#1291 – Expat Life in Latin America: Water, Pools, and the Hidden Dangers of Bottled Water

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 expat wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Let's start with a few emails This one's from Frankie says hey Johnny I heard in your most recent expat file show where you mentioned there's an article saying that a black Sears brand hose Could be used as a cheap water heater when put up on your roof

[00:48] Is there a comparable sturdy hose brand in Guatemala that could do the same job? Well, I'm living right now They don't want me to install solar panels, though I'm tempted to do it anyway, but if I could just use a black hose as a cheap Alternative to a solar hot water heater. Maybe I could get away with that in the meantime with sincere. Thanks Frankie Well, Frankie. Thanks for that You know, I first heard of that do-it-yourself use your hose on the top of your roof solar hot water thing Way back when when I was thinking of having a pool in Guatemala But you know, I found out after living in the Altiplano, you don't want to have a pool It's too cool If you do have one you'll have to heat it even very wealthy people in the Altiplano for that reason rarely have pools Instead they've got a second house

[01:33] They have a house by the beach a couple hours away from their main house in the Altiplano and those beach houses almost always Have a pool by the way The problem with using a hose as a hot water heater for your pool or for your hot water in the home Is that they're at full pressure all the time. So unless you have a really good expensive hose You're gonna pop a leak eventually and what if it's at night or you're not at home when that happens now I found it I lived in the Altiplano a long long time many years that I never Felt it was necessary to have a pool was never hot enough So you just had to have a pool so you could cool up However, if you live anywhere near a beach or the low altitudes you want to jump in a pool about six times a day so that's why I never recommend you have a pool if you're living in the Altiplano unless of course you're an avid swimmer and

[02:22] Swimming happens to be your hobby your thing To me having a pool in the Altiplano is kind of a waste of money though If well maintained they look awful nice don't they problem is if you have a pool at high altitudes you got to heat it and That's why I looked into that rubber hose solar heating alternative to heat pool water Which by the way, you never have to do if your pool is at low altitudes or on the coast Again, I repeat if you have a pool in the Altiplano It'll be cold and you'll want to heat it up and that'll cost you dough That is if you're gonna heat it up with a traditional gas or electric water heater for pools Yeah, I know. I know you can buy prefab solar hot water heaters for your pool They're very efficient, but that'll set you back at least a grand or two, which may or may not be worth it But like I said unless you're nuts about swimming or maybe you just want to show off

[03:11] You know a lot of people have a pool as they do jacuzzis and hot tubs just to show you know The neighbors in the world that they can afford to have such a luxury by the way I've had a few hot tubs and jacuzzis in my day and I found out in the end They were never worth it never in fact expat Eddie says having a jacuzzi or hot tub is like having sex in a new Relationship you'll have more sex with that person in the first six months than you will in the next six years Just as you'll spend more time in your new jacuzzi in the first six months than you will in the next six years By the way, just a little word of warning You should never use a public jacuzzi like at one of those resorts or in a health club or on a cruise ship Because they keep recirculating the same Bacterial laden water for days even weeks. Oh, and if you do have a jacuzzi or hot tub at home

[03:59] I highly recommend you empty it after every use and refill it when you're gonna use it again Or you'll be doing much the same thing. Give it a nice warm pewter at home to billions of bacteria The fact is I'm not even really big on going in public pools Even if they look super clean like at a nice upscale resort. Nope I don't spend much time in public pools Not since I had that discussion a while back with a little girl sent across from me in a big beautiful Apparently squeaky sparkling clean pool at a very nice upscale all-inclusive resort when I asked that little girl as a joke Did you pee in the pool? She said four times. I forgot how honest kids can be I know I know some of you are thinking picky picky Johnny. What's a little pee in the pool? It won't hurt you picky picky

[04:46] Well guilty is charged But at least I don't carry my own bottle of disinfectant wipe down the tables and chairs at restaurants and bring my own forks And I well nothing wrong with that either if you don't mind people staring at you and whispering behind your back Aside from that though, there's something else I do that often garners strange looks you longtime listeners Probably heard me say I make my own water with my own water purification system at home And I carry a glass bottle of water in my car when I go into restaurants I'll take that bottle in with me and put it down on my table And I'm sure most everyone in the place who sees that is thinking what a cheap ass Bringing his own water so he doesn't have to pay two bucks for overpriced restaurant water Well, you know what so far. Anyway, no one's ever called me out on it. Never had a waiter or waitress save

