#1161 – The Expat Files: Language, Culture, and Life 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 up to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you ex-pat wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live 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 man the things you discover when you're not even looking to discover anything now You longtime listeners may remember me talking about when I was a kid. I used to read everything I'd sit on the John even Pull out the Lysol and Drano bottles from under the sink and read the labels which inadvertently made me the child expert on under counter

[00:48] toxic bathroom chemicals My friends thought I was nuts and the adults thought I was sick So anyway since I've always been kind of addicted to reading anything that's just sitting around From appliance repair manuals to digging up fossils to building the Eiffel Tower That means I'm a repository of lots and lots of useless data But along the way, it's inevitable you pick up some really interesting tidbits, too Sometimes stuff that relates or indirectly relates to the theme of this show living in Latin America For example, we all know that one of the major hurdles stumbling box to getting along in Latin America is learning Spanish, right? In fact, I'd say only about one out of 50 tourists that is gringo tourists in Latin America Know any more than what could get a buy a Taco Bell and it seems the vast majority of gringos and expats that end up living

[01:34] in Mexico land on the tourist trail So they never really have to learn their Spanish and most seem to be good with that Why because they figure there's enough gringos around speaking English and locals that can speak English They never have to give it any real effort Even though it is a fact and I've said this many times the more Spanish, you know The lower your cost of living ironically when you talk to people up in the states who have for example Latinos moving in their neighborhood who don't speak English. They get all pissed off and say they're in our country. Damn it Why don't they learn our language? Hmm personally, I'm in that camp, too But don't on the other hand think you can move to Latin America and get away with not learning their language At least you should make a good stab at it Where's yet you read in rags like International Living and other gringo magazines telling you to move to Panama and Costa Rica

[02:21] Mexico and such saying you don't have to learn Spanish. Come on down. There is enough English spoken. You could fit right in Oh, yeah How would you like if a Spanish language newspaper or rag said the same thing to people moving to the United States? You don't have to learn their language. You don't need English There's enough Spanish spoken in the US said you could fit right in though Unfortunately that happens to be true the words out amongst the poor and lower classes They don't have to speak English to move to the states and no matter how much of a do-gooder you think you might be Remember this pole folks have poe habits Funny how so many do-gooders want the borders opened yet? They certainly don't want them living in their neighborhood Hippogrids just like the Pope who says it's a sin for Europe not to welcome Arab and African refugees

[03:06] Yet the Vatican one of the wealthiest countries in the world has not accepted a single refugee Moral of that story never trust pallet old white guys in funny hats But I digress man, did I digress where were we? Oh, yeah, you've also heard me say the farther you live off the gringo tourist trail The quicker you pick up your Spanish you're forced to it's a trial by fire And there's more and more evidence now that learning Spanish or any kind of second language is very good for your brain That's why when we started the show today, I brought up my crazy reading habits Because you see I just happened to have read a book by a brain surgeon about what else brain surgery Hey, who knows am I coming handy someday? Anyway in that book about brain surgery, I stumbled on a little anecdote Regarding people who go under the knife who are fully bilingual English and Spanish

[03:55] In this case the surgeon that wrote the book had to do a delicate brain operation on a bilingual lady with a brain tumor So now i'd like to read a few crazy excerpts from this book though possibly cringe worthy. They're never boring But first let's talk about some of the not so obvious benefits of being bilingual So then how exactly does bilingualism pay off in brain performance? Well dozens of studies have demonstrated the benefits on attention and focus and here's what you didn't know The benefits are due in part to the fact that a bilingual person's brain must actively suppress one language When he or she's speaking the other so being bilingual actually works your brain harder So being able to handle that extra workload results in a stronger overall control of your attention span

[04:41] Studies have shown over and over again that bilingual people have increased attention spans over monolingual people On top of that brain scans have shown the better a person speaks a second language The thicker the gray matter on the left parietal lobe cortex So the brain actually grows when you're bilingual In fact neurologists can even tell by a brain scan if a person's learned more than one language better yet in repeatable brain studies The first one published in 2007 by researchers in toronto showed that people who spoke more than one language developed symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer's four years later than people who are only monolingual Since that study in 2007 many other studies went in montreal, india, belgium, etc confirm Protective side effects against dementia in bilingual people. You knew that already, right?

