Episode Summary
In this episode of The Expat Files, Johnny Mueller shares his insights on the realities of living, working, and running a business in Latin America. He begins by introducing the podcast as a platform that offers an honest, unfiltered look at life in the region, contrasting it with the idealized versions often found in travel magazines and websites. He acknowledges that many expats are interested in starting brick-and-mortar businesses, particularly in the restaurant and hospitality industry, and suggests that they should look for skilled, ambitious local employees to manage their ventures, often paying them higher salaries. He also discusses the role of tipping in Latin America, explaining that it is a significant economic motivator for many locals, especially those without higher education, and that it is often included in the bill. Johnny notes that tourists may tip twice without realizing it, especially when dealing with multiple currencies.
The segment then moves on to discuss the common issue of overcharging and incorrect billing in tourist areas of Latin America, particularly in places like Cancun and Costa Rica. Johnny explains that tourists often tip twice without realizing it due to the lack of Spanish language skills. He highlights that in these areas, waiters and waitresses expect double tipping from first-world tourists. He also warns that errors on bills are common, with Eddie, an expat, estimating that about a quarter of the checks in tourist areas are incorrect in favor of the bar or restaurant. He attributes this to the fact that businesses in tourist areas know tourists are only there for a short time and thus try to maximize profits. Johnny contrasts this with areas off the tourist trail, where errors are less frequent. He also notes that while Latin Americans are good at the personal interface part of customer service, they are often clueless about resolving actual customer problems. He provides examples of how businesses handle complaints, such as bringing back a dish with a cockroach or charging for an item that was never ordered, and how the staff often deflects responsibility by saying they can't remove the charge without affecting their salary. He advises tourists to escalate complaints to the manager for resolution.
In another segment, Johnny discusses the cultural differences in customer service between gringos (mainly North Americans) and Latins in Latin America. He highlights that Latins are not complainers and often avoid confrontation, even when they are dissatisfied with service. Johnny uses the example of Eddie, a friend of his, who plays a trick in restaurants by writing a note about cockroaches in the bread and then complaining about it, which leads to the waiter replacing the bread. This illustrates how Latins are non-confrontational and how gringos, on the other hand, are more likely to confront managers and get satisfaction. Johnny also mentions that in tourist areas, businesses often adapt to gringo expectations, leading to better customer service. He concludes by explaining that tips in Latin America are called 'propena' and warns about management stealing tips from staff, which is common but rarely enforced.
The episode also touches on the challenges expats face in Latin America, particularly in managing workers and dealing with local customs and practices. Johnny highlights the lack of strong labor laws and how first-world companies like McDonald's benefit from this. He also talks about Eddie's experiences with running a business in Latin America, including issues with employee punctuality and theft. He explains how Eddie has adapted by implementing security measures and using surveillance cameras. Johnny also discusses the issue of compact fluorescent bulbs being stolen from restaurants, despite being used in many Latin American establishments due to cost and energy efficiency concerns.
Finally, Johnny discusses the cost of living in Latin America, highlighting that while essentials like electricity, gasoline, and guns are expensive due to government taxes, most goods produced locally are significantly cheaper than their first-world counterparts. He emphasizes the frugality of the lower middle class, who often use wood for cooking due to the high cost of electricity. Johnny also touches on the environmental impact of this practice, noting that over 250 million people in Latin America cook with wood, a fact often overlooked in discussions about climate change. He shares a personal anecdote about his gardener and cleaning lady who cook with wood and discusses a local scam involving compact fluorescent bulbs being stolen and replaced with burnt-out ones. Johnny concludes by mentioning a humorous solution involving Van de Graaff generators to combat the bulb theft issue. The segment also includes a discussion on the affordability of organic eggs in Latin America, which are often cheaper and more readily available than in the first world, even though the sellers may not be aware of the term 'organic'.