[05:32] Sorry gringo, you can't bring your own agapura. The fact is even the name is an oxymoron. There's nothing pure about it Hmm. Yeah, right agua pura. That's what they call bottled water pure according to whose standards purer than what dish water toilet water gutter water meanwhile anything in a plastic bottle is loaded with micro plastics and Nanoparticles that end up staying in our bodies You know that it's all over the news these days. The thing is though You could bring your glass bottle of water into the restaurant But remember half of everything prepared in a restaurant or even in your own kitchen is prepared with water, right? What is that water come from a plastic bottle normally? Especially since these days so many people have switched over to bottled water and have delivery companies drop off five gallon jugs weekly At least that's the norm down here in Latin America. I don't know what it's like up by you in Boston or Cleveland

[06:21] By the way, speaking of pollutants and micro plastics and water I've been getting questions about water from gringles and expats who are renting Who tell me they're not allowed to modify the plumbing under the sink to put in their own water purification system They're not allowed to modify the pipes drill holes and put in their own spout Renters mostly can't or just won't do that and some even if they could are afraid to try Most don't have the tools or the do-it-yourself know-how Since working with plumbing and PVC pipes take some practice You have to know how to cut clean and join those tubes And if you're not used to doing it, it could be a real mess that glue man. It gets on everything You only have so much time to work with that glue It starts setting right away If you don't know what you're doing you don't have experience you could easily screw it up and even me and I've got lots of

[07:10] experience with that stuff I still get a tiny rush of anxiety when I first open the valves and Pressure the system up because that's when you see if you got any leaks and if you have one It's back to the drawing board the more angles connections and fittings the more chance for a leak by the way My best tip here is when you're working with PVC Installing water filters as such definitely put in more quick connect unions than you think you need You might know what I'm talking about their plastic twist off couplers They twist on and off by hand and have a little rubber o-ring type gasket inside that way If you do get a leak when you first pressure it up You don't have to get under the counter take out the hacks on start cutting You could just pull out the section that has the leak and work on it by unfastening those couplers Then lay the leaky section on the kitchen table instead of laying on your back in a puddle of water

[08:01] Trying to fix it with your head stuck in that dark cabinet Come on. All you do it yourselfers out there admit it. It's happened to you, right? Anyway for you guys and gals He she's and it's out there Hmm did I miss any Pronouns if you can't or are unable or not given permission to install a hard piped water filter system My best advice is to get one of those echo filters That is if you're living in Guatemala Salvador or Honduras you long-term listeners have heard me talk about those filters before in fact We visit their factory in Guatemala during practically every one of my expat insider seminars Anyway, you can buy one of those units at any of the big hardware stores in Guatemala and in a number of other Latin American countries Though not all they're under a hundred bucks and have no plastic parts

[08:48] They filter bacteria viruses metals pesticides herbicides and microplastics In fact, I know some gringos and expats who buy bottled water because it got really terrible city municipal water It comes out of tap kinda brownish color, you know Anyway, they buy bottled water and put that through their echo filter Simply because if they put their dirty cloudy tap water through an echo filter, it'll quickly get clogged I don't have to clean it out over and over and though it's fairly easy to clean off that scum Some gringos and expats, I know just don't want to put that kind of nasty water in that filter They're just kind of turned off by that. So they buy those big five gallon so-called Agua puta got a phones those plastic water bottles They pour that water through their echo filter knowing it'll clean up the micro plastics

[09:35] Remember throughout Latin America those big plastic water bottles are stored in alleys and on top of trucks in the Sun Which of course degrades the plastic and sometimes you could even taste the plastic that water even smells like plastic when you pour it into a glass Which is why some gringos and expats who have that dirty municipal water as mentioned Come on admit it How many times have you taken a drink from a water bottle and it tasted like plastic thing is by the time you could taste and Smell plastic in your water. That means there are countless thousands of plastic particles in that bottle that you're drinking Now I also get questions from gringos and expats guys and gals he's and cheese and it's people who live in Latin America But don't have access to an echo filter They're not available in every Latin country and in most countries in South America

