Episode Summary
In this episode of The Expat Files, Johnny Mueller explores various aspects of expat life in Latin America, offering a candid and insightful look at the region's unique challenges and cultural dynamics.
Johnny begins by discussing the difficulties expats face when trying to use coupons in Latin America. He explains that while coupon clipping is common in the first world, it doesn't work the same way in Latin America due to the high rate of piracy and counterfeiting. Stores have tried implementing coupon systems, but they often fail because counterfeit coupons are common and difficult to distinguish from real ones. Retailers find it too risky to offer double coupon days, as they can lead to financial losses. Instead, two-for-one deals and membership discount cards are more popular, with subscribers to local newspapers often receiving up to 75% off on various services and products. Factory rebates are not common due to low literacy levels and unreliable postal services.
The episode then shifts to a discussion on the economic challenges faced by Latin America. Johnny highlights the limited use of US dollars and the reliance on remittances from first-world countries. He explains how financial crises, declining incomes, and the depreciation of local currencies have led to economic struggles. He contrasts the situation in Latin America with that of the first world, noting the lack of financial literacy among the population and how this leads to misplaced blame on businesses rather than corrupt governments or the fiat currency system. He uses the example of Blockbuster Video to illustrate how businesses in Latin America lag behind the first world and how consumer behavior is influenced by the desire to associate with first-world brands.
Johnny also delves into the cultural fascination Latin Americans have with first-world products. He highlights the significance of items like shopping bags from high-end stores or t-shirts with English lettering as symbols of status and coolness. He touches on the irony that many of these products are actually manufactured in Latin American countries, underscoring the complex relationship between cultural identity and consumer behavior. He explores the business implications of this cultural dynamic, suggesting that while first-world franchises like Blockbuster may have survived in Latin America due to this fascination, they are likely to face challenges in the future due to technological shifts and piracy.
The segment then discusses the prevalence of piracy in Latin America, particularly in Bolivia. Johnny notes how the internet has made it easier for pirated content to spread without borders. He highlights the significant role of Russian involvement in the illegal distribution of pirated media and the lack of effective enforcement by local governments. He also mentions the common practice of pirated DVDs being sold with Russian subtitles and the lack of real action against piracy, as evidenced by photo ops and public displays that are more symbolic than substantive. He further explains that pirated movies are often in English, which is not appealing to Latin audiences, and that these pirating groups often take credit for their work by including their websites and emails on the DVDs, making them easy to track.
The episode concludes with a discussion on the severe underfunding and poor maintenance of public services in a government department, specifically the Ministerio Publico (Department of Justice). Employees face constant shortages of supplies, broken equipment, and inadequate resources, forcing them to pay out-of-pocket for essentials like paper, toner, and even toilet paper. The budget allocation is heavily skewed toward salaries, leaving minimal funds for operational needs. Employees resort to bringing their own supplies, purchasing their own equipment, and even using private lockups for shared printers. The situation is so dire that some departments have resorted to using external services like drugstores for copying, and there are even reports of government facilities lacking basic utilities like water and electricity.
Finally, Johnny discusses the lack of effective anti-discrimination laws in the Third World, using employment ads as examples to illustrate systemic discrimination. He highlights how job advertisements often include discriminatory criteria such as religious affiliation, gender, and physical appearance, which are typically ignored or enforced poorly. He also describes the prevalence of sexual harassment in the workplace, particularly in Latin America, and the role of attractive women as 'adornos' or eye candy in professional settings, while the actual work is done by less attractive, more competent women. Johnny provides personal anecdotes and observations from his experiences in Costa Rica to support his points.