Topics
Introduction to The Expat Files, Expats starting businesses in Latin America, Tipping in Latin America, Tourist areas in Latin America, Overcharging and incorrect billing, Customer service in Latin America, Cultural differences in customer service, Behavior of Latins and gringos in customer service interactions, Tips in Latin America, Labor practices and enforcement in Latin America, Labor laws in Latin America, Cultural differences in work habits
Chapters
00:00:00 Opening 00:00:24 Expats Starting Businesses in Latin America 00:02:47 Tipping in Latin America 00:05:07 The Double Tip Culture in Tourist Areas 00:05:14 Expectations in Big Tourist Areas 00:06:38 Overcharging in Tourist Areas 00:07:23 Customer Service in Latin America 00:08:35 Handling Complaints in Tourist Areas 00:10:08 Introduction to the topic of customer service differences between gringos and Latins 00:10:10 Latins are not complainers 00:10:12 Examples of patience and tolerance in Latin culture 00:10:17 Patience in everyday interactions 00:10:22 The other side of the coin: non-confrontational behavior 00:10:24 Waiters asking about the meal experience 00:10:28 The expectation of positive feedback 00:10:30 The expectation of positive feedback 00:15:12 Dependence on Boss Treatment and Labor Laws in Latin America 00:15:35 First-World Companies and Labor Laws in Latin America 00:16:14 Cultural Challenges with Employee Punctuality 00:17:10 Theft Issues in Eddie's Business 00:18:06 Theft of Compact Fluorescent Bulbs 00:18:58 Lighting Standards and Energy Efficiency in Latin America 00:21:07 The Cost of Living in Latin America 00:22:23 The Environmental Impact of Wood Cooking 00:23:57 The Local Scam Involving Compact Fluorescent Bulbs 00:27:17 Affordability of Organic Products in Latin America
Transcript
Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.
[00:03] Hi everybody, I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America. The show that tells you what it's really like to live, work, play and or retire in Latin America. I tell it just like it is, not the version they give you in those glossy travel magazines or the picture they paint for you in those international traveler websites where they're only trying to sell you something. What's it really like for expats living in Latin America? Well, if you stick around a while you'll find out, so let's get started. You know, it turns out a lot of you listeners want to come down here to Latin America with the intention of starting a brick and mortar business. And I know that for a fact because I get an awful lot of emails asking me about expat
[00:48] Eddie and his business and how he handles this and that. For one thing, everybody wants to know what the difference is between the way you handle your workers in Latin America versus the way you'd handle your workers in the same kind of business if you were up in the first world. People want to know things like this obviously because they have an idea back in their head that they're going to be expats eventually. And many of them already have an idea what their dream business is going to be. And obviously hearing some of expat Eddie's own business stories hasn't discouraged you yet. In fact, I'm sure some of you are already thinking if a guy like Eddie could come down with five grand and become a millionaire, you could come down with three grand and become a billionaire. Now, as for me, I've always thought that the restaurant and bar and hospitality business
[01:33] is just a little too much work, at least for someone like me. Those kinds of businesses are very labor intensive and down here even more so. The key to getting a business like that jump started so that you don't have to be on the premises 24 seven, which should be your main objective, by the way, is to take one of these smart, skilled, ambitious little Latin guys or gals, erase all their bad habits, turn them into an empty slate, and basically whip them into shape and beat as many first world values into them as you can. Then once you've made that person manager of your place, that's when you can sit back and enjoy the sweet life. But of course, if you do find a manager like that, there are some concessions to be made. For example, you just might have to pay him or her an exorbitant salary, like maybe five
[02:21] or 600 bucks a month, about double what you're paying everyone else. And that's what Eddie tells me. In each one of his restaurants, he's got a manager that he pays about $500 a month and the rest of the people get about 250 plus tips. Oh, and speaking of that, a lot of gringos want to know the do's and don'ts about tipping down here. What's customary? What's not? And you should know that tipping is a huge economic motivator down here for the common people. That's why every Latin American without a college education, which is about 98% of the population, by the way, that's why they flock to the tourist centers to get those tips, those US dollar tips, specifically flocking to places that cater to North American and European tourists, who are notoriously big tippers compared to Latins who are on vacation.
