#124 – The Expat Files: Romantic Realities in Latin America

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 we're going to talk about something once again that's completely politically incorrect. But the subject comes up all the time in emails, so I just have to talk about it, because it's by popular demand. But I'm asking you ladies out there not to send me nasty emails after you hear this,

[00:48] because I'm only the messenger. And anyway ladies, you should pay attention to this, because it is great information for you to store away in the back of your mind, since it is an integral part of Latin American culture. And that's what we're all trying to become experts at, right? Anyway I get so many of these similar types of emails, mostly from shy guys and from men who've had a lot of trouble with women up in the first world, guys who've been in and out of bad romantic relationships all their lives, guys in the first world that is. Now you know as well as I do, on the internet there are tons of mating and dating websites, in fact that's one of the top 5 most popular reasons people use the internet. The other popular reasons being porn, gambling, social networking and shopping. Latest statistics say that dating and mating comes in right in under porn, in the largest number of hits on the internet.

[01:34] And one huge section in the internet mating and dating game involves hooking up with foreign ladies, Russians, Orientals and of course Latinas. But the fact is almost every case I've ever heard of, where some lonely heart in the first world hooks up with some third world lady through an internet mating and dating service, most of the time those kind of pre-planned hookups don't turn out so well and in fact can be a disaster. So what I recommend for all you Mr. Lonely Hearts up there in the first world is forget about all those mail order and internet dating games and just come down here to Latin America in person, no matter how good or bad your Spanish is. Because like I've said so many times before, as soon as you step foot down here in Latin America, off the tourist trail now, remember that, off the tourist trail, that gringle advantage kicks right in and you get an automatic two to three points added to your scale.

[02:23] So if you judge yourself as a five out of ten up in the first world, well then you're a seven or an eight automatically. But remember this, if you judge yourself as a five, you're probably really only a four because we first world people all tend to be optimists now, about ourselves anyway. But so what? So what if you're a four? If you get two or three points added, you're a six or a seven down here in Latin America, which is a huge improvement, right? But before I get deeper into this, let me read one of the emails that is really pretty typical of the kind I get all the time. And the ones like this about love and romance are always from men. Listen to this. Dear Johnny, thanks for all that great information so far. I have a quick, semi-inappropriate question for you that I'm sure you've gotten before. My buddy is 33 years old and just got divorced. He's six foot four blonde and about 70 pounds overweight.

[03:09] He's probably a five and a 10 scale, so he needs those extra two to three gringo points you always talk about, that gringo advantage. So after listening to you and what you talk about on the shows, we've decided to take a partial plunge and go on vacation down in Latin America, but we just don't know where to start. So my question is this. Where can we vacation in Latin America that will be super fun so that my buddy will have an amazing or somewhat guaranteed, and that's the inappropriate part, romantic chance to hook up with some beautiful Latin American lady. We'd really love to stay off the tourist path, of course, like you always recommend. But we don't have a clue of where to start. Do you have any ideas so we could start making our plans? Signed, anonymous. So there it is and I get a lot of emails like that.

[03:55] And I won't read his name, since these things can be a bit delicate, but just know that I get a lot of emails like this, so I thought today would be a good time to answer some of these questions and go into some details. Now here comes a politically incorrect comment that I'm sure a lot of you aren't going to like. But like everything I say, it's based on fact, experience, and tons of personal interviews that I've had with expats who have come down here and hooked up with Latin ladies and dozens and dozens of expats who've actually hooked up, gotten married, had families, and lived happily ever after. However, that almost never happens if you bring your Latina girlfriend or wife back to the United States. And that's something everyone's missing who hooks up with those dating services by internet up in the first world. They think they're going to hook up with a beautiful disadvantaged foreign lady, whether

[04:41] she's Latina or Russian or whatever, and naturally the main idea is to correspond back and forth for a while with Skype and emails and photos and webcams, and after a few months of that you take a trip to her home country, meet her family and friends, get married maybe, and bring her back to the States. Or, after all that meeting and greeting on the internet, you ship her directly to your hometown, you get married, and live happily ever after in Cincinnati. Well, let me tell you, in the long run that almost never works. In fact, the only real successful Latino gringo hookups I've ever seen, marriage, family, and all, is when the first world expat gets married down here, has his family with his new Latino wife, and ends up living down here. And of course, you and her don't live third world style, you live first world style with all the first world creature comforts. And let me tell you from what I've seen, there are more successful gringo expat Latina hookups