Topics
Coupon Clipping in Latin America, Piracy and Counterfeiting, Two-for-One Deals, Membership Discount Cards, Factory Rebates, Economic challenges in Latin America, Financial literacy and economic blame, Remittances and their impact on Latin American economies, Consumer behavior and brand perception, Blockbuster Video's market in Latin America, Cultural fascination with first-world products, Consumer behavior and status symbols
Chapters
00:00:00 Opening 00:00:55 The Reality of Coupon Clipping in Latin America 00:01:12 The Challenges of Coupon Systems in Latin America 00:01:26 The Piracy and Counterfeiting Problem 00:01:50 The Ultimate Scam: Pirated Coupons and Software 00:02:07 Retailer Perspectives on Coupon Days 00:02:34 The Consensus Among Retailers 00:02:45 Two-for-One Days and Membership Discount Cards 00:03:07 The Popularity of Membership Discount Cards 00:04:40 Limited Use of US Dollars in Latin America 00:05:16 Remittances as a Major Income Source 00:06:06 Blame on Businesses Rather Than Systemic Issues 00:07:05 Lagging Behind the First World 00:08:58 First-World Brand Perception and Consumer Behavior 00:09:26 Status Symbols in Latin America: Shopping Bags and T-Shirts 00:10:20 The Business Potential of Latin America for Disney 00:11:47 Blockbuster's Survival and the Future of First-World Franchises 00:14:28 Piracy and the Internet in Latin America 00:14:48 Russian Involvement in Piracy 00:15:41 Photo Ops and Symbolic Enforcement 00:16:34 Pirated Movies and Language Preferences 00:18:05 Austerity Measures and Government Workers 00:19:06 The Call for Austerity and Resource Shortages in the Department of Justice 00:20:57 Budget Allocation and the Neglect of Operational Needs 00:22:48 Electricity Cuts and the Impact on Daily Operations 00:23:35 Anti-Discrimination Laws in the Third World 00:23:51 A Real-World Example of Discrimination 00:24:12 The Worsening of the Ad
Transcript
Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.
[00:03] Hi everybody, I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to The Expat Files, living in Latin America. The show that tells you what it's really like to live, work, play and or retire in Latin America. I tell it just like it is, not the version they give you in those glossy travel magazines, or the picture they paint for you in those international traveler websites, where they're only trying to sell you something. What's it really like for expats living in Latin America? Well, it's time to take off those rose-colored glasses and find out. So let's get started. Now here's a funny email, it's from a female expat wannabe, who wants to know if they're into coupons at the retail establishments down here. She's quite into clipping coupons herself, and says it's a very big thing with her crowd, the over 50 crowd, up in Northern California.
[00:50] She says she saves at least 50% on her food bill, by being an astute coupon clipper. Well, good for her, but down here it doesn't work that way. They are just not a society of coupon clippers. And it's not that the people down here wouldn't love to have coupons to clip, if they were available, because if you're living on two or three bucks a day, coupon clipping could become a life-saving industry, don't you think? Well here's the real story on that. A lot of stores, food stores especially, have tried issuing coupons in the past, the same way they do up in the first world, by running them in newspapers and newspaper flyers. Which would have seemed to be a very good idea, because it works so well up in the first world. And of course, they like to copy anything first world they can, anytime they can. But the problem is, down here, it's a pirate society. Anything and everything that can be printed, that has any value, can easily be pirated.
[01:38] Or counterfeited, and it is. Especially since we have such nice software these days, like Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. Which by the way, are two software programs that are pirated like crazy down here too. So it's the ultimate scam really. You create pirated things, with software, that you pirated. And add that to the fact that you could get a very nice, high quality printer these days for about 30 or 40 bucks. Well that just means that down here, there's a potential counterfeiting and pirating operation, in practically every neighborhood. And like one middle manager from a big food chain down here told me, when I asked him why he didn't have any big double coupon days at his store, he told me they'd go bankrupt in about two weeks. And he even admitted that he himself couldn't tell the difference between counterfeit coupons and the real ones these days.
[02:23] And he said what makes it worse, is that they always seem to have trouble getting rebates and credits back from the companies who actually issue those coupons. It's just not worth it, and it's a pain in the ass. And that seems to be the consensus with all the retailers down here. Now some big transnational stores and first world franchises have tried it, like Taco Bell, Wendy's, and Pizza Hut. But it's never really caught on in a big way. Instead, what's popular down here in Latin America now, is a two for one day, once a week offered by a lot of the big restaurants, along with thousands and thousands of retail stores and service establishments too. It's a lot like those two for one senior citizen days they have up in the first world. Now that scheme is very popular down here in Latin America, and it's for everyone, not just seniors. And another thing that's really taken off down here is the membership discount card.