[03:09] Now you see, in Latin America, whether it's a high tourism place like Costa Rica or very low on the tourism trail, like Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Belize, and Nicaragua, it doesn't matter. When you get your bill at a restaurant, they'll almost always add 10 or 12% tip into the bill. And I've noticed now that some places on the well-beaten tourist trail, like Cancun and Costa Rica again, you'll find them adding 15, even 20% tip to the bill, though there's no law that says they have to do that. Though it's becoming so common down here to put the tip on the bill that if the management doesn't do that, then they're kind of screwing the waiters and the waitresses, because since everybody believes it's added to the bill, the customer doesn't even ask, he just assumes it is. And at the end of the night, it's the waiters and waitresses that get screwed.
[03:55] Oh, and get this, another reason why the common Latin loves to work in tourist areas for tips is because first time gringos and Europeans who come down don't get the local money. It takes a long time to figure out in your mind the difference between dollars and euros and, let's say, cordobas, pesos, lampiras, or quetzales. So tourists, when they tip and they've got a wad of local funny money in their hands, they often give way over 10%, especially when traveling through multiple Latin countries when they have to differentiate through multiple Latin currencies. They rarely can figure out an approximation quickly in their head, and they're on vacation and they don't want to appear like cheapskates in front of their friends and family. Now personally, I hate the idea of the tip being added to the bill, because the tip is for service.
[04:41] Good service, good tip, bad service, no tip. But we already lost that battle, up in the first world too. But here's the thing, most gringos and Europeans on vacation don't know or care either way if the tip is added to the bill. I hear it all the time. I'm down here, sitting in a restaurant, and a gringo will say to me, hey bud, tell me, do they add the tip to the bill or not? Nearly all green gringos wonder about that. Obviously if they don't know Spanish, they don't ask. And since most don't know Spanish, tourists often tip twice and don't even know it. In fact these days in really big tourist areas like Pia del Carmen and Cancun and Costa Rica, waiters and waitresses have come to expect that green first world tourists especially will double tip. So I say screw that, unless you get extra exemplary service which you almost never get
[05:32] down here. Sure the waiters and waitresses smile and they're real nice to you, but if you have some kind of complaint, let's say your soup is way too salty, or your V8 or your tomato juice tastes like it came out of a can that was open 10 days ago, well I can guarantee you that no one's going to be in a rush to give you a new glass fresh from the kitchen. And if they do, you better check your bill because you're likely to get charged for it. And let me repeat that. You should really check your receipt before you pay your bill, just like you'd do up in the first world. Even if you don't know any Spanish, you should be able to figure out what you ordered. An expat Eddie says it like this, he says that if you're on the tourist trail like in Costa Rica or Cancun, probably about a good quarter of the checks that you get for food and drinks will be incorrect in favor of the bar or restaurant.
[06:19] And when you're off the tourist trail, the errors will be much less frequent. In that case Eddie says about 10% of the bills will be wrong, almost always in the favor of the bar or restaurant again. Now I've asked Eddie is that because people in the bar and restaurant business are basically dishonest and is it any better in Europe or the States? Well he says it's much worse down here, you get overcharged all the time and it's not that they're out to scam you, though Eddie says in places like Cancun and Costa Rica, it seems like it's kind of pre-planned because owners know that you're only there for a weekend or a week or maybe two and they're probably never going to see your face again. So they're going to squeeze as much as they can out of you in the moment. They don't operate on the premise that you're going to be a repeat customer, but in the
[07:05] towns off the tourist trail it's much different. Bars, restaurants and hotels do see the same faces over and over, so they have to cultivate the repeat client. Now it's like Eddie said, it's not like customer service down here is completely bad all the time or as some people say, non-existent. It's that there are two parts to customer service and Latins are very good at one part and terrible at the other. The first part of customer service is your actual interfacing with the client. Now waiters and waitresses and cashiers and people who attend clients in retail establishments nearly always get an A or an A plus in that department. The vast majority of Latins are upbeat and happy and genuinely pleased to serve you and it's evident it's not a put on.