[05:31] down here, and eventual marriages, that turn out to be long lasting and happy than anything I've ever seen up in the first world, between North American men and women, who get married in the usual way, and try to live happily ever after in Cleveland or Dubuque. And it rarely turns out that way, just look at the divorce rate up there, it's over 50%. Well guess what, down here in Latin America, it's under 20%. So burn this into your brain, all you expat men up there, all you expat wannabes, who think you could come down here to Latin America, hook up with the latin beauty, fall in love, get married, and bring her back to Cleveland, well guess what, you can do all that. You've got those two or three extra points, with the gringo advantage. So you're gonna find beautiful latin girls, lots of beautiful latin girls, and they're gonna be attracted to you in a way it never happened to you up in the first world, that's

[06:18] for sure. And these are not those loose girls you see hanging around in cantinas in Hollywood movies, but nice, normal, stable, loving, beautiful girls, who aren't stressed out, neurotic, high maintenance, career obsessed women on a treadmill. Well was that a mouthful? Now I'm not saying that to put down first world women, or to say that all first world women are like that, but I've met quite a few, I even have sisters like that. But down here in Latin America, you almost never meet stressed out, high strong obsessed women like that, except for the high maintenance girls in the upper classes, when the parents have a lot of money, and the daughters are treated like princesses, like many middle class and upper middle class girls in the first world are. And that's why I discourage expats from hooking up with girls in the upper classes here in Latin America, because if you're bouncing off some romantic disasters up in the first

[07:06] world, chances are you're gonna jump into the same mess if you set your sights on wealthy latin girls. The fact is, I know way too many expats who have done that, and after a while they all suffer the consequences of hooking up with a girl in a family like that. But of course you're not gonna find wealthy girls like that in those internet dating and mating and hookup websites. Those are the kind of girls you meet at those embassy parties only when you're down here in Latin America. And you'll meet them down here at events and get togethers that your lawyer or accountant or wealthy latin business friends will invite you to. Those kind of get togethers and parties are just filled with beautiful latin ladies who speak perfect English because they went to the best schools, they wear designer clothes because they take trips to Miami a couple times a year to buy the latest fashions, they drive late model cars that their daddies gave them, they wear real designer clothes and

[07:52] jewelry, and they always can be seen or are looking to be seen at the latest greatest most expensive discos and restaurants in town, and they hang around with exactly the same kind of friends. Oh and I forgot, this class of girl comes with her own bodyguard and designer colored blackberry, usually fuchsia pink or multicolored, high maintenance paid for by daddy until she gets a boyfriend or a husband. Though unlike in the past, these girls are all college educated these days, and some of them even have jobs in their daddy's or daddy's friends' companies, or daddy himself has bought them a fashionable little storefront business in a high end section of town just to keep her busy. A lot of wealthy daughters like this have little fashion boutiques, which works very well for those little buying trips back and forth to Miami. So basically I'm trying to steer you clear of ladies like that, even though in a lot

[08:39] of expat and expat wannabe's minds, all is fair in love and war. And if you got that gringo advantage going for you, why not go for a rich girl? I mean that same thought has run through every guy's mind up in the first world too. Hey, why not marry a rich girl? But usually up in the first world, that's a fantasy unless you're a rich kid yourself, or you're a guy who was born a 9 or a 10 and can have any girl you want because you look like Brad Pitt. But down here in Latin America, some expats, knowing that they have that gringo advantage, they can hook up with a wealthy girl like that quite easily. And it's true. In fact, my buddy expat Eddie had that very same idea when he first came down. Coming from a middle class or lower middle class family in the states, he'd never had a chance to mingle with the wealthier girls up in the states. Not girls like that. Eddie was a bit too white trashed across that social boundary.