[05:31] But here's what you didn't know at least I didn't till I read the book I mean really who would unless you're a brain surgeon or your hobby is reading books about brain surgery The surgeon who wrote this book talks about a surgery a typical surgery for removing a brain tumor in this case from a latina Patient named maria who's fully bilingual. She's a 36 year old teacher If this story doesn't fascinate you then you just might be one of elan's ai simulations All right. Let me read you a little bit of what was going on in the surgeon's mind He says if I was going to remove maria's tumor without destroying her ability to speak and understand language I needed to map the entire surface of her unique cortical canopy exploring the safe versus language sensitive spots in her brain

[06:16] You see I needed to cut through that section of her brain to get to the tumor And I had to do all this while she was awake and able to guide me through the process He says I needed her to be awake to help me determine tiny islands of brain tissue that could be parted And serve as portals as I cut deep inside her brain to reach the tumor He said I told maria and her husband. I would have to remove the top of her skull that part under anesthetic But then he'd have to wake her She would need to tell me by her ability to speak or not where it was safe for me to begin dissecting And because she was bilingual, I would have to check each spot twice once for english and again for spanish He said in the beginning of the surgery when her scalp skull and dura were open

[07:02] It would have been too painful for her to be awake for that portion because of the bone saw But because the brain itself has no nerves to feel pain The anesthesiologist was now able to dial back the sedative In preparation for the real work once the top of her skull was removed So when she was awake again, I said welcome back maria. Are you okay? She said yeah, just a little groggy Is my brain open? Note that days earlier we had practiced an operation simulation so she knew her role in the process So we started The doctor said in my left hand I held an electric stimulator a device that shape and size of a fountain pen the twin tips are forked like a snake's tongue The tiny air gap in between when I press a button It releases a tiny electrical current that runs from one of the contacts to the other

[07:51] Allowing me to temporarily stun a tiny piece of tissue between those two points The brain however cannot feel my touch It doesn't have the ability to know when it's being touched cut or manipulated But the zap neurons are momentarily stunned resulting in the loss of whatever function they possess So we started the neurophysiologist asked her to count to 10. She did he asked her to sing the alphabet in english She did now he repeated both questions in spanish her native tongue. She performed flawlessly I was ready to test probe and cut then he says I lowered the electric stimulator onto a spot On the edge of her speech area The neurophysiologist posed maria a list of questions in both english and spanish each of which she also answered flawlessly

[08:40] He held up objects and asked her to identify them and all went well Then he says I started to stimulate an adjacent area then a neurophysiologist asked maria To sing the whole alphabet as I zapped the spot with the stimulator She kept right on singing then she went through the song again in spanish I waited till she was halfway through the zap it She stopped at the letter n as if i'd pressed a mute button on her her speech was arrested I knew this spot was a no-go So I placed a tiny red piece of confetti on the area with a letter s for spanish We repeated the process for an hour and got a topographic map of the language critical areas of her left brain It was covered in a mosaic of white and red confetti Some of the red no-go bits had an e for english and some added s for spanish and some added es for both

[09:31] Where I had placed the white pieces of confetti that meant I could dive through the brain's surface underneath To get to the tumor and not affect any of her speech areas. I began to cut I reached the edge of the tumor Now a week earlier marina and her husband and I discussed two possible scenarios if things went wrong If for example, I found it necessary to cut into her speech areas and necessarily destroy some of her speech centers She said doc if I have to choose the language to lose I'll lose the english. She said take the english if you have to but leave me the spanish So that's what the doc had to do to completely remove that cancer He dissected through the brain tissue that mysteriously housed her english-speaking abilities And now it's been five years since that surgery. She's cancer-free, but she only speaks spanish

[10:21] She lost her english abilities completely. It was her choice. It could have been the other way around Wow, how about that real interesting stuff? Uh, well it is to me Makes you wonder what had happened if you had a brain injury and you only knew one language Hmm. Oh, I get it. So that's what happened to maxine waters and babbling biden But I digress as usual by the way This book on brain surgeries are really good to read Do you want to read about the brain and some other interesting stories like that? Send me an email the xmet file So gmail.com and i'll send you a copy Which begs the question. How's your spanish coming as for me? I'm a language doctor i've been down here a long long time and i'm still Probably no more than an eight. It'll never be any more than eight By the way, the three biggest obstacles preventing gringos and expats from learning spanish or at least enough to get by

[11:10] Number one is living around and hanging with gringos and expats most exclusively number two basic laziness Part of which includes leaning on someone, you know or a friend who speaks spanish pretty well So you're leaning on them all the time for the translations Number three google translate a crutch that's also highly correlated to laziness Full disclosure here, you know, we'll probably call me a hypocrite. But once in a while I do use google translate For example when i'm dealing with legal documents in spanish They're long and drawn out sometimes five six ten pages long and i'll run them through google translate Because it's just so damn tedious to go through a contract in spanish going through legalese and english is torture enough But in spanish Forget about it

