Episode Summary
In this episode of The Expat Files, Johnny Mueller explores the challenges expats face while living in Latin America. The episode covers a range of topics, including construction safety, cultural norms, and personal anecdotes from expat Eddie. Johnny discusses the lack of uniformity in stair construction and how it can pose safety risks for expats. He also highlights the differences between first-world construction standards and the common violations in Latin American buildings. Johnny emphasizes that while some aspects of life in Latin America can be managed, cultural norms like long lines, poor driving, and lack of adherence to building codes are difficult to change. He explains the technical aspects of first-world construction codes, such as minimum and maximum stair riser heights and uniformity requirements, which are often ignored in Latin America, leading to potential hazards for expats. The episode also includes a discussion on the various hazards and design issues common in Latin American buildings, particularly focusing on stairs, bathroom layouts, and water management. Johnny highlights the lack of adherence to first-world building codes, such as the absence of handrails, narrow staircases, and inadequate headroom. He also explains the design of bathroom floors, which are intentionally sloped to direct water into floor drains, a practice that can lead to tripping hazards. The segment includes anecdotes and stories involving expat Eddie, highlighting his experiences with everyday challenges and more complex situations. Johnny shares a story about the leaking roof at a location during the rainy season, where plastic buckets are used to manage the water. He then transitions into a humorous story about Eddie's microwave and the 'cleaning lady IQ test,' where Eddie finds it difficult to align the microwave properly, leading to a funny situation. The segment also includes a detailed account of a robbery incident where Eddie lost $4,000 and the subsequent polygraph tests with his contractors, which ended in a humorous and frustrating situation for Eddie. The episode also touches on the challenges of lending money to Latinos, emphasizing that it's often a one-way street with little chance of repayment. Johnny shares his own experiences and advises treating such loans as gifts rather than investments. He also discusses the complexities of family relationships in Latin America, where family is central to social life, and how this can lead to conflicts when expats set boundaries. The segment includes a story about Eddie, an expat, who faces issues with his wife's family stealing from his home, leading to a rift in their relationship. Johnny highlights the importance of family in Latin America and the challenges expats face when trying to set boundaries with family members. The episode also discusses the challenges faced by gringo expats married to Latinas, particularly in maintaining privacy and security in a digital world. Johnny shares a story about Eddie, a gringo expat, and his wife Claudia, who is from El Salvador. Eddie, who has bought a piece of a casino, gives Claudia an ultimatum: either he or her family will live in El Salvador. Claudia chooses to move with Eddie, but they continue to visit her family in El Salvador, often bearing gifts. Johnny highlights the cultural differences between Latino and gringo families, noting that Latinos maintain close, frequent contact with family members, often through social media, while gringos tend to use more secure communication methods. The segment also touches on the issue of data privacy, particularly in the context of at-home coronavirus testing kits, which Johnny criticizes for being expensive and potentially insecure. Finally, the episode discusses the impact of the pandemic on Latin America, highlighting how it exposed the weaknesses of local governments, which are described as weak, toothless, under-motivated, and underfunded. Johnny then shifts focus to expat advice, mentioning Eddie, an expat who offers tips to newcomers on how to impress Latin American women. He emphasizes that while being a gringo (foreigner) can provide an advantage, it's not a guarantee, especially for tourists. The episode ends with a call to action for listeners to contact Johnny for help with their expat plans.
Episode Notes
In this episode of The Expat Files, Johnny Mueller dives into the challenges expats face in Latin America, including construction safety, cultural norms, and personal stories from expat Eddie. From stair construction issues to family dynamics and digital privacy concerns, Johnny provides a detailed look at life as an expat in the region.