[09:27] But down here, like I said before, first worlders and gringos cross all social barriers. We get invited to parties and get togethers all the time. Everybody wants a pet gringo around. I'm talking off the tourist trail, of course. And even in my case, in any given month, I'd get invited to a party by the gardener one day, a business owner the next, dinner at an Air Force general's house the next day, and the next week, I get invited to a quinceaños party, which is the 15 year birthday party of the daughter of the Salvadorian ambassador. And you just don't refuse an invitation like that. And besides, last time I went to one of his parties, he served Johnny Walker Blue, which goes for about three or four hundred bucks a bottle. Yeah, three or four hundred bucks a bottle when the minimum wage down there is about a hundred and eighty bucks a month. Nice work if you can get it, the ambassador's job that is.

[10:14] Yep, you get invited to those things too, and sometimes you just can't refuse. And that's a trap a lot of expats fall into when they first come down here. They get sucked into that high society mode because you're kind of in demand if you're not in the tourist area. There's a big shortage of gringos living down here permanently in almost all the big cities off the tourist track. And the proof is, like I said before, you could walk all day long in a big city like Managua Nicaragua, Tegucigalpa, or San Pedro of Sula, Honduras, or Guatemala City, Guatemala. Cities like that with well over a half a million people, and you could walk for hours even days and not see a single first world person or a gringo. Unless of course you're hanging around the embassy district and frequenting those expat bars, which I never recommend, unless you're really homesick for some first world gossip. But you can get that on cable TV on the internet.

[11:00] So forget about those expat bars. You'll never get in touch with the real Latin America that way, only a jaded, more expensive bad copy of it. But you wouldn't believe how many expats do fall into that trap, because it's easy. And I have to admit, you feel a little privileged at first, rubbing shoulders with generals and diplomats and local power brokers that wouldn't give you the time of day up in the first world. The fact is, some expats get used to that kind of exalted plastic life and never break away from it. So they end up making friends in that segment, and hooking up with those high maintenance first world wannabe daughters from wealthy latin families, and after a while you find yourself going to a lot of places and parties with a lot of good looking superficial people that you really don't want to be with. I don't know about you, but I have my limits. I can only take so much jewelry rattling. And I don't want to hear about that new SUV or what you bought on that latest trip to

[11:46] Miami. But fortunately, it's easy to escape that kind of crowd if you want to, though there are always some superficial expats that really dig it. But thankfully that rich latin crowd only comprises about 1 or 2% of the population at most. So my suggestion to all you lonely hearts guys up there, when you come down, you should stick to the girls in the middle and the upper middle classes. The latin definition of the middle and upper middle classes, that is. If you use the first world definition of upper middle class, that equals the latin definition of wealthy, which I advise you to avoid if you can. You'll just have better all around luck in the romance department if you listen to that advice. And let me emphasize, if you do decide to come down to Latin America to find love in romance, it's the kiss of death to bring that woman back up to the United States to live. And first world women, that goes for you too.

[12:32] If you find a latino lover down in Latin America and you marry him, don't bring him back up to the United States to live with you. That's really one of the biggest mistakes an expat in love can make. So if you're not planning on living down here and making a life in Latin America, you should forget about the love and romance angle because the odds are against you. It's not that you won't find love, and a woman who is absolutely devoted to you, that's not the issue at all. The fact is, if you bring your lovely latin girl up to the United States, well here's what expat Eddie says about it. He says that taking your beautiful latin wife up north to live is like parking a Ferrari in Harlem with the keys in the ignition. And he's right, if you take your lovely latin back up to Cleveland, and believe me she's gonna be lovely, and much hotter and sexier than any of the girls you had a half a chance with up in the first world, because remember up there you didn't have the gringo advantage

[13:20] working for you, down here you do. So even if you were a four or a five up in the first world, and hot looking girls never gave you a look, down here in Latin America with the gringo advantage in full swing, you'll find that you're in big demand with the girls, kind of a minor celebrity. And I'm not saying they'll throw themselves at you, they'll never do that. They're a bit more shy and reserved than the average first world girl, and besides if you're off the tourist track, she probably won't know much English. And even if she did, she'd be too timid to use it, because like I said before, when you're off the tourist trail, only one in twenty latin people has ever even spoken to a gringo face to face and in person. So in these places you're a rarity, and that's a big part of the gringo advantage. Look at it this way, if I went up to Cleveland, and I interviewed someone on the street, and said, have you ever spoken face to face, one on one, with a person from England?