[07:52] Eddy oh vouch for that. Now Latins have that personal interface down pat. They're very good at that and it's kind of an inborn talent and it has a lot to do with the fact that Latin American countries rate the highest in the world in general happiness. Even with all that poverty, they are in fact the happiest people on the planet. But it's that other half of the customer service equation that they really fall down on and in fact they're just clueless about. And that's the part that has to do with actually helping you if you've got a problem. It's all in well that the guy who's waiting on you is very happy. But when you walk out of the place, are you happy? If you've got a problem, are you satisfied with the way they handled it? Generally not. Oh they'll be smiling and sincere about wanting to help you alright.
[08:38] There's no grumpy faces or putting on an act and they feel genuinely concerned for you. For example, if you report that there's a cockroach swimming in your soup. But what they'll do is they'll bring it back to the kitchen, take out the cockroach and bring that same bowl right back to you. And they'll do it all with a big genuine smile on their face like, I'm sorry sir, no eye problem, it's all taken care of. Or for example, and I've seen this many times, you go into a restaurant and you order something off the menu and you don't exactly get what's stated. And then you tell the waitress that you didn't order this. So you order something else on the menu and she takes the first plate back. Well chances are when you get the bill, you'll have been charged for that salad with mayonnaise that you never ate. And yes, unfortunately they put mayonnaise on almost everything, yuck.
[09:27] And if you don't know a bit of Spanish, you might not catch that you were charged twice on the bill. However, if you do catch it and you call the waitress on it, there's a very good chance that she'll make a sympathetic face and say something like, sir if it was up to me, I'd eliminate the charge. But I'm not authorized to do that. And if I take the charge off, it'll come out of my salary. And man, if I've heard that once, I've heard it a thousand times. And you know how I address that? I say, let me talk to the manager, the hefe or the hefa. And guess what? When the boss or the manager comes over, nearly every single time, you'll get satisfaction. And from what Eddie says, it's a tremendously rare occasion for the boss to be called out by a client like that. Latins are just not complainers.
[10:12] Remember, we're talking about people who routinely wait in government lines for two, three, even four hours just to sign their kids up for school or get a driver's license. And here's the other half of that coin. Often a waiter or a waitress at the end of your meal will ask you how everything was, just like they do in the first world. And guess what? Latins lie through their teeth. They always say everything's fine, it was just wonderful. They just are not confrontational. And Eddie says the thing that always strikes him the most strange is that people keep coming back to these restaurants. And here's a little trick that Eddie plays sometimes when we go to other restaurants. You know how in most decent restaurants, to give you a basket of bread at your table with five or ten slices in it, you know the drill, right? Well here's what Eddie likes to do. Right after he sits down, he takes out a pen and writes on a little slip of paper, raise
[11:01] your hand when you read this. Or sometimes he'll write, there are cockroaches in this bread. He writes it in Spanish of course. Then he takes that little piece of paper and slips it between two pieces of bread. Then when the waiter comes over, he tells the waiter to throw the bread away because there's cockroaches in it. And he asks for a new basket of bread. And the waiter, ever so obliging and apologetic, brings him a new basket of bread right away. Now it never fails, when Eddie does this, always about 15 or 20 minutes later, someone in the room will raise their hand or some people at a table somewhere else in the restaurant will break into uncontrollable laughter and wave Eddie's piece of paper in the air. And if that doesn't happen, many times Eddie will find that little piece of paper in that brand new fresh basket of bread that the waiter just brought over, in exchange for the basket
[11:49] that Eddie complained about. Which means the waiter just went in and out of the kitchen and gave him back the very same basket. Now being in the restaurant business, Eddie has a lot of cool little tricks like that. The fact is, everyone should have a friend like Eddie. He's always been the life of the party, but you've probably figured that out already, haven't you? So anyway, on that customer service bit, that's where gringos who come down to Latin America really shine. And Eddie says, you should see the look on the people's faces when he gives an unhappy camper something for free, or even hands them a gift certificate for something cheap like a free dessert. Their eyes bug out like they've just won the lottery because no Latin owned and operated businesses do that kind of thing down here. So the thing is, if you're in a hotel or restaurant and you really do want satisfaction, and you
[12:37] demand to see the boss man or woman, first of all, that's unusual. And like I said, since most Latins are non-confrontational, the boss man or woman won't want a confrontation with you either, especially not in front of other clients or customers. So by all means, if you are having a customer service problem, make sure you complain loudly and in front of other clients, and you'll almost always get satisfaction. And keep this in mind. For Latin managers, any irate customer is bad enough, but an irate gringo. That's a double embarrassment, because like I've said before, gringos are preferred clients. And once you get a gringo into your establishment, you certainly want to make him happy. You want to keep him there, and you want him to refer other gringo clients. So, when a gringo confronts a manager, the manager almost always caves.