[11:57] Other than that, I don't use translate apps at all Fact is I hate google and what it stands for so much that when I sometimes need to translate a contract Or some kind of legal document. I feel like a traitor to the cause when i'm doing it The other thing that hampers my spanish abilities a bit is that i'm slightly deaf in certain tonal ranges From playing so many years on stage behind loud amps because of that. I have another problem Sometimes i'll ask a person who's speaking me in spanish to repeat themselves And that's okay if you're dealing with people on the street or mechanics or people you don't know that well But if all your friends and acquaintances happen to be spanish speakers who don't know english or not enough to get by I notice that sometimes they'll get a little annoyed when I ask them to repeat themselves

[12:43] They not realizing that spanish is my second language and i'm not as fluent as they are They don't realize it because i'm immersed in their world, which is all spanish conversations 24 seven They forget it's my second language and don't cut me the slack that cut you and other expats and gringos who Obviously can't just dive in and shoot the shit with them in spanish right off the cuff By the way I know a lot of you listeners out there have the same problem too much loud rock and roll music and you're getting a little deaf too, aren't you? You'll know for sure when you've been watching tv a long long time and someone walks in and says what's wrong with you It's way too loud you're deaf or something The fact is that i've been living off the gringo tourist drill for so long I sometimes forget certain words in english And sometimes my friends who don't speak spanish and the ones up in the states when i'm communicating with them will accuse me of

[13:30] Mixing the two languages in other words I'll say a passage phrase or paragraph in an english conversation and i'll drop in a few words of spanish unknowingly I won't even realize it till they point it out Maybe that's normal for gringos and expats who've been down a very long time When the exact english word doesn't come to mind your brain fills it in with spanish and you don't even know it Could be your two language centers spanish and english automatically pick the path of least resistance when a certain word's not at the tip of your tongue Who knows but it does happen. It's happened to me or maybe it's me who's next in line for brain surgery Bottom line science has proved bilingualism absolutely pays off in brain performance All right switching gears. Let's talk about beating up your kids here in latin america Personally i've only seen it happen a couple of times twice in a big grocery store

[14:18] You know when kids are running wild and their parents rain them in big time Saw it one time at a wedding at a water park at a street event A parade where kids were running wild and their parents rained them in and then there's the case of the lady That i had often buy coconut water from she had a machete She cut it open and handed to me once one of her little kids ran up to me to say hi And he dropped a cup of juice. He was carrying and soaked my shoes No harm done to me, but his mom was in paris. So she came over and clocked him one A little excessive I thought but back when I was a kid We all took the occasional licking and we lived with it and somehow we never turned into whiny emotional basket cases Did we anyway regarding latinos disciplining their kids? I've seen it a half dozen times in my 30 plus years down here now as a rule kids down here are so Much more well behaved than kids up in the states

[15:06] Though it seems that's the rule only with the lower and middle classes the upper middle classes and wealthy classes They treat their kids the same as the american middle and upper classes treat their kids like little princes and princesses That can do no wrong in the eyes of their mommies and daddies So as far as my experience i've only seen rude and misbehaving kids In the so-called upper middle class and wealthy gringle wannabe classes You regular listeners might remember that story I told about six months ago now When my gringle friends and I were confronted with a screaming kid in an upscale restaurant at 11 o'clock at night And the parents and the people around didn't do a thing Only me the rude gringo spoke up only to be bitched at by an upscale gringo wannabe who obviously went to a helicopter school herself Because her english was pretty good. She was definitely infected with gringle parenting tendencies

[15:56] In fact down here in latin america. There seems to be a very high correlation between wealth and badly behaved kids It's funny. It seems the more a family struggling and hurting for door the more poor they are basically the better behave their kids Sort of counterintuitive maybe because the parents don't have the time inclination or temperament to put up with an unruly kid And that combined with the fact that many adolescent kids 10 11 12 years and above in lower and middle class families Which makes up about 90 of families in latin america those kids Actually have a job work at something to contribute financially to the family They have to that puts a responsibility on poor and middle class kids at a very early age Now I know there's lots to talk about that child labor problem