[14:06] Well you'd have about the same odds, I'd bet only one in twenty people ever has, maybe even less. And I can guarantee you this, anyone from England that goes to Cleveland, well in no time at all he'll be a minor celebrity, and in fact, if he walks into a bar or disco, by the end of the night I'm sure he'd be invited to a half dozen parties by any number of complete strangers. And that's how the gringo effect works down here in Latin America. But let me give you some more reasons why it's never a good idea to bring your latin wife or girlfriend up to the United States to live. Well first of all it's going to be the Cinderella effect in reverse. At midnight, you're the one that's going to turn into a pumpkin, and kind of a moldy pumpkin too. Not her, because now she's in the land of the gringos, and that gringo effect is gone for you. And as cruel as this might sound, if you consider yourself a 4 or a 5 up in the first world,

[14:54] and suddenly with the gringo effect you're a 6 or a 7 down in the third world, when you go back to the States with your new bet or half, guess what? You're a spectacularly dull 4 or 5 again, albeit a 4 or a 5 with a beautiful latin girl on his arm. And though you still have that almighty dollar working for you, and chances are you're making 10 or 20 times the average salary down where she comes from. But that big monetary differential doesn't cut much slack when you're back up in the States, because everybody around you makes that much too. So that part of the gringo advantage dissolves away fast. And here's what happens next, you have a job and you have to go to work 9 to 5 every day like everybody else does, jumping back on that treadmill to pay the rent. However your beautiful little latin girl is going to be at home all day. She's never really been out of Lima, Peru before, so now she's stuck up in Cleveland

[15:41] and she's got a degree of culture shot going. And even if she wanted to get a job, she couldn't get one until she learned English well enough and that could take a year or two. So I guarantee you, for the first 6 months at least, after she gets over the initial wide eyed excitement that she's up in the first world, where everything works, it's nice, it's bright and it's squeaky clean. And her house has things in it she might not have even seen before, like a dishwasher and a trash compactor and a garbage disposal. The fact is only 10% of latin families have a clothes dryer. But after that initial thrill wears off, you're going to have a sad, depressed little Latina lady sitting around the house, racking up the hours on skype, talking to all the friends and family that she's homesick for, down in Peru. And she'll mope around and cry a lot, and you'll feel sorry for her and you'll have

[16:27] a great idea. You'll send her off to a community college or a vocational school to learn her English, which should kill two birds with one stone. For one, she'll learn her English. And secondly, she'll get out of the house and she'll meet some people. Because she has no friends up in Cleveland and she knows no one but you. And you're gone 8-10 hours a day at work, which means you're only really available on the weekends. So she's really like a bird in a gilded cage and now it's time to let her out. So far so good, right? Wrong. Well here's what happens next. Your sexy little Latina is going to gain some confidence. She's going to go out of the house little by little, to school, to the grocery store, to the gas station, whatever. And she's not a 5 on the 10 scale, she's like a 7 or an 8 or even a 9. And besides that, she's got that little extra Latina sexiness going for her, that exotic

[17:15] little touch that all the girls south of the border seem to have. So suddenly, everywhere she goes, guys are hitting on her, in the grocery store, in the dry cleaners, at the ATM machine. And these are handsome, fit, young American guys, closer to her age, not your age buddy. Expats that come down here to Latin America and hook up with Latinas are usually coming off of one or two bad marriages up north, which means the guys in his 40s or even 50s, and generally his new Latina love interest is in her 20s. And like I said in a past show, down here in Latin America, no one looks on that autumn spring romance thing with any kind of discrimination at all. No one pays attention to it. It's just not an issue. It's very common down here within Latin families. In fact, with two of the Latin girlfriends I had, both of their fathers were more than

[18:02] 20 years older than their mothers. It's just so common and natural down here that no one thinks a thing of it. But up in the first world, it's a whole different story. Can you think of anyone besides Michael Douglas and Hugh Hefner? Guys that are more than 20 years older than their girlfriends or wives? I don't think so. And if you do know a couple like that, I guarantee you that when they leave the room, there's a lot of tongues wagging. Outside of Hollywood, those kind of age spreads are just not well accepted up in the first world. And you too, you're going to have to put up with a lot of cultural friction. And from people within your own family, including mothers, sisters, grandmothers, and aunts. Notice that I excluded brothers, dads, grandfathers, and uncles. Because the fact is, stateside male relatives, especially your male friends, will almost always accept your beautiful young Latin wife.