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Topics
Expat life in Latin America, Cultural challenges for expats, Construction standards and safety, Building codes in Latin America, Stair construction and safety hazards, Stair design and safety, Bathroom layout and water management, Building codes and construction standards, Water damage and leakage issues, Expat life challenges, Humorous anecdotes, Relationship dynamics
Chapters
00:00:00 Opening 00:00:26 Overview of the Show's Content 00:01:30 Cultural Challenges in Latin America 00:01:44 Building Codes and Their Enforcement 00:02:43 Stair Construction and Safety Issues 00:05:39 Stair Safety Issues in Latin America 00:06:34 Bathroom and Shower Hazards 00:09:32 Headroom and Doorway Design Challenges 00:11:00 Rainy Season Challenges at Immigration and Luggage Carousel 00:11:05 Strategic Use of Plastic Buckets for Water Management 00:11:10 Leaking Roof and Life Details 00:11:18 Introduction of a Funny Expat Story 00:11:20 Addy's Stories and Humor 00:11:23 Microwave Alignment and the Cleaning Lady IQ Test 00:11:35 Eddie's Microwave and Cleaning Lady IQ Test 00:11:45 Eddie's Experiences with Cleaning Ladies 00:16:15 Lending Money to Family Members: A Risky Venture 00:17:07 Cutting Ties with Toxic Family Members 00:18:47 Eddie's Move to El Salvador and the Family Struggles 00:21:25 Eddie's Ultimatum and Claudia's Decision to Move with Him 00:22:04 Johnny's Observations on Family Dynamics and Privacy Concerns 00:24:13 Johnny's Critique of At-Home Coronavirus Testing and Data Privacy 00:26:44 The Pandemic's Impact on Latin America 00:26:48 Weaknesses of Latin American Governments 00:26:54 Eddie's Advice for New Expat 00:27:11 How to Impress a Beautiful Latina 00:27:27 The Gringo Advantage and Its Limitations 00:27:33 Expat Files: Living in Latin America 00:27:36 Call to Action for Expat Planning
Transcript
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 that 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 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 You know after living in Latin America while after the honeymoon phase, you know The newbie starry-eyed green gringle phase is over there will be things that really get on your nerves Of course, there will be the top ten obvious things that terrible terrible drivers manana time long lines at banks and government buildings
[00:48] Hygiene problems and restaurants and bathrooms sloppy workmanship and poor attention to detail Etc etc etc and you'd think all that stuff would be easily correctable But only some of it is and only really within your own personal sphere of influence For example within your own house your domain and or within your own business if you own one That's also part of your gringo advantage and why gringo businesses do so well here in Latin America It's all about the details training up your help and making your place first world But as far as where you live at home, you can train up your maid in your gardener They're not dumb. In fact, some of them are pretty smart and they catch on fast But you'll never be able to do anything about the long lines the bad drivers manana time, etc Etc. Those things are cultural but you knew that already, right? Well aside from all that another irritable annoyance that you won't be able to change
[01:38] Something I never even heard any gringos and expats talk about except in the moment where it can be dangerous to your health Now you've heard me say before that all the first world building codes exist here in Latin America They're in the municipality archives. In fact somewhere in every large and small towns inspection department There is a list of first world building norms that contractors are supposed to adhere to and in some of the newer upscale subdivisions This is almost all those codes are adhered to at least 90% of them Anyway, that includes office buildings big malls and commercial centers, too They're almost always built to first world codes and norms because international companies come in and build those things But as mentioned in previous shows if you violate some of those norms Builders can almost always get away with it because inspectors just don't come around and I've talked to some of these inspector guys
[02:27] And they hardly even know the rules themselves a government building inspection job It's just a license to sit on your dead ass all day long and peck away at your phone, but I digress as usual Where are we? Oh, yeah, so then what's that irritating and sometimes dangerous pet peeve? I'm talking about well It's the fact that there's no uniformity in stairs or hand railings on stairs now You might say so what give me a flight of stairs, and I'll manage it Why should it matter how uniform or un-uniform the stair heights or widths might be the thing is though We're so used to walking up and down stairs by the time you're 30 years old you probably walked up and down 10,000 staircases and your brain and your feet kind of automatically know the comfortable minimum and maximum Stair height that is the distance between one stair to the next because they're all uniform up in the states and Canada and the first world