[10:22] Especially in South America. Most people have never heard of them So then how can you solve that micro plastic contamination problem if you don't have an echo filter? What if you're a renter and can't install a hard plumbed unit under your sink? By the way, Amazon does not sell echo filters Not because they aren't a great product and they are it's because they're very fragile. They're like a big ceramic pot Easy to crack and damage In fact, I know gringos and expats who love them so much that they bring a unit or two back to the states when they go Back to visit guess what? They generally don't bring it as a stowed piece of luggage because it can get damaged when it's packed the normal rough-and-tumble way By the luggage crew instead, they hand carry those things into the cabin I've seen people flying from Guatemala to whatever country carrying a boxed echo filter on their laps

[11:10] Just so it doesn't get damaged. So again, they're not available on Amazon though By the way, the echo filter engineers are working on another model a flat disc that fits into a tank So they can just ship the discs around the world. That way they won't break that model is still a few years away Remember there are gravity operated filter. No plumbing involved If you look around for gravity fed filters on Amazon, you'll find those famous Berkey filters famously expensive Berkey filters over 400 bucks But here's the problem and I've looked into those things. They're in court right now They're being sued for falsifying lab tests. So what's that mean? Well, here's the thing Berkey's always had a really good filter system pretty much like the echo filter system only they use not a type of ceramic pot filter, but a ceramic candle or

[11:59] Candles because a Berkey system you can put one two three or four candles They're called or candelas in Spanish in the base of the system. They look like big fat white candles They're made out of ceramic carbon charcoal and they're impregnated with colloidal silver just like the echo filter But here's the thing a couple of years back Berkey came out with a different kind of candle It's not white like the previous models They're black. I mean solid black They promised with those black filters the unit would last at maximum efficiency for three years and they did according to their tests But they didn't use the standard NSF filtration standards Which they say are much more rigid than the independent private testing laboratory they used

[12:44] So the lawsuit says they misrepresent the results of their filters now as for me I rather like the Berkey system though with the white candles the white ceramic candles and in verified tests for those they remove practically all contaminants to 99% and microplastics and forever chemicals, too Though you have to replace those candles regularly so it gets kind of expensive as it turns out You're supposed to replace those candles every six months So if you got one candle in your system six months two candles one year three candles year and a half four candles Which is maximum in the unit two years So each of those candles gives you about six months of pure water for a family of four So then what's the life on those echo filters made in Guatemala the tests show those last at least three years

[13:33] By the way, those Berkey filter candles are expensive gonna cost you at least a hundred bucks a year Plus get this a big Berkey unit costs around four hundred and something bucks all stainless steel Of course, no plastic parts, which is good. But here's a tip a really good tip There's another company in England called Dalton D o u l to n they actually make the filters the white filters for Berkey and other companies and You can buy from them on Amazon an exact copy of a Berkey system Same stainless steel same look same filters everything For half of what a Berkey system costs 200 bucks So that's what I recommend for you. If you cannot get your hands on one of those echo filters

[14:21] the actual name of the company is British Birkenfield Dalton and They've got a couple of different sizes of units if you want to know the exact one to get the one I recommend Send me an email the expat files at gmail.com and I'll send you the Amazon leak. I make nothing off this by the way zero I just think it's a very good thing to know if you can't get your hands on one of those echo filters By the way, if you have one of those newer Berkey systems with those black carbon filters They're still good. Just don't believe the three-year business Change them at about one year change them to the other filters the white ceramic filter because guess what? They're finding there's another little problem with those solid black Berkey filter system Lots of people are reporting a kind of algae build-up around those filters themselves Yuck, by the way, that's something that almost never happens if you have those white candle filters

[15:11] Unless you don't use the unit for weeks or months Like for example if the tank has water in it and you go on vacation For a couple of weeks or a month when you come back you better check it for algae If so, just clean out the reservoir and wipe down the filter Now if you happen to use one of those Dalton systems and have the white filter candles that almost never happens because they're impregnated with Colloidal silver just like the echo filter unit made in Guatemala It's impregnated with colloidal silver too and silver as you know, even the old Romans knew Inhibited algae growth the Romans found if you threw a silver coin in a water bucket You could let it sit for days weeks months even and no algae will grow By the way, that was one of the first methods of water purification in the old old days

