some splainin to do it could be a lady doctor realtor doesn't matter You got some splainin to do could be a lady from a hardware store or even a lady taxi driver Not many of those for sure, but in fact yesterday I took a taxi and surprise surprise was a lady driver, but she looked like she could take care of herself You know the B word butch they still use that right not bitch butch So anyway handing her phone over to Eddie as cloudy as ploy to get his phone

[22:25] And like Eddie says you have to comply because you don't want to get into a spat with your Latina girlfriend When it has anything at all to do with the opposite sex or jealousy because you'll lose every time It's an irrational argument that never ends well, so I expanded he says anytime Claudia reverts to jealousy mode He says here take my cell phone check it out And she knows just enough English now so she can check it out and as you might have figured she and all Latinas are a thousand times better at using a smartphone and digging into its innards then most all gringos over 40 Especially as baby boomers, but now as Eddie said he's just dreading the fact that he gave out that phone number Because now he knows there'll be almost no way to explain if that phone call comes in while she's there

[23:12] Well, you can see the problem and then I said yeah But Eddie you can always say it's a bank calling and that would be true sort of And he just gave me one of those laid-back shrugs mixed with a touch of anxiety and the unknown However, Eddie does have a plan B. He's never going back to that branch bank again He says just too dangerous to which I said Eddie look on the bright side if Claudia dumps you you've always got a fallback position He didn't find that too funny So the lesson here for all gringos gringas and expats is that Latinos are very jealous often to extremes And the thing is up in the first world We've been taught that jealousy is kind of a negative thing not good immature kind of childish behavior and all that Whereas down here in Latin America you ask any Latino or Latina in Nolce jealousy is part of love if there's no jealousy

[24:02] Then it's not really love which is hard to understand at first though My various Latina girlfriends have told me exactly the same thing if a guy doesn't show symptoms of jealousy once in a while Then it's not true love. They're thinking the thrill is gone I've had a number of girlfriends tell me that right in my face And I really do know quite a few people up in the states who are not the jealous type, but when pushed hard enough I suppose anyone could get jealous So just remember that if you're in a relationship down here in Latin America because down here Latinos and latinas have reason to be jealous the guys are where he goes which means you know They seek out other partners when technically they're attached to someone else It doesn't matter how nice intelligent or beautiful their girlfriend is either They're still seeking others and latin ladies though. They're generally much more loyal than the men

[24:52] They just love to dress really sexy which often sows the seeds for jealousy in fact I've talked to some gringa tourists coming down You know just on vacation and when they hit the discos and clubs at night to go dancing and they see how the latinas are Dressed they'll admit if they the gringas dressed that way up in the states all their friends would say they were dressing slutty Whereas down here in Latin America, that's not dress and slutty. That's just the way things are provocative and sexy That's the latina style of course even down here a girl could go overboard on the skimpy sexy Look and all the other latinas in the room who are dressed provocative and sexy But not to that extreme will say she's a puta or she's dressing vulgar vulgar puta meaning bitch or prostitute So anyway, X-Men Eddie is hoping that phone call will never come

[25:41] It just might not who knows the girl might be a little timid and you might be thinking if she calls and he doesn't answer For some reason or he's not near his phone. That'd be the end of it Except there's pretty much a hundred percent chance. She'll call on what's up And when you call on what's up your phone number and your photo pops up on the screen for all you who use What's up? You know what I'm talking about and that would be very bad for Eddie because you see the posted What's up photo for most all latinas is generally a picture of the girl at the beach possibly in a bikini or? Dressed very provocatively for a night on the town and that's what's worrying Eddie any suggestions out there Alright, so that's expat Eddie's latest He's got a few more stories to share and I'll get to those in upcoming shows. So stay tuned

[26:28] Alright now a plug for my expat insider seminar will be shoving off January 10th It's a Friday evening through January 16th Thursday night for all the info and sign up information The pricing itinerary etc and how you could work it to kill two birds with one stone That is come to the seminar and apply for your Guatemalan residency. Go to www.the expat files calm and click on Johnny's seminar link or just go to www.the expat files calm Seminar as mentioned the early bird discounts here in effect So sign up and save 500 bucks off the regular price and again repeat offenders get a thousand dollars off We always have repeat offenders and when you sign up you get a free one-hour phone or Skype call with me

[27:17] and we can discuss everything and anything that has to do with the seminar or your life or your plan B or Cryptocurrencies going off the grid even the price of mangoes Which begs the question with all the chaos and worse going on up by you in the first world? How is your plan B coming? 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 You