[03:15] It's burned into our memories when you talk about such things They're technically called a minimum and maximum stair step riser height and width It's a well-known construction measurement and rule violated over and over again in practice every Latin American house and commercial building again Why should it matter you've got eyes you can judge distances well for one thing if it's getting dark or staircases dimly lit You could stub your toe or even take a nasty tumble every gringo an expat Who's been down here a while has had a close call or worse all right? Let me explain now in the states and Europe and everywhere They have first world construction codes the maximum stair step riser height that's the distance between stair steps is 7.75 inches and the minimum rise height is 4 inches so when you're constructing staircases
[04:05] You got a nice acceptable range of distances 4 inches minimum to 7 and 3 quarter inches maximum a lot of flexibility there A lot of wiggle room though that doesn't seem to matter much here in Latin America Oh, and there's another first world construction code that says the step riser height uniformity That means the maximum variation between step heights from one step to the next you know as to not screw up your rhythm as You're walking up and down stairs can be no more than three-eighths of an inch variation between Successive step surfaces because you know how just one stair a little bit too high or too low can really throw you off if you're not Aware of it well let me tell you here in Latin America the violation of that code is the norm in fact every single house I've rented or built even everyone I've stayed in as a number of those staircase errors now of course if you've got a really short
[04:53] Or really tall stair sticking out like a sore thumb if you're living in that house you get used to it your brain your Subconscious automatically conforms even at night with no lights you don't trip on it But visitors sure will and we haven't even talked about open staircases You know where you can see through the stairs they have a horizontal stepping surface, but no vertical. It's open Well the first world code says that you must have the inner tread edge Extend beneath the outer edge of the tread or stair above it well good luck with that I don't think any contractor here in Latin America even knows about that rule and Believe me no inspector would ever call you out on it that is if you could ever get an inspector to come to your house Not that you want them to come to your house So let's review stairs of uneven height will screw with your walking rhythm nothing you can do about it
[05:39] You better get used to it so open your eyes well that seems to be the norm down here especially with older houses and commercial buildings So keep your eyes open Then there's another problem of stairs that are too high that is between one stair in the next one that is over seven and three-quarter Inches or too short below four inches you can complain, but it won't do any good And if you fall and break your leg remember, this is Latin America, so there's no one to sue so then what's worse stairs That are uneven in height from one stair surface to the next or stair steps that are too tall or too short well for my money It's the stairs that are too short and believe me some of them are so short sometimes a lip or a bump of a half Inch to two inches tall will just pop up out of nowhere If you've got one or two or five or ten of those in your own house you think you'd get used to them right well
[06:26] You do to a point unless you've been drinking problem is and I've done this myself even years later You'll still get yourself cursing when you're going for that midnight snack And the worst offenders of all are in Latin American bathrooms and showers in fact It's standard practice though totally against building standards and rules to have the shower stall base Drop down a half inch or an inch below the main surface of the bathroom floor So why do they do that when there's a big risk of tripping and falling on your ass because Latin Americans are so conditioned to having water Drainage problems you know under sized plumbing pipes and all that you've heard me speak about that many times and by dropping the bathroom floor And the shower stall floor a half inch or so it becomes kind of a catch basin for any kind of water overflows So let me give you the setup what the usual suspect Latin American bathroom is all about you're walking down the hall
[07:16] You open the bathroom door We're talking about tile and concrete floors now I'd say about 99% of all Latin homes and businesses have cement or tile floors very very few of them have carpet or hardwood floors And that's a good thing again because of all the water overflows down here So anyway you're walking down the hall to the bathroom you open the door and suddenly you drop down one inch or more I know you're probably thinking I could handle that we all walk through door openings rather slowly anyway It's much different though when you're walking out of the bathroom You're likely to stumble or stub your toe on that one inch lip now if you live there of course you do get used to it sorta Alright, and then once you're in the bathroom when you proceed to the shower You'll experience another instant drop of about a half inch to an inch or two very disconcerting at first because well