[03:11] For example, if you get a year subscription to one of the local newspapers, they'll give you a platinum or a gold or a silver card that looks just like a credit card. And with that card you get discounts at dozens of local establishments, and you just don't get them easily 5, 10, or 15% off. No way. They really break the mold down here, and give you 50% even sometimes 75% off on services and products. And that's for restaurants, hotels, beauty parlors, gym memberships, you name it, and it's heavily discounted. But only if you buy that year subscription to one of the big newspapers down here, which could run you up to 100 bucks. Which in itself is a really good deal. Because I don't know of any first world big city newspaper that gives you a subscription to a daily for 100 bucks a year. It's more like triple that up in the first world. And just as an aside, another thing that's never really caught on down here are factory
[03:59] rebates. Somehow I think it's the fact that the average person only has about a 6th grade education, so that when you try to explain what a factory rebate is, they just don't get it. Companies are just better off saying, we're offering our product today at a nice big discount. What could be simpler than that? And as far as factory rebates go, remember you always have to send those things through the mail, then you get your check back, right? Well one thing you have to realize, that down here in Latin America, government snail mail services are inefficient and undependable at best. And that means if you sent a $10 factory rebate coupon to Ever Ready Battery Corporation, you're probably never going to hear from them again. Not to mention that rebate checks probably going to be in dollars and in English. And only about 5% of the people down here in Latin America have a US dollar account that can even cash that check.
[04:46] So you can see the problem here. In another discount device that's popular down here with retail establishments are those little punch cards that we're also used to seeing up in the first world. You know, like at Blockbuster, when you rent a video they punch a little card, and for every 10 videos you get a free one. And in the last 6 months I've seen more and more of this kind of thing. Retailers trying in vain to revive their falling sales, with 2 for 1's, discounts and punch card offers like that. Because incomes are down and remissas from first world countries are falling too. And remissas can make up to 25% of a Latin family's income. Remissas being the monies that family members in the first world send down to their families here in the third world. You might remember I talked about that on one of my previous shows. So with the general financial crisis, affecting Latin America now too.
[05:32] Incomes are shrinking, remissas are falling and the dollar buys less and less, just like it does up in the first world. Though the people rarely mention that fact because when they get those remissa dollars they always go to the bank and switch them into the local currency, which is nothing more than ever depreciating funny money just like the US dollar. But since both the local and the US currency seem to be depreciating at pretty much the same rate, or nearly so, people down here in Latin America aren't educated enough to blame the real culprits, which are corrupt governments first and third world and the fiat currency system that's backed by nothing but air. Instead, Latin consumers blame the business community and manufacturers for rising prices. In other words, kill the messenger. Which is typical because only about 1 in a thousand persons down here knows anything
[06:20] about banking, finances or economics. And as long as the public remains so stupid, and they will, the trend is not gonna change and it's only gonna get worse. But that's not to say the average guy in the United States knows anything about international finance or economics either. Most of them are as dumb as a box of rocks on that subject too. And maybe only 1 in 50 or 1 in 100 first worlders has a decent handle on it. And the rest of the common workaday folks, well, they're just gonna go down with the ship. Anyway, a few minutes ago I was talking about Blockbuster Video. You might be surprised to find out that they have a huge franchise industry down here, and it's still thriving. Not bankrupt or in receivership like it is up in the first world. And that's because like I said, everything down here lags the first world by at least 5 years.