[18:49] But they'll never admit that within earshot of a first world female, especially not their own first world wives or girlfriends, out of fear of ending up in the doghouse themselves. Like expat Eddie, an expert on this subject, always says, the younger, the sexier, and the better looking your Latin wife is, the more crap you're going to have to take from the first world women around you. And you'll get crap from first world women you don't even know, since most women have a way of throwing daggers with just their eyes. And here's another thing that Eddie says. Expect the wives of even your best friends to sabotage you. They won't permit their own husbands to hang around with you anymore. They'll at least make a big effort to cut off your guide time together. They're afraid you'll contaminate their husbands with your deviant ideas about love and romance and robbing the cradle.

[19:35] Just watch how fast those party invitations tape her off after you bring that young sexy Latin wife of yours back to Cleveland. And it's par for the course that in no time at all, you and your new wife will have no married friends to hang around with. And in no time, your new young Latin bride is going to feel a lot of pent up hostility too. She's not immune to what's happening around her. She knows that your friends' wives have cut you and her off from the group. All because of her, of course. So here she is, a stranger in a strange land. What do you expect to happen after that? Well one of three things usually happens and none of them are good. Well the first is that she gets so depressed and miserable and throws in the towel on the effort to fit in that you end up breaking it off and sending her back to Peru. And a second thing that can happen is even worse. Latin wives that are so isolated like that sometimes end up connecting with friends and

[20:21] family and or compatriots from the home country that are living nearby but not in a nice neighborhood like yours. There are always some Latin immigrants nearby who she can bond with to try to alleviate some of that homesickness. But the problem is most of those compatriots and family and friends up in the first world are not married to first world gringos with the middle class American lifestyle. There is a good bet that they are low class illegal aliens themselves or children of illegal aliens. And who wants to come home from work? To face a crowd like that sitting in your living room drinking your beer and watching Spanish language soap operas on your plasma TV. And the third thing that is also very bad that often happens to a girl that you bring back to the states is that in the process of all these handsome young men hitting on her everywhere she goes anytime she steps foot out of the house.

[21:08] Well eventually a thing like that can become like the Chinese water torture. One drop at a time it finally breaks you down. If she's bored out of her head all day long and you're only home a couple hours a night and on weekends and there's a young good looking guy at the health club hitting on her offering to give her a ride home every day in his boxer. Well just think of it if the tables were reversed and you were bored out of your head and there was some beautiful young girl at the health club hitting on you every day. How long could you hold out? Just remember if you're a 40 or 50 something guy and you've got a few love handles and you're losing your hair there's always going to be a younger, richer, handsome or stud waiting to hit on your hot latin wife in the Walmart checkout line. I'm sure I've drummed in the point enough but if you decide to skip my good advice and bring your beautiful latina back to the states here's a few suggestions to help you get over

[21:57] some of those crater sized bumps in the road okay? Discourage clubbing and dancing at all costs. Now that suggestion might be the hardest of all because latin girls have a whole extra chromosome for dancing. A gene that skipped the gringo population completely. Next don't let her get a job or go to school where she comes in contact with young eligible males. Next don't let her go to shopping malls unless accompanied by you or one of the female members of your family and that's a tough one to keep too because female members of your family won't want to go shopping with her either because she'll always look better in clothes than they do. Next live way out in the country or pick old people for neighbors and don't let her get a driver's license and if she insists on learning her English at night school or by taking vocational courses try to convince her that learning English is overrated.