[08:03] It's something new something you haven't seen before in bathrooms back home So again, we're used to walking up and down stairs and across floors on autopilot our brains assume Each step height is the same as the step we took before it so a surprise step that's taller shorter or has an extended lip can make you stumble or fall and Don't get me started on handicap facilities. That's a huge can of worms by the way when I was a young kid I lived by Lake Michigan went fishing a lot and opened many cans of worms and I could tell you firsthand and open can of worms is not the chaos and madness you've been led to believe by the way all first world construction codes say that every staircase must have A handrail at a minimum of 34 inches above the riser with a minimum of one and a half inch clearance from the wall
[08:48] Well good luck with that. I'd say about a third of all the staircases in Latin America have no handrail at all That means it's sometimes going up and down the stairs It's a balancing act and you're on your own by the way Did you know that first world codes say every stairway has to have a minimum width of 36 inches? Well, I can tell you contractors down here haven't heard about that rule either You know down here in Latin America, you'll routinely run into staircases that are so narrow The average expanding American would have to butter up with Crisco Oh, and there's another first world building norm that most Latin American contractors have never heard of either That's the minimum vertical clearance or distance from a floor surface to the landing on the next floor above or below In other words the headroom you have as you're walking upstairs to the next floor You'll find out in a hurry that Latin American doorways and floor clearances were not designed for gringos or anyone six foot or taller
[09:39] I know many gringos who crack their noggins on overhead beams I'm one of them, but thankfully newer houses and commercial buildings have factored that in but Utah guys out there Do keep that in mind if you're invited to one of your Latin neighbors houses Oh, and one more thing about bathrooms in Latin America this time. It's something positive. It's a good thing You'll notice that almost every bathroom has a little floor drain somewhere You rarely see that in bathrooms up in the states Well, that's because over the years Latin Americans have learned their lessons about water leaks in certain water problems in general Funny thing though many of them go at the problem ass backwards instead of fixing a leaky roof They'll count on the floor drain to handle the overflow the floor drain being the collector of last resort By the way, just because there's a floor drain doesn't mean that the floor is pitched correctly to move water down that drain
[10:26] I've seen many floors where the cement contractor screwed that up Royally, oh well in the states you'd call your lawyer right down here. You just open another bottle of tequila Now when I say that water damage and water problems are big issues down here. That's not hyperbole I can't tell you how many houses buildings and restaurants have been into that leak like a sieve In fact, I've been in restaurants nice restaurants where during the rainy season They've got buckets strewn all over the place In fact the Guatemalan International Airport that many of you will be flying into for the seminar You won't get to see this because it's not the rainy season But during the rainy season on that walk down to immigration and the luggage carousel You'll see a dozen or so plastic buckets placed strategically in the main walkway Because when it rains the roof leaks like a sieve and it's fairly new to oh well such as life details details, huh?
[11:18] Oh before I forget. I got to tell you something funny expat Addy just told me he's always got a few stories and it's good for a laugh You know how your kitchen microwave has a little glass platter that spins, right? And you know if something bubbles over a food drops on that plate you take it out wash it and put it back on But you have to align it with the three little slots in the center So it engages properly and spins as it should when you turn the thing on well expat Eddie calls that a cleaning lady IQ test Because you see over the years He's had many cleaning ladies and he's yet to find one who can actually align that thing properly He says when it's cleaning lady leaves at 5 he goes directly to the microwave oven and aligns that thing He says she gets it right about 20% of the time, but it's pure luck. That's why he calls it the cleaning lady IQ test
[12:04] Eddie you're mean Speaking of expat Eddie, you know a couple of months ago I told a few expat Eddie stories that hadn't quite resolved themselves yet They didn't have an ending one about that robbery he had when contractors came in to fix his window And then he found $4,000 missing from his secret hiding place in that room. I guess it wasn't so secret You might remember that he called his general contractor on the carpet his general contractor swore his men were honest So Eddie spent another 750 bucks to get those guys polygraph And if you remember the cleaning lady passed with flying colors She took it because she was in the house at that time too and the two glass and window installers failed They even tried to use certain breathing techniques to fool the polygraph But the polygraph guys were wise to that and picked up on it right away