[07:06] And though all the hundreds and hundreds of local blockbusters in Latin America seem to be doing good, they're making money and they're still packing them in, it's starting to taper off little by little and soon, in the next 5 years, they'll all be out of business too. It's obvious, and the writing is on the wall, but the average Latin, even the above average Latin, just can't see past his nose, when it comes to following negative business trends like that. But the same thing could be said for average American people too, because do you remember a long time ago, when video stores were popular in the United States, and mom and pop outfits like that were popping up everywhere, and eventually every last one of them went broke. Yet even at the very end of that bubble, if you would have asked the average guy on the street, most of them would have sworn it was still a good investment, and many of them
[07:52] had dreams of doing it themselves. And eventually that whole business went the way of the VHS player. Anyway, blockbusters down here have always had a limited market, even though they've been a big success on paper, they only catered to the upper 15% of the population with money. And that's because, to rent a video at Blockbuster, it costs you about 2 bucks, even though there are a lot cheaper ways of getting a video down here. Because you see, just a few blocks away at any corner gas station, you could find a little guy outside selling those very same videos, though they're pirated, which means of course they're not quite the same quality as those blockbuster legitimate versions of the same movie, but even so, you only have to pay about a buck to a buck and a half each. And the thing is, when you buy from that little guy in the corner, you own those videos, and
[08:39] at Blockbuster, you have to bring him back. And now you're probably wondering, why would anybody rent a video at Blockbuster, when they could actually own that video for a little less money? And it's not at all about the fear of being caught with a pirated video, that fear down here just does not exist at all. Well, it goes back to the fact that down here, Latins love everything and anything first world, and Blockbuster, to them, is the epitome of first world. It's clean and nice and safe, and it's air conditioned, and the bathrooms are spic and span, and they give you a nice little Blockbuster first world registration card that you can show to all your friends. And down here in Latin America, especially with the upper classes, it's all show, and just to walk around the mall with a Blockbuster first world shopping bag, or for that matter, any first world shopping bag, well, that's an instant self-esteem poster for any Latin
[09:26] American, and something that all his or her friends will envy. And that's the whole point now, isn't it? And down here, you probably won't be surprised to know, the highest shopping bag, cache, of course, is toting a real shopping bag down here in the third world, from a high-end first world retailer, like Macy's, or Neiman Marcus, or Lord and Taylor, or better yet, a real bonafide bag from a store, from the grounds of Disney World or Disneyland. Because in fact, going to Disney World or Disneyland is the be-all and end-all for any Latin American making a trek up to the first world, whether the Latin person that goes to the US is illegal or not. It's like when a gringo goes to Paris, he just has to scale the Eiffel Tower. But to the local Parisians, the Eiffel Tower is just a big rusty erector set, and a Frenchman
[10:13] would never spend 10 bucks to climb the thing. But the Latins and their Disneyland fetish is a subject I'll say for another show, though I really think the Disney people are missing out on a huge gold mine. If they put a Disney World somewhere in Latin America, they would do a landmine business. No matter where they put it, the Latins will come. And speaking of Latin first world fetishes, now there's one sheer way to bring joy to the hearts of any Latin American person, and that goes double for Latin American boys and young men. And that is, give them as a present a t-shirt from anywhere up in the first world. But that t-shirt has to have some lettering in English to really make it oh so extra cool in the minds of the Latin people. And that little first world touch is what does it for them. And it doesn't matter if the letters say, Joe the Junkie's Toxic Needle Disposal business.
[11:01] As long as the letters are in English, it's the ultimate in cool for a Latin person. And though 95% of them won't have any idea what the lettering says. That doesn't matter one bit, and they don't even care. So remember that all you expats and expat wannabes, if you're thinking about bringing down a cheap little gift for some of your Latin friends, or for some of your Latin domestic workers, not to mention if you have a business down here and you want to spread a little love around with your employees, you just can't go wrong if you bring down t-shirts that have English lettering on them. But get this, the irony of it is, a good 90% of the time, if you bothered to look at the labels, those t-shirts were actually manufactured in Guatemala, Honduras, or Salvador. So go figure. But I was talking about Blockbuster and the case of pirated DVDs.
[11:47] Now Blockbuster in Latin America has survived so far, mostly because of that irrational Latin American love for everything first world. So let that be a lesson to all you expat and expat wannabes up there who are looking to start a business down here and haven't got too many ideas yet. Although I'd never recommend investing in anything like Blockbuster or any first world franchise that's run its course up north and looks like it's going to run into bankruptcy problems in the future. The fact is, if a business is having a good run in the first world, it has a great chance of making it down here. But forget about Blockbuster, in 5 years it'll be bankrupt down here too. And it's not at all about those ridiculously low priced pirated DVDs down here either. It's about downloading movies directly from the internet into your computer. Which is a huge problem in the first world but hasn't much caught on down here yet.