[16:41] The thing is though most of these kids remain in school and work on the side It's not like they lie about their age and their parents shove them in a sweatshop These days so-called sweatshop owners could get in big trouble for that. So they demand a government id Those sweatshops are unionized. So they're pretty strict about that. But underage kids do work You see it all the time school-aged kids 10 12 14 years old selling crap on the street Shining shoes washing cars selling eggs and candy sharpening knives grinding out keys handing out flyers washing windshields Hey, nothing wrong with that as long as they're still going to school and to their credit Most of them are doing both most often. They need to be working too for the family to make ends meet Now you may have heard of this latin american thing called the canasta basilica

[17:26] That's the basic so-called basket of combined items a family of four needs to survive for a month Obviously since every country is a little bit different the calculation is a bit different for each country, too for example in june of 2022 The cost of living for a family of four your so-called basic family basket canasta basilica Made up of 75 products and services by the way was estimated to be 529 us dollars So as of june 2022 the average latino family of four in ecuador spends 529 dollars a month that includes food rent utilities clothes transportation, etc But since the average legal basic salary in ecuador is only 425 bucks a month

[18:12] One worker in the family just won't cut it You have to have 1.6 people earning the basic salary to cover it for a family of four So then generally you have the mother and the kids over 10 or 12 years old chipping in Having that mission at a young age to help the family seems to make the kids hardworking diligent non whiners Who listen to their parents and don't act up in public? Just like up in the states though the more kids have the more the parents do for them the more entitled they think they are Same old story, but you knew that already by the way. I've got a latino friend hoye He's got three super well-behaved kids He and his family are slightly above middle class latin american style his wife runs a mary kay business You know women's products door to door and he well he's got a loan shark business That's legal down here kind of and he's in the beauty parlor product supply business

[19:03] So they're slightly above middle class latin american style. I bet they make around 1500 a month between them It's a family of five thing is the kids work a bit in the business, too And you know every time i've been around him and his kids I notice his kids are very happy and they're always amusing themselves and playing nice and quiet never Interrupting adults or screwing with them or demanding things. There's three boys eight ten and sixteen I remember once not so long ago. I said jorge your kids are pretty well behaved. I bet you don't have to discipline them much He said we're pretty much over that phase But if they get out of line and i'll bring out the chancla the chancla or chancleta is a shoe or a sandal He said that's an age-old tradition down here You punish your kids early on by whacking them a few times in the butt with a chancla or chancleta

[19:50] He said after a while. You don't have to whack them. Anyway, you just point to your shoe and they get the idea real quick Though he said it's usually the mother or grandmother in the family, you know They usually live in the same house that will whack the kid with a chancla since dad's usually gone out working And like jorge says you got to strike while the fire is hot You got to punish him in the act. You can't wait and promise the kid he'll get whacked when daddy comes home So bottom line whacking your kids when necessary is alive and well here in latin america And guess what surprise surprise it seems to have produced a more respectful and courteous breed of kid Now of course most latinos they know how lenient parents are up in the states They know parents won't whack their kids because they believe it's cruel. It's a humane It's child abuse besides that some of them have heard stories that the kids have all the control

[20:38] They can dial a number social services will come over and the parents will be in big trouble Yeah, well that doesn't fly down here in latin america. Not yet. Anyway, remember there's big lag time in almost all areas Though I suppose in 15 or 20 years the way things are going a system like that just might kick in down here in latin America, but it's doubtful then again 20 years ago Who in america ever would have thought the wokesters the lgbgtwtf's blm and the cancel culture terrorists Along with big brother big media and big pharma would have the final word concerning your life By the way, how's your plan be coming? Anyway, jorge admits he had to discipline his kids in the early days by whacking them with a shoe the junkla or junkleta treatment What an evil and despicable man And now a quick email from ellie

[21:24] She says johnny with all the dire warnings of how global warming is going to melt the planet within the next few years We've got the coming financial catastrophe and possible nuclear war on the horizon triggered by the ukrainian thing on the bright side If a few nukes are dropped there'll be less population. So bill gates will be happy There'll be less need for pipelines and carbon-based fuels The resulting dust clouds will plunge the world into a little ice age which should make those obese porkers michael moore and al gore and the tree huggers in the green movement exceedingly happy And since supply chains will be totally disrupted Survivors will have to get used to growing their own and buying local instead of from the chinese What's not to like about that? People just don't realize johnny that every nuclear cloud has a radioactive silver lining signed ever the optimist ellie