[12:52] So anyway in the end the general contractor who said that he would pay the 4,000 bucks and the 750 to Eddie if his boys didn't pass the test and when they didn't he reneged He said get this he didn't trust the polygraph guys to be accurate. Yeah, right He just didn't like the results made him look like a fool an idiot though He never admitted it but Eddie knew that's what the guy was feeling You could see it in his face Then Eddie said to the guy if that's how you feel about it There are four or five other polygraph outfits you select one you want you paid the 750 bucks this time by the way It was 250 bucks a person to have a polygraph done Then Eddie said to the guy go ahead get your own polygraph done But aren't you just a little concerned the results were so overwhelming against your two guys
[13:38] They even got caught using countermeasures against the machine if you really think another polygraph test is gonna exonerate those guys Go for it and the contractor said that's just what I'm gonna do I'm gonna hire another polygraph company of my choice Well a couple of weeks went by even a month Eddie called up the contractor The guy flip-flopped again saying he trusted his guys and didn't need another polygraph So in the end Eddie was out 4,000 plus a 750 for the polygraph He got burnt alright, but Eddie wasn't without a plan He figured he was gonna cause at least forty five hundred dollars worth of damage to these guys So he scanned the complete polygraph test and all the results and he had that what's up numbers of eight Of the guys that worked on his remodeling job the plumber electrician tile guys painters
[14:23] Solar installers concrete guys and Eddie sent those scans to all of the guys that worked on his property And now there's one thing for sure you can count on the rumor mill and social media to do its dirty work Eventually those two guys will never work a construction job again Now for those of you listeners who missed the first part of that expat Eddie story I guess you'll just have to go back in the archives about three or four months It's a good story and a lesson to gringles and expats who are building a house or remodeling Now the reason why I'm telling you the conclusion to this story is because I've got a ton of emails from people saying You never finished that story. You never finished it Well, that's because it was still a work in progress when it was first told speaking of expat Eddie There was another previous story told about him quite a while back, but never had a conclusion now your longtime listeners
[15:09] Probably remember me talking about Eddie's girlfriend Claudia from El Salvador They've been going together maybe seven or eight years now And we're supposed to get married a couple of different times actually but it never did happen in fact They broke up for a while, and you'll never believe why you wouldn't be able to guess in a million years now You may have heard the saying if you marry a latino or latino You're married to the family too Well was Claudia's family that drove a wedge between Eddie and her now if you remember how the story went You know Eddie travels a lot, and he has a beautiful house in an upscale subdivision in El Salvador That's where Claudia's from El Salvador. He met her there turns out Eddie was at a big event a restaurant convention I think it was at the Barcelona Hotel in San Salvador the capital and Claudia was at that same event as a model So anyway they fell for each other Eddie made his fortune in the restaurant business
[15:57] They moved in together and little by little her family started knocking at the door her brothers and cousins coming around asking for jobs And loans dropping in on weekends to use his pool eat his food and drink his booze And Eddie the nice calm good guy that he is and he is put up with it for a long while till it finally got on His nerves so he made a few rules One was that he's never gonna lend any money to her family because he'd lent little bits here and there to family members But never got reimbursed. That's normal. It's happened to me and practically every gringo has been down here for a long while My advice from experience has always been if you're gonna lend Latinos money or anyone money even your own family members You're much better off telling them it's a gift not alone And of course, they'll be falling all over themselves to tell you that you're gonna get every cent back right on time
[16:44] Yeah, the yada-yada and really I can vouch for this that almost never happens And you know what they say the easiest way to lose a friend is to loan him money But that doesn't work with family members you lend him money. They don't pay you back You're still stuck with them their family and you still have to look at their ugly mugs every Christmas and Thanksgiving Unless of course you got that plane B going and you're living in Latin America That's one of the very positive secondary effects of getting out of Dutch You can kiss those energy sucking time vampire friends of yours and those family member parasites. Goodbye We've all got a couple of those I bet you're thinking of one or two right now You know when I first came down here, I ditched a few of those and what a relief it was Oh and as for lending money to Latinos, almost none of us are immune to a hard luck story, right? There have been some times when my maintenance guy cleaning lady or some kid in a neighborhood