[12:36] Because people who do have internet, which aren't many, don't have a fast connection. But in 5 years everybody will and that's when Blockbuster will bite the dust down here too. So what's the real story on these guys selling these pirated videos? Well for one thing, they can sell them cheap because they have a couple of huge advantages. One is, they don't have the overhead of a store. And they always have all the first run movies that are running currently at the cinema down here and they even get some movies before their general release in the United States. Now you might wonder how that's possible. How could you be on the streets of La Paz, Bolivia and a little guy comes up to you on a street corner and tries to sell you the video of cowboys and aliens before it's even out yet in the cinemas in the United States? Well let me tell you how they do that. Now the big studios like Fox and MGM in Columbia pass out limited numbered copies of these
[13:26] DVDs to certain movie and media executives and movie reviewers weeks, even months before the movie ever hits the big screen. And they send out copies to members of the Academy Award Committees so they can review some of these movies for awards considerations. So there might be 25 or even 50 or 100 of these CDs floating around and at any time one of those could get swiped or sold to the highest bidder. And how do I know that? Well it's easy because when I'm down here watching DVDs I often see at the bottom of the screen a little transparent watermark and a note that says, this movie is not for sale it's for awards consideration only. Which means of course someone got a hold of one of those studio preview issues of the DVD and they put it out on one of those pirate internet sites where anyone can download it.
[14:15] And if you have a high speed DVD cop here, which only costs about a few hundred bucks these days, you can start turning them out like hotcakes and that whole process from the first theft of the original DVD in Hollywood and then copying it, uploading it on that pirate internet site, then downloading it on somebody's computer in La Paz, Bolivia. Well the whole thing can be done in less than a few hours. And you never have to ship those pirated video discs across borders. With the internet there are no borders to worry about. Which is why those pirate guys can get those things out on the street well before those movies ever hit the big screen. But as you might imagine, the Russians have a big hand in that too. I can't tell you how many times I've seen a DVD down here in Latin America before it's ever hit the big screen that has Russian subtitles.
[15:01] Leave it to the Russians to have a market on that illegal business too. And like I've said before, Latin America is one of the pirate centers of the world. And that's because governments only pay lip service to it. They've got a lot bigger problems going on down here than to chase after DVD counterfeiters. Though they make a show of it sometimes in the press, but only when first world countries put the pressure on them. But it's a show that never lasts. I read the news down here and I've never once seen anyone hauled in for a crime like that. Or any case ever taken to court. Though once a year there'll be some kind of photo op in the paper with local police and governors and mayors and of course some representatives from the US embassy and maybe even the FBI. And they'll all be standing in the street in front of a mound of pirated DVDs or CDs or software or clothes or shoes or whatever.
[15:49] And there might even be in that photo a bulldozer destroying the lot. In a photo like that sometimes makes it to the first world wire services when some propaganda machine in the third world wants to show the world that they're serious about pirating. Well they're not. But one police sergeant that I know down here who occasionally works in one of these anti-pirating units told me that the police always get first choice of the pirated items before they ever take those photos that show them or a bulldozer destroying the majority of the counterfeit stuff. Hey, this is Latin America. What can I tell you? And here's another thing that seems hard to believe. When a Hollywood movie ends up being pirated down here naturally it's in English and not in Spanish. And Latins are not going to buy a movie in English. They absolutely have to have it dubbed in Spanish or with Spanish subtitles.
[16:39] And to give you an idea of just how unafraid these pirating outfits are of ever getting caught. If you've ever seen a pirated Hollywood movie with Spanish subtitles down here you'll see at the end of the movie the guy who did this subtitle is so proud of his work that he actually takes credit for it and he gives you his email and website right on the screen. And if you go to your computer and check out that website you can see all the other pirated movies that this guy has taken credit for in the past. Now I'm not a cop and I don't know much about law enforcement but don't you think that would be the perfect place for anyone who's investigating pirating to start? Since anyone who's got a website like that leaves a permanent trail all over the web. Any guy like that with his own website would be ridiculously easy to track and then catch.