[13:27] Now, I have to warn you once again, we're talking about off the common tourist trail here. Because in those high-volume tourist areas naturally, there are a lot of gringos, and they get ticked off so they complain. That's why in places like Panama and Costa Rica and Cancun, there are so many hotels, bars, and restaurants that seem nearly first-world in all respects, even in customer service. Because gringos are the lifeblood of those tourist areas, businesses just have to adapt to them or die. And that's why so many businesses on the tourist track are owned by foreigners, mostly Americans, Canadians, and Europeans. Because the traditional Latin-owned businesses just shriveled up and died. But to finish up the point I was making about tipping in Latin America, just remember this. A tip is called a propena down here.
[14:14] P-R-O-P-I-N-A. So look on the bill when you get it for that word, propena, or the abbreviated version, P-R-O-P. Just to make sure they've included it in the bill or not. And by the way, there's another thing that pisses Eddie off. And that's the fact that the management from most bars and restaurants steal some of the tips, the propinas, from the working staff. It's common down here for the management to take maybe half of the tips at the end of the night and give the other half to the employees. And of course in the first world, if the management did that, you could have their nuts in a ringer. And of course it's illegal. And sure, workers have a right to complain about things like that, but Latins aren't complainers and it wouldn't matter much because there's little or no enforcement down here anyway. And like in the first world down here, workers have their legislated rights like vacations and maximum hours in a work week.
[15:06] Your basic labor protections. But as usual, enforcement is weak to non-existent. So you're pretty much dependent on the way your boss treats you more than anything. Unless you work for a first world franchise that's come down, like McDonald's. Then those workers rights that are legislated by the government are followed to the tee. And that's because first world companies come down for two reasons. One, for the dirt cheap labor. And because there's a ready market for their products. So when first world companies and franchises do come down and they see how lenient the labor laws are compared to the first world, it's no skin off their back at all to comply with those weak latin laws. For them it's like operating under labor laws in the United States 50 or 60 years ago. Now like I said at the beginning of the broadcast, I get a lot of emails directed towards expat Eddie because obviously he knows about doing brick and mortar businesses down here.
[16:00] He is pretty much the expert expat on that stuff I have to say. Now in a previous show I mentioned that Eddie's number one problem when he started doing business down here was trying to get his workers to come in on time. Because latins have that manana thing going. It's a cultural thing where they come a few minutes to a half an hour late. And that you can almost count on. And like I said that drives us expats nuts. Now from my personal experience I can't tell you how many times I've had an appointment with a professional, a physician, a dentist, an accountant. And I've had a two o'clock appointment and I end up sitting in my car outside the place till 2.20 till the secretary comes back from lunch and slowly puts the key in the front door. No embarrassment. No apologies.
[16:46] Just a smiley buenas tardes. Good afternoon. Anyway like I said Eddie conquered that problem. Now since I spoke about that on the show people are asking now what's the next thing that Eddie had to overcome when he started his business down here? What's number two on his list of frustrations? What are some of the particular problems that a gringle boss has to put up with down here that you rarely see up in the first world? Well Eddie says certain things consistently go missing. And he doesn't believe it's just his employees doing the pilfering. He learned a long time ago. It was important to have a big lock up for all his durable goods and paper supplies and stuff. But still even though Eddie's managers do a physical purse opening and a backpack check every time the employees chain shifts certain items still go missing.