[17:32] Nicked me for five ten twenty, maybe fifty bucks After all the maintenance guy the cleaning lady the guys who wash your cars are all living on the edge So you help them out once a while as long as they're not boozers Though I really liked the way Bitcoin Dan gifts people money. I didn't say give I said gift G IFT gift I've been to places with Bitcoin Dan You know restaurants and people's houses where he'll slip 20 50 even a hundred bucks in the local funny money Into the apron of a cleaning lady or waitress and he'll do it clandestinely to knowing that they'll find it sooner or later Long after Dan is gone, you know You really gotta admire Dan for that because most of us when we give us something we kind of crave the instant acknowledgement, right? That's so-called serotonin do-gooders high. That's actually been scientifically measured
[18:17] Some people just need the recipient to smile and acknowledge it maybe even fawn a bit and shed a tear, too That's why I'm always suspicious of dickhead do-gooder photo ops where some charity big shot is handing a check over to someone Where she had sometimes it's a big old cardboard cutout prop check that takes two people a hoist up for the camera now to me There's something exploitive about that or us made the wrong way But back to expat Eddie's story and what happened with him and Claudia because it doesn't involve a few lessons for gringles and expats Anyway, Eddie moved into this really nice high-end house in El Salvador And after being hit up one too many times by Claudia's friends and relatives He laid down a few rules Like for example her family and friends could only come to the house if invited for pool parties and such
[19:04] They couldn't just drop in unannounced with their swimming gear and they weren't allowed to bring friends or acquaintances Eddie and Claudia had never met or didn't know well that worked for a while a couple of years in fact But as Eddie and Claudia traveled more and more more often than not Claudia's mother would house it while they were gone And what of Eddie's rules was that if her mother was house-hitting she couldn't have any people over Especially a particular sister of Claudia's who was known to have sticky fingers in fact two or three years ago Claudia thought she'd misplaced some jewelry She had lots of nice jewelry and of course that could happen and it could show up in the future sometime, too Well, it turns out it did on her sister's fake book site That's when Claudia realized her own sister had stolen the jewelry and was wearing it herself Then Claudia took inventory and saw that some of her shoes and clothing items were missing, too
[19:50] Yep, her sister again now, Claudia never did confront her sister to keep the family peace and Eddie was pissed off about that So Eddie decided to install a nice surveillance camera system all around the house with some of the cameras stealthily concealed After the cameras were first installed that was a few years ago now Eddie and Claudia went on another trip They were gone for about three weeks and when they returned Eddie decided to play with his camera system Have a look at the hard drive see what the motion detectors had picked up in the last few weeks And sure enough Claudia's mother broke rule number one. She had people over worse yet. She had sticky fingers, too She was not only stealing little things from Claudia's closet She was stealing food and edibles from their well-stocked kitchen pantry It was all on camera and Eddie was furious and Claudia once again didn't want to start a family feud
[20:38] So she kept her mouth shut, but Eddie laid down the law no family at the house anymore They're not invited But going back to that business if you marry a Latino or a Latino you marry their family, too Well, Claudia could not or would not allow Eddie to banish her family completely because once again in Latin America family is everything They're really tight much more so than any gringo family I've ever met So Eddie and Claudia feuded a while and he caved a bit. He said we can visit them, but they're not welcome in this house They've disrespected me he said and I won't have that so on the end it caused a big rift in Claudia and Eddie's relationship So Eddie went off on a few trips of his own by himself He's got dough, so he's always looking for investment opportunities He went to Panama, Roatan Honduras Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. He bought a townhouse and a high-rise
[21:25] He even bought a piece of a casino and as far as Claudia. He gave her an ultimatum He said it's either me or your family. I'm not gonna live in El Salvador anymore I'm gonna sell that house in fact that he had a few buyers on the line gringo buyers He said I've got a place in Panama the DR and Honduras We can take a pic or split our time between those places, but we're not gonna live in El Salvador In fact, that's not the first time I heard a similar story from a gringo expat married to a Latina The only way you're gonna separate them from their family is to move at least a couple a hundred miles away Of course a lot of Latinos and Latinas have some really nice family members who become really good friends to you And you wouldn't think of moving to avoid them, but believe me That's not the first time I've heard stories of family members who are nothing but leeches or worse sticky fingered thieves So anyway after about a month and a half of Eddie scouting around
[22:12] Ostensibly for new business opportunities Claudia made a decision to go back to Eddie no matter where they lived and they made a deal because Latinos and Latinas can never be Separated completely from their families not for too long. Anyway Yep, that's right. No matter how dysfunctional they are. Hey, come on yours isn't I know mine is so anyway for Christmas holidays and certain other events Claudia pops back to see the family in El Salvador and all as well though always bearing gifts for the dysfunctional family on Eddie's tab Of course, but he's loaded so he doesn't care as long as she's happy Oh, and by the way, Eddie says being Latina and therefore addicted to social media She checks in with some of her closer family members at least once a day Which provides another big example of the difference between Latino families and gringo families