[17:25] But I guess the pirate police are just not interested. And the guys who make and dub those DVDs know that or they'd never advertise their own website on the DVD. That would just be suicide. But let's move on to something different now. Now just recently I was invited to a barbecue. It was a party being held by a middle class family. And by the way a barbecue is called a churrasco down here. That's churrasco. And even though I haven't eaten red meat for about 20 years I went. And it happened that I was sitting in the backyard with a half a dozen 30 to 40ish Latin ladies who were talking about their jobs. And it seemed to me they were very upset about something. In fact they all worked for the government and they were worried about getting laid off because of the recent round of austerity measures that had just been announced by the government
[18:10] and had been talked about repeatedly in the local papers. Now three of the ladies in the group worked at the city courthouse which down here is called the Ministadio Publico. And they appeared to be really upset about these forthcoming so called austerity measures thinking that their jobs would be cut or they'd be transferred somewhere else with a cut and pay. And since I hadn't put my own big foot in my mouth lately I decided that I'd tell them that those austerity measures proposed were probably a good thing for everybody in this country. But I stopped short of saying that I thought all governments were bloated, inefficient, blood sucking parasites. Because I didn't think I'd make too many friends that way. Not when all these women worked for the government. So I opened my big mouth and said austerity? Why not? And one of the ladies turned to me and said you know what my job is down at the Ministadio
[18:57] Publico? I'm in charge of supply requisitions. I fill out the orders that go out to the central supply dispatch and you know what? They only fill about 10% of those orders. And now they're asking for austerity? They want to cut back on everything? And she said look we have three copy machines in our department and two of them have been broken for months. And that third overworked copy machine goes through a ream of paper every two or three hours. That's 500 sheets. And the supply office only gives us one ream of paper a day. So everybody who wants to make a copy has to line up early in the morning, before ten o'clock, to get a copy done. Unless of course you bring your own paper. Which a lot of people do. Because otherwise they can't get anything done. And not only that we only have enough toner to do a half a day's worth of copies.
[19:42] By noon it's out. So we have no toner in the afternoon. So therefore we can make no copies in the afternoon at all. Even if you bring your own paper. But we have to make copies and people are coming in all the time. So we have to make copies. So what do we do? We send a runner around the corner to a drugstore that has a nice copy machine. And they charge us 50 cents a copy. And guess who pays for that? We do. The employees. And if we want copies we have to pay for them out of our own pockets. And that drugstore is cleaning up with our business. And it has been for months and months and months. And listen to this. We have a gardener at our ministerial public office. Now our gardener can't do the necessary work with his flowers and shrubs and grass. Because over a year ago the shovels, the rakes, the barrels and the hoses all went missing.
[20:30] But even if he had his hose back it wouldn't matter. Because none of the waterfalls it's work. Not outside or inside. And we have fluorescent lighting here. And half of our bulbs are broken or burnt out and have had a requisition for new bulbs in for over six months and we still haven't received a single one. And I'm worried that when they do arrive they'll disappear within a day like the last batch did some six months ago. And then another lady chimed in in that group and said, you know what? That's not the big problem. Here's the big problem. In our country the ministerial publico has a budget each year of about a hundred million dollars. And the real problem is that 96% of that goes just for salaries. Only 4% of that goes for maintenance, repair, operational expenses, utilities and office supplies. And then she told me that less than half of the computers are actually working at any
[21:18] given time and the ones that do are filled with viruses and have other problems like keyboard letters that don't work, software that locks up and connectors and USB ports that are just simply broken. So a lot of people have just resorted to bringing in their own computers. That small few that can actually afford to do so that is. And some people in certain departments have actually chipped in and bought their own printers with someone in charge of putting them in a private lockup every night. Because if you leave anything like that out on your desk in the morning it'll probably be gone. And it's gotten to the point that in departments that do have computer printers, some people have actually bought their own cartridges and they just pop their own cartridge into the printer when they need to use it. And then the next guy who wants to use the printer does the same. Then another lady who was a secretary nodded and told me that ever since she got the job
[22:06] a few years ago she always had to bring in her own paper, books, pens, pencils and she even ended up buying her own office chair because when she got the job she was just assigned a desk and no chair. And then one of the ladies told me it's even worse in the bathrooms. The ladies actually chip in to buy their own toilet paper and soap because as long as they've been there the government has never once supplied any of that. And if by chance they ever did get some bathroom supplies, those ladies assured me the stuff would probably disappear within a day. And besides the fact that they almost never have water in the bathroom, which is a pretty revolting development if you ask me. And luckily there is a Burger King across the street which means there is a decent bathroom. But just imagine if you had to work under those conditions. But they also said that a few months ago the electric power company cut their electricity