[22:14] from north carolina P.s. What are the dates for your next seminar? I need to petition my boss to get that time off when you work for the man You just can't bug out on a moment's notice All right, thanks for that ellie and thanks for that positive pep talk Even terrible tragedies aren't all bad and it's been proven You know that positive thinkers live longer though in the case of nuclear war it might only be a few seconds longer still it is longer Then again, if you happen to be sitting in latin america somewhere a couple of thousand miles from the action That is thousands of miles from any strategic target There's a good chance you could sit back and watch the first world implode from a nice safe distance Though I wouldn't want to be living anywhere near a us border or the panama canal or anywhere in panama Yep for all you panama lovers out there

[23:00] You know, the panama canal is the only nuclear strategic strike zone in all of latin america. You knew that right? You know, there are many nuclear winter studies out there One recently from louisiana state and ruggers university says that If just two countries for example started dropping nukes on each other and no one else got involved. That's always a possibility Like for example pakistan in india, you know, they don't like each other or russia and ukraine They say in the first month following the detonation the average global temperature would drop by 10 to 13 degrees fahrenheit And remain that way for quite a few years not an experiment We'd like to try but with all that lunatic saber rattling out there It's never completely out of the question Though I doubt it's on people's reasons to get out of dodge top 10 list. Nevertheless. It's always a lurking possibility

[23:50] Just imagine a nutcase like hitler sitting in a bunker moments before his death If he'd have had nukes and had a button to launch him, you don't think he would have pushed it Yep in politics psychopaths always rise to the top On a lighter note the other day. I was on a big highway going through a toll booth You can't get away from them every country in latin america has tolls here and there And sometimes when you're going through places like mexico where lots of gringos are coming in and out Gringos are targets and easy to gouge at high priced toll booths You'll see at those tourist areas where there are lots of gringos. The tolls are heavy Anyway, the other day it was raining This is the rainy season I was going through a toll and right on the side of the road They had a gas station and a convenience store, you know auto mart where you could sit and have a cup of coffee I sat down and situated myself looking straight at the toll booth watching the cars come through and pay etc

[24:39] From there I could make out the prices of the tolls for cars trucks mini buses, etc At that particular place. It was about a buck for cars two bucks for mini buses and depending on how many axles pro rated for trucks Now here's the thing the sign said 35 cents for motorcyclists 35 cents in the local funny money That is and as I sat there having a brownie and a cup of coffee I saw at least 30 motorcyclists go through without paying They just whipped around the side of the toll gate avoiding it and going on the shoulder of the road Right past the ever-present big line of cars Not to mention five or six cops and some military police standing at every toll booth kind of just lounging around like a bunch of slugs Doing nothing didn't bother them that the motorcyclists were just whipping on through and not paying They didn't bat an eye

[25:25] So the motorcyclists would come up buzz right through Jump the toll and without fear when there was a cop or a military guy standing not three feet away Now in this little gas station supermarket There was a military guy sitting at the table right next to me having his coffee, too And I asked him I said what's it with those motorcyclists they're buzzing right through without paying The sign says they're supposed to pay 35 cents. Do they have a free pass or something? He said oh, yeah the sign. Well that 35 cent thing's been on there for years. They never pay It just buzz right through that's normal. I guess someone should fix that sign Then I asked a stupid question. I said Why then if it's the law doesn't anyone enforce it? He said no one's gonna fire up a cruiser and chase a guy down the road for 35 cents

[26:12] But the way he said it revealed the real reason The real reason was that if a cop pulled the guy over it was futile You see when you pull someone over anyone you either give him a ticket Or try to squeeze some more dita out of him a bribe and those motorcyclists with those rusted out 90cc rice burners Besides their piece of junk motorcycles. They haven't got a pot to pee in oftentimes They don't even have 50 cents to put fuel in the tank Much less pay a 25 dollar fine for toll jumping as we're having bribe money Well the cops know that's completely out of the question If they have a hard time keeping gas in the tank, how are they gonna have money for a bribe? So there's another little fact of life you learn if you live down here long enough It also tells a whole lot about how lax the government and bureaucracies are down here

[26:57] What's not to like about that by the way, how's your bureaucracy treating you up there in big brother land? Cracking down pretty hard out here Oh one last thing ellie was asking about the dates for my next sex pad insider seminar. Wait, did I say sex pad? Little Freudian slip there. Anyway, we're shooting for october Planning on a week of the fire hose treatment in the dr The dominican republic this time by popular demand to change things up a bit We haven't picked the exact dates or itinerary yet. So stay tuned However to get on the early bird discount waiting list send me an email the expat files at gmail.com 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

[27:44] 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