[15:57] Before anyone even knew about bacteria or bugs you couldn't see with the naked eye Just another one of those very lucky incidences a kind of serendipity that the old Romans figured that out Problem is as it turns out when people did that in the old old days it worked All right, but oftentimes kids are no goodniks would dive in and steal that coin But replace it with a cheap copper coin, which did not have the same bactericidal effects By the way, speaking of micro plastics and forever chemicals, which unfortunately appear in all water bottles that are plastic Now talk about serendipity in an article that just came out today in the British news service the Guardian Let me highlight this here It says the US chemical industry spent over a hundred and ten million dollars during the last two election cycles

[16:44] Deploying lobbyists to kill dozens of pieces of forever chemical. That's PFAS Legislation their objective to hinder if not stop the regulation around forever chemicals That information was obtained from federal lobbying documents by the Freedom of Information Act It goes on to say forever chemicals or PFAS is our class of about 14,000 compounds Found in our food and water used to make products to resist water stains and heat these forever chemicals do not Naturally break down and are linked to cancer high cholesterol liver disease kidney disease hormone changes fetal and embryo complications, etc, etc It says cursory look at lobbying records for eight major producers of forever chemicals such as 3m Honeywell

[17:33] Chemors Dupont and Monsanto show that during the last two election cycles over 130 PFAS forever chemical bills were introduced into Congress and only eight passed the rest were killed in committee Turns out chemical company lobbyists helped kill more than nine out of ten of those bills It says just eight of the largest PFAS that is forever chemical manufacturers paid a combined 28 old-time lobbyists to put pressure on Congressman to defeat those bills It says the petrochemical industries lobbyists put up the fiercest resistance to the PFAS Action Act versions of that bill which were introduced in each election cycle The bill would have designated forever chemicals PF OAS and PFOs

[18:23] The two compounds that are most dangerous and are widely polluting all the nation's water supplies Turns out if passed the bills would have deemed those two chemicals as hazardous substances under the US Superfund law This designation reserved for the nation's most dangerous chemicals would have made the manufacturers Financially responsible for the cleanup physical damage to people and the environment But after lobbyists spread a hundred and ten million dollars around those bills did not pass Alright me Johnny here again, you know ever since I've been doing this show. It's been 12 years now, right? I've been talking about water and water pollution I've been giving away my own do-it-yourself plans how to make an assemble your own cheap, but very effective three-stage water purification system using parts

[19:11] You could find it any big hardware store or pool supply outfit and now of course you can order all the pieces from Amazon I know that some of you long-term listeners We're thinking maybe I'm going a little overboard on this water purification thing thinking maybe I talk about it way too much You were thinking why is he making things so complicated? Why not just uncomplicate things and buy bottled water at the grocery store like everyone else that'll solve everything, right? And then just this year in fact just in the last six months comes all that news The floodgates are open on Nanoplastics and forever chemicals just how bad our water supplies worldwide are how even drinking bottled water comes at a risk You and everyone else never even knew existed So in the end, I guess I wasn't crying wolf after all

[19:56] So once again, if you want my own do-it-yourself plans to a slick little under counter water purification system That can be obtained for well under a hundred bucks Send me an email the expert files at gmail.com And if you can't rig one up because you're all thumbs or you're renting whatever Next best thing and it is a great alternative get one of those echo filters. It's well under a hundred bucks, too But unfortunately unless you're in Central America or know someone who's living there and can get one to you You're probably not gonna be able to locate one in that case Just go right to Amazon and order one of those stainless steel Birkenfield Dalton gravity feed systems Not to be confused with Berkey though It's an exact copy and most all respects with the very same filters at half the price

[20:46] Confused yet you shouldn't be just send me an email the expert files at gmail.com And I'll send you the link and some info Again, my recommendation don't get the Berkey filter with those black carbon candle filters Stick with the white ceramic ones. They've got carbon inside. You can't see it. It's in a layer deep inside and impregnated with colloidal silver and Finally for those of you who are great believers in reverse osmosis systems, man, they're great I had one for many years myself Problem is and this is a big problem as mentioned in a past show Chlorine destroys the membrane and you don't even know it puts microscopic pinholes in it Which is why every reverse osmosis unit comes with a filter a pre filter

[21:31] Either made out of activated charcoal or a carbon block which absorbs the chlorine that might get into the system Works great too for a while except there's a limit to how much chlorine the carbon can absorb So you just have to keep changing that filter they recommend every six months though that may not be enough here in Latin America because Municipal water system is here even neighborhoods and residential towers that have their own private. Well, they just love to over chlorinate their water It's very inconsistent to it's all over the map some days There'll be no chlorine smell at all when you turn on your tap other days The smell could be so strong in your bathroom and kitchen when you take a shower, etc You just won't be able to stand it and that of course means if you have a reverse Osmosis system hooked up under your kitchen sink those days when your water supplies saturated with chlorine