[22:44] So I'm sure now that I've mentioned all of the dangers of bringing a lovely latina up to the first world with you and I understand that this kind of news can be pretty discouraging to people up there in the first world that had their own ideas of using that gringo advantage to rescue some beautiful latina, merrier and bring her back up to the first world and live happily ever after. That almost never happens. And there's no doubt that you too can live happily ever after up in Cleveland for about three months but down here happily ever after can really be happily ever after and it happens all the time. I know a lot of expats who will swear on their life that it's happened to them. And here's another thing I have to say about you guys who are sending me emails asking me where in Latin America are the best places to pick up latin girls. Well it's like this if you're off the tourist track it's not a simple matter of let's say

[23:30] just going down to Tagusi Galpa heading into the nearest shopping mall sitting down at the nearest sidewalk cafe or walking into a little store and asking a girl out of the date and because you've got that gringo advantage going for you she's going to say okay how about tonight? Well things just don't happen that way. Like I said before latin girls off the tourist trail are quite timid when they first run into gringos. There's a great chance that they never met one or spoken to one before which means you'll have to do all the talking and if you know it's no English or it really sucks you guys are going to have a little communication problem right off the bat and if you think because of that gringo advantage of yours you're going to come down here meet a girl in a pastry shop and that's going to be the beginning of a torrid affair that's going to last the whole two weeks you're down here on vacation well that's not going to happen. Latin girls on and off the tourist trail want the same things that almost every woman wants

[24:18] they want stability a home family and kids and there are certain rumors going around throughout latin america unfounded or not that latin girls have about gringos. If you do happen to meet a nice latin girl in a shopping mall or at a party or in a bank and she picks up on the fact that you have some interest in her the first thing she's going to do is look at your hand to see if you have a ring she wants to figure out if you're married or not and when you meet a girl for the first time down here within the first five minutes she'll inevitably ask you if you're married or have a girlfriend and of course if you say yes the connection is over because latin girls as much as they all want to hook up with gringos and have little baby brad pits running around the house with blue eyes and blonde hair and by the way even if you're short you have dark hair and brown eyes every latin woman thinks you've got a smidgen of brad pit jeans stuck deep down in you somewhere so there's always that chance to have that blue eyed baby anyway latin girls

[25:07] are always suspicious that a gringo has a wife or a girlfriend in a family back home and that's why even though you've got that gringo advantage going for you which turns on girls that would have never given you the time of day before the fact is the biggest hurdle that you have to get over is convincing a latin girl at your first meet that you're not married and you don't have a girlfriend somewhere because a good girl is not about to waste her time on a vacation fling with a gringo and if you can't get a latin girl to have a fling with you she's not the kind of girl you want for a long term relationship and if you're simply coming down here to have a fling with a latin girl then by all means go to the big discos outside of the tourist areas of course because you'll still have that gringo advantage going for you so you'll have two or three points added to your score in a place where everybody's drinking and doing designer drugs and are just out to have

[25:53] a good old time just like some of the crazier bars and discos up in the first world where you won't have that gringo advantage working for you by the way so my point is if you're looking for a long term relationship with a nice young latina beauty you're gonna have to take things nice and easy at first until she's fully convinced you haven't got a wife and two kids stashed somewhere up in the states or a girlfriend somewhere and by just telling her so well that's not quite enough because you see latinas are so used to being lied to by their own latin boyfriends that they have a general mistrust of what men say when it comes to sweet talk and romance the fact is by the time a latin american girl is twenty years old she's been cheated on by one or more boyfriends and has certainly caught more than one of them in a lot of very heavy duty lies and most of them are well aware of the fact that their own father has cheated on their mother and that's a fact of life in

[26:40] macho spanish societies so armed with that background most latinas aren't inclined to believe everything that a guy says especially when it comes to the wife and girlfriend question and the thing is no matter how much solid proof you give her even if your driver's license or passport says right on it that you're single well that doesn't mean you don't have a girlfriend now does it now wouldn't you know it that expat eddie has figured a way around us to prove that he's single and doesn't have a girlfriend he calls up his mother or sister gets one of them on the phone and says please tell my girlfriend that i'm not married and i don't have a girlfriend and then he hands the phone to his new girlfriend and everything's on the up and up that is if his new girlfriend understands english because eddie's mother and sister don't speak spanish and i know eddie's used that family phone trick more than once because he's told me and he's also told me that his mother and

[27:26] sister will lie for him after all eddie's the only boy in the family and i thought latin guys knew how to lie south of the border down mexico way you've been listening to the expat files living in latin america coming to you each week from somewhere south of the border and don't forget you can email me on anything at all about latin america the expat files at gmail.com once again the expat files at gmail.com see you next time