[17:36] And that's why in all of Eddie's restaurants he's got a surveillance camera pointed at the garbage in the back alley. And he's done that for a few years now. Ever since Eddie discovered that one of his employees was hiding stuff in the dumpster and coming back later with his buddies to pick it up after the restaurant had closed. Now of course there's a certain amount of small time pilfering going down in any business especially one where there are employees coming in and out all the time on different shifts. Now just lately Eddie's been having a lot of trouble with pilfering of those compact fluorescent bulbs we all see everywhere. Now we all know they're a little more expensive maybe three four or even five bucks a piece up in the States. Well they're the same price down here because they're imported.
[18:22] And since they are really big energy savers the average Latin household loads up on those things as best they can. And I know that up in the States and in the first world there are laws in place up there where incandescent bulbs are already being phased out or completely banned. So everyone will have to eventually use either those LED lights which are still horrendously expensive. But at least they give off a nice kind of light or they'll have to buy those compact fluorescence which give off a real low class kind of trailer court lighting effect if you ask me. I don't know anyone who doesn't think the glow off of those things isn't irritatingly ugly. But that being as it is there's only one out of all the 20 Latin American countries so far that's eliminating standard bulbs in favor of those ugly compact fluorescence and that's Argentina.
[19:09] They passed a law now eliminating the importation of common incandescence and Chile Panama and Costa Rica are next. Yep that falls right in line with what I've said about the four Latin American countries that are trying their damnedest to be first world. That's Costa Rica Chile Argentina and Panama. So that makes it four for four with those Latin countries trying to be first world with banning standard light bulbs and not that I don't think it's a good idea to save energy. But if you want nice quality light and you have the money why shouldn't you be able to make the decision to have it not to mention you've probably heard that those fluorescent bulbs all contain mercury. So when the burnt out ones hit the landfill they explode and the mercury has to go somewhere on the ground in the groundwater or in the air and eventually in you and me.
[20:00] But that's another issue. The issue here is that Eddie loses those compact fluorescence left and right and he's not losing them from inventory. No one's stealing them from his locked storerooms but they're stealing them out of his kitchen bathroom and outdoor fixtures. Now remember Eddie's restaurants are first world all the way. He wouldn't be caught dead having those compact fluorescent bulbs or any fluorescent bulbs for that matter in the restaurant proper where the clients are sitting and enjoying themselves. Fluorescent lighting there would be way too crass and institutional looking a definite low class turn off for first world people like us. But I would say about 80% of all the restaurants in Latin America use those horrid little bulbs everywhere. That's why most Latin owned restaurants look like hospital cafeterias.
[20:48] That kind of lighting is good enough for a government building or a locker room or a hardware store but it's just impossibly ugly in restaurants bars and hotels and you know that. But in Latin America for the common man anyway it's all about the money. Electricity per kilowatt hour is three even four times as much as it is in the States. And by the way that's one of the only pricey things about living here in Latin America. Electricity gasoline and guns and what makes those things so expensive government taxes of course. But everything else down here as long as it's made and produced down here in Latin America and not imported from the first world is a half to a quarter of first world prices. Now the thing is when you've got half or more of the population making 300 bucks a month people are very very frugal when it comes to electricity.
[21:39] That's why down here more than 50% of the people still use wood to cook with and all you have to do is drive a little way out of the city and you'll see men and women hauling bundles of sticks and logs on their backs. It's a very strange site but that's what they're going to cook with tonight. And like I said you'll see that as you get a little ways out of any city in Latin America but only outside of the cities because the cities are already virtually deforested. Sure you'll see the odd tree now and again and there's always a few in the parks but there are no big wild concentrations of trees anymore in any of the Latin cities. All the wild city trees and even the ones a ways out have been used to cook up dinner. Now here's a very disturbing statistic. Did you know that there are a half a billion people in Latin America and 250 million of them cook with wood.