[22:20] Your carbon filter, which is in front of your reverse osmosis unit That's supposed to take out that chlorine will most probably not be able to handle it There'll be some overspill and there goes that delicate reverse osmosis membrane Just saying love reverse osmosis myself, but it's just not all that practical here in Latin America Then again, if you're living out the boonies have your own little homestead and your own personal well Reverse osmosis is a great idea. Just skip the chlorinator on your well. Oh and here's something important I forgot to mention, you know, let's get back to those problems. They're having with those black Berkey filters Well as it turned out a couple years ago when Berkey introduced those black filters They promised on their list of particulates and chemicals that they filter to remove fluoride

[23:10] That's what made them so popular initially. What's not to like about that? Since many people up in the States anyway with a half a brain We're starting to realize that fluoride though traditionally putting nearly every American water supply was not a good idea and that new Berkey unit Offered a solution it removed fluoride as well. Even the corrupt FDA says there's no amount of fluoride That's not toxic to the human body In fact, there are some companies up in the states that sell replacement candles for other water systems That specifically remove fluoride but Unfortunately, and you could look this up those filters that promise to remove fluoride add aluminum to your water as part of the ion exchange process and As most people listen into this show and most above-average people in the States know

[23:57] Alzheimer's patients wins autopsy to have an unusual amount of aluminum in their brains Aluminum is not supposed to be in your brain or anywhere in your body a toxin that just in the last hundred years is ubiquitous in all the society, which is why by the way, I have no Aluminum utensils in my house pots and pans, etc. Only stainless steel So for you listeners up in the States who have a purification system with a fluoride filter Just a little heads up here There's an excellent chance the fluoride in your waters being replaced with an equal amount of aluminum ions Not good, which brings us back to water supplies in Latin America Well, they certainly have their problems, of course, but they do not have fluoride problems No one fluoridates their water here in Latin America

[24:42] So no need for aftermarket fluoride filters or any of that crap by the way Have you ever wondered why municipal water companies here in Latin America don't fluoridate their water? Well, it's because one part per million is supposed to reduce cavities That's misinformation. So anyway in the States fluoride level is set at one part per million did you know that at two parts per million even one and a half a Condition sets in called fluorosis where the teeth start turning yellow or green or black your bones do Permanently, it's called fluorosis That's why Latin American municipal water companies don't floridate their water They can't control the chlorine in their water. Sometimes it's ten times more than the recommended dosage Whereas fluorides a completely different animal if you even double the recommended dosage of one part per million to two parts per million

[25:34] Teeth in bones become permanently discolored In other words, the range of fluoride concentration is very tight in the States It's set at point seven to one part per million. No more now Just imagine in Latin America if the guys responsible for fluoridating the water We're the same guys in charge of chlorinating the water supply The guys who occasionally go nuts and jack up the concentration five or even ten times by mistake Details details it happens all the time down here do that with chlorine and the water just stinks and tastes bad You do it with fluorine and you've got a whole generation of young kids with green yellow or black teeth When I forgot to mention that five to ten times the regular dose even at three parts per million That's three times the US municipal dose kids get mental and toxic kidney problems, too

[26:25] So the good news is for not only Latinos, but gringos and expats says well There's never gonna be fluoride added to the water down here. By the way, how florosis was discovered Well about a hundred years ago or so It was discovered that in some isolated mountain communities around the world kids and adults have yellow green and black teeth They discovered their local natural spring water supplies had natural fluoride levels of two and three parts per million turns out They had very ugly teeth, but a few cavities and that's when the bright idea came which turned out not to be such a bright idea Hey, let's fluoridate water Just below the level of giving people yellow green or black teeth in the US They went whole hog and did it never realizing there'd be negative secondary effects That took until a few years ago to come to light

[27:13] I repeat here in Latin America. No one fluoridates the water and isn't it funny cavities are few and far in between Except in some cases of entitled rich kids who have unlimited access to candy sweets and junk food That's what my latino dentists friends. Tell me anyway, they tell me the poor kids have good teeth and the rich kids. Not so much 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 dot 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

[27:59] No spammos