[22:52] for 9 days because their light bill hadn't been paid by the government. And without electricity they just came in and hung out. But the topper was this, those ladies said that the government was a month and a half behind on paying their salary checks. And even so they're not seriously pissed off about that yet because they know that the school teachers are 3 months behind in getting paid. Now what I'm telling you is taking place right now in the Ministerio Publico, which is the Department of Justice, the department that's in charge of handling all the crimes and the court cases and the lawsuits filed within the country. And if what I've told you is just partly true, just imagine what a good dose of austerity can really do to these guys. As if they're not handicapped enough already. And that my friends is why they call it the Third World. And now I'd like to talk a little bit about the anti-discrimination laws, which exist
[23:40] down here aplenty, just like they do in the First World, though they might as well not exist because no one ever enforces them. Now regarding equal opportunity rights and anti-discrimination laws, here's a really good example that proves my point. Just pick up the classified ads section in any big newspaper and you'll see employment opportunity ads like this. And I'm reading this directly and I'm translating, okay? Salespersons wanted for a large local firm. So far so good. Then it says, must be a good practicing Christian. Now if you were to print that in a First World newspaper, that's a discrimination lawsuit just waiting to happen. In fact, no First World newspaper would dare to print that. But the ad gets worse. Listen to this. Males only, age 19 to 35, must drive and have your own vehicle in good condition and must be taller than 1 meter 70, which means taller than 5 foot 5.
[24:29] Now can you see anything wrong with that ad? Once you pass those requirements and you get to the interview, you find out there's a lot more discrimination in store. It turns out, the lighter your hair and the lighter your skin, the more likely you are to get the job. That is just a proven fact down here. And what's worse, if it's a secretarial job and there are a lot of young girls being interviewed, often a young girl will be alone in a boss's office for that interview and he'll compliment her and make a few sexual comments if she's pretty and he just might conduct the whole interview with one hand resting on her leg. And I can't tell you how many times I've heard the same story from so many young girls going for a job interview. And though most young ladies resist this and are even somewhat disgusted by it, they know if they put up a fuss they'll be out of the running. So it often depends how desperate a girl is to get a job down here as to how much sexual
[25:19] harassment she'll be willing to put up with by the boss. But let me tell you about another sexually charged Latin American employment situation, one that I've come across a lot down here myself, especially with professionals when they have group offices, like lawyers, accountants, marketing guys, and architects. Many of these professional types hire a knockout young woman to act as the waiting room receptionist or girl Friday that these male executives take around with them when they go to luncheon dates, meetings, or business trips. And in reality, the girl is only there for appearances and might not have any secretarial skills at all. But that doesn't matter. In macho societies like these, it's about the show. In fact, they call beautiful useless office girls like that down here adornos, which means adornment in English, kind of like a shiny piece of jewelry that the boss takes around
[26:07] with him everywhere he goes. Now the first time I realized this kind of thing was going on was when I was down in Costa Rica visiting my lawyer's office, where there were three lawyers in the same office complex. And the receptionist was the dead ringer for a playboy bunny, with a short tight skirt you could never get away with in the same kind of job in the US. And she sat there, filing her nails all day and talking to her friends on the phone. And having her there as eye candy and first contact for anyone who came into the office was very good PR. Because in lawyer's offices in Latin America, almost all the important clients are male. And in Latin America, almost all males, married or not, are on the make and like the flirt with beautiful girls whenever they get the chance. But it was an altogether different story once she got past the beautiful receptionist. Through the door and into the inner confines, you'd run into his legal secretaries that
[26:56] did all the work. And they were business like and plain looking and didn't have time to do their nails. And that's the way almost all executive offices are set up down in Latin America. The beautiful young receptionists and the ladies that do the real work in the back room where they can't be seen much. At least that's the setup I've seen down here time and time again. And of course the wives of these lawyers and executives put up with that because well, that's the way it is down here. It's a macho society, it's traditional and everyone does it. And when I asked my own lawyer about it and tried to get his take, he said, what? Should I put one of my ugly brainy girls up front? Would that be better for business? So feminists beware. You've been listening to The Exped Files, living in Latin America.
[27:41] And don't forget you can email me on anything at all about Latin America. The Exped Files at gmail.com. That's theexpedfiles at gmail.com. See you next time. Nos bemos. Nos bemos.