[22:31] So why doesn't anybody mention that when they talk about CO2 and global warming. RS expats the only ones who notice. In fact closer to home my own gardener and cleaning lady cook with wood. And I know that because every time they walk by me it smells like they've been out camping. Bottom line the lower middle classes cook with wood to keep those electric bills down. Now just lately the middle and lower classes have discovered the compact fluorescent light bulb. They've also discovered there about three or four bucks each as opposed to incandescent bulbs which are about a half a buck down here. So anyway this is what Eddie's discovered around some of his restaurants. He says the bulbs don't actually go missing in the kitchen or the employees bathroom or the stockroom or in the alley.
[23:18] He thinks well he actually knows that one or more of his employees or clients actually comes into his restaurant with a burnt out compact fluorescent or two in their pocket or somewhere on their body. Maybe in their sock or their underwear who knows. And they'll just unscrew one of Eddie's good bulbs and put the burnt out one there in its place. And Eddie said he didn't figure it out himself for about a year to a year and a half. He was thinking maybe the bulbs that came to Latin America were a bad batch rejects. They're supposed to last six thousand hours. In fact they're guaranteed to it says on the box and that's a long time. They should last a couple of years even if you run them 10 or 12 hours a day. Then one day he looked at the burnt out bulbs that were accumulating in his closet and he realized that some of the bulbs that were burning out weren't the brands he was buying like a brand called Full Gore f u l g o r e which is a cheap brand made in China.
[24:15] So there you have it folks a nice little small time scam. Now in the old days before those compact fluorescent bulbs I don't think pulling a thing like that would have been worth it. But it's all relative especially to a guy making two hundred fifty to three hundred a month. So anyway Eddie still hasn't figured out what to do about that one. He might never solve that problem and though it's not a big deal it is aggravating and actually Eddie had half a mind to put up a sign in his kitchen that said or was supposed to say if you need light bulbs go to the Chinese restaurant across the street. They've got a million of them and nobody's watching. Then I told Eddie about Van de Graaff generators those electric spark gap generators that they use in Frankenstein movies where you see sparks rising up two wires that look like the old TV rabbit ears.
[25:02] You get one of those things within five feet of a fluorescent bulb and it'll light up even though it's not plugged in and even if it's burned out. You might have done that experiment yourself in junior high school science class. I did so I told Eddie to order one of those things for 50 bucks off the Internet and his problems would be over. Just make his employees walk past it when they leave for their shift and after I told him that Eddie just smiled and said you know what Johnny you're nuts. And then I said but Eddie wouldn't you give anything to see the look on a guy's face as his underwear started glowing enough said about that. Now changing to a completely different subject for a minute Eddie was explaining to me how some things are absolutely topsy turvy down here as compared with the first world. For example eggs Eddie buys a lot of eggs for his restaurants and he says if you go buy a lot of eggs at one time in bulk at for example Walmart or any of the big first world style supermarkets which are everywhere down here now like in the huge chain they call price smart which is actually Costco.
[26:06] Anyway if you buy eggs there you pay about the same price as you pay for eggs in the first world like about 10 or 12 cents a piece about a dollar 20 to a dollar 50 a dozen. But suppose you wanted to buy organic eggs that came from chickens that were free range in that case in the States you'd pay more than double about 25 to 30 cents an egg or about three to four dollars a dozen. But guess what down here in Latin America if you want organic eggs from free range chickens you'll actually pay the same or slightly less than the factory farm chicken eggs that you buy at Walmart and you can buy these organic eggs practically in every little Tienda those little mom and pop corner stores you find everywhere. Now they get their organic eggs fresh every day from small farmers that produce maybe only 10 or 20 dozen eggs a day the tens of thousands of tiny farms like this do not pin up their chickens in coops all day and they can't afford to give their chickens growth hormones and antibiotics.
[27:04] The fact is most chickens and eggs bought this way are organic though the people selling them have no idea at all what the word organic means they just raised their chickens the way they've been doing it for hundreds of years. So just think of that as another big advantage to moving down to Latin America you've got giant organic eggs on every street corner for a third of what you pay for them in the States and the thing is organic is everywhere down here and the people selling this stuff don't even know it. 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.