[22:58] for example Eddie being an only child was really close to his mother and she Formerly, Texas trailer trash is that he describes her Of course that was before Eddie made his mark in Latin America now She's living the good life though. Not too far from the old trailer corp her choice Eddie says anyway Eddie checks in with her on the signal app every week or two That's pretty normal for gringles living down here in Latin America As far as maintaining certain connections with folks back in Cleveland Milwaukee or Texas meanwhile Latinas like Claudia when far away from friends And family they check in routinely once twice sometimes five times a day and almost exclusively with what's up They have no idea that a much better encrypted app like the signal app that saves no data at all even exists And they don't even care However, a while back Eddie got Claudia to use the signal app exclusively when talking to him
[23:47] He trained or he said it wasn't easy He taught her never to put her passport Sedular or any kind of bank documents on whatsapp or any other platform by the way You know, what's really irksome to me is when you're traveling these days with this co-videot crap Airlines and governments are forcing people to upload sensitive documents photos passports co-videot stuff. None of that's secure You know, it's just more data mining. For example, all this kovat testing remotely using laptops and smartphones That's the latest thing, you know, it's all super invasive and pretty disturbing In fact, one of our listeners Wes who's coming to the expat insider seminar He filled me in on this at home remote co-videot testing thing seems to be all the rage now He says Johnny I ended up getting this kit ordered online and then he gives me the link
[24:32] It's an Abbott a laboratory at home test, but I found out he says they're not all the same He says you get two rapid antigen tests for 70 bucks, which includes the shipping You can order at Optum, but online testing is done using emed.com which sells the kits to you So Wes says this particular at-home rapid antigen test is 70 bucks for two. Oh, by the way, Wes I got an email from a guy in Germany the other day He told me they have rapid antigen tests there for a guess how much about 80 cents. That's about a 4,000% markup talk about a massive gouge. I wonder who's getting that dough. Why Abbott labs, of course Anyway, Wes goes out to say the directions are non-existent other than the box telling you to set up a navika account
[25:18] And to not open the box until instructed to do so So I got to two tests in overnight mail The navika app is a free download to your smartphone. You can use your Google email account if you wish I Created a separate account. He says using my email and they test your email to see if it's valid Then you're instructed to go to emed.com. You use a navika account login for emed.com It asks you a few questions like are you using this for travel, etc I couldn't find a way to set up an appointment for the online portion though It's first come first serve It looks like as for me He says having done a travel test before the online sequence would be something like this After logging in and answering questions a live body comes online to proctor you to show an ID
[26:07] You swab your nose and you use that for the test kit. Anyway, Johnny That's how those at home online tests go says Wes You show the results to the proctor online to your test result is now online in 15 minutes and printable You can also display it via the navika app if you have internet access All right, Wes Thanks for that and I'll be seeing you in a couple of days at the seminar though What you said about that test does reinforce my worst fears about this strange new world We're rapidly slipping into where you've got no privacy at all. Everything's online Accessible by every and all government agencies including all manner of hackers and no-goodniks, too It's sad to think what it's become the kovid it crisis was the perfect setup But luckily you have options, you know in Latin America governments are weak toothless under motivated and underfunded
[26:54] Exactly how you want your government to be? Oh and one last thought from expat Eddie He gets questions all the time from newbie gringles and expats who don't speak any Spanish They see him physically as just slightly above average a six maybe a seven all dressed up on a great day yet He's with Claudia a spectacular ten He says newbie green gringles ask his advice on how to impress a beautiful latina Since he's obviously got the neck and Eddie just laughs and says man You've got that gringo advantage that he says and the ability to crack open a difficult pickle jar believe me He said that's more than enough to impress the ladies. But if you're on the gringo tourist trail all bets are off You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America If you need some help with your own plan be we can schedule a one-on-one phone or Skype consult
[27:41] 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