#76 – The Expat Files: Navigating Legal and Cultural Challenges in Latin America

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:02] 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. If you remember, last week I didn't quite finish off my bit about how to secure your house, business, or apartment. So not today, but in the next show, I'm going to give you some really important tips on how to secure your place, whether you leave it for four hours, a day, two days, or even

[00:47] a week or two. So be sure to tune in to my next show. Well anyway, another very strange thing happened to me this week, and I have to admit that down here strange things happen to me all the time, so it's not really unusual. Not for me anyway. But I can guarantee you that it's pretty shocking, and you might not have heard anything like this in your whole life. Now let me start by saying that up in the first world, one of the worst things you could possibly do as a car driver is to get involved in an accident and run. In other words, your classic hit and run. Anyone who's the perpetrator of a hit and run is a pretty low creature, isn't he? And when you do hear about a hit and run, 95% of the time, the guy gets caught. Because most of the time, there's either a witness, someone gets it on camera, and there's always any number of clues left at the scene. So it's pretty easy to track the guy down. Not to mention, the car that you hit almost always has your paint all over it.

[01:37] And that, the cops can match. Anyway, law enforcement and forensics up north have their ways of finding out from hundreds of little clues like that. Now in the first world, if that happens, they're going to throw the book at you. And unless you're a connected politician, you're probably going to go to jail. And if you injure or kill somebody in that accident, and you run, no matter how connected you are, you're going to do some time, believe me. And that's why hit and runs are such a rare crime up in the first world. But down here in Latin America, it happens all the time. And the percentages are reversed. About 95% of the time, if you run, you don't get caught. Because in fact, down here, they don't have cameras everywhere. And people are reluctant to talk to the cops, no one wants to get involved. And most of the people involved in hit and runs are driving rusted out duct taped junk

[02:22] boxes on wheels, which they have no problem abandoning when they get into an accident and they know it's their fault. So they'd rather run for it than face sure jail time. But on the other hand, if there's a chance that the guy in the rust bucket can blame it on the other guy, or there's no real proof and it's just his word against the other guys, then he won't run. Especially if the other guy's got a decent car, which means the guy in the junk heap has a good chance of getting an instant payout way before the cops get there. So of course, it's worth his while to stick around, which just goes to show that the deeper pocket theory is alive and well and living in the third world. And that's why when a guy driving a real piece of crap hits a high-end car, in his eyes he often wins the lottery, whether it's his fault or not. Because you see, in that case, if the guy who's driving the junk has his papers in order,

[03:10] or somewhat in order, he'll hang in there and take a chance on getting a nice settlement. That is, a cash settlement on the spot from the other guy with a nice car. No matter whose fault it is, as long as it's a regular fender bender, the guy with a nicer car usually opens up his wallet on the spot. Because no one wants to wait however long it takes for the police to show up, and that could take hours, and end up not only wasting that day, but other wasted days with trips to the municipality, the courthouse, the police station, and all that crap. And a lot of times, the guy with the nicer car won't even call his insurance company, even though the insurance adjusters will be there in 15 minutes to a half an hour. I mean, what's the point of filing an insurance claim, and possibly, because of it, seeing your own premiums go up the next year, when you can give the guy you collided with, the guy in a chicken wire rust bucket, 50 bucks, and he'll gladly go away.

[03:58] In fact, you can both go away well before the cops ever show up. Again, down here, that happens all the time, no matter whose fault it is. And just for your own information, it's usually the guy with the rust bucket's fault, because he's the guy with bad steering, bad suspension, bad brakes, and broken mirrors. Unless of course the accident's at night, then it's probably going to be your fault, because you rear-ended him. But that's because he didn't have any taillights to begin with, which is a pretty sickening kind of cash 22, if you ask me. And even if you rear-ended him, because he didn't have any taillights at all, you'll end up in court telling that one to the judge, which is bound to steal three or four more days out of your life. So for some people, paying that 50 or 100 bucks right on the spot is the easy way out, and it'll save you a lot of grief. Well what's this got to do with hit and run?

[04:44] Well I was at a party last Saturday with some movers and shakers down here. A lot of local high rollers, embassy guys, expat guys working for transnationals, and in this group there were a lot of local lawyers. And I don't usually like to mingle with those kind of people, as you might well know, but they always have a great first class spread, and an open bar where they serve all the top shelf stuff. And since I get a lot of invites like that, I can't exactly ignore that crowd, because once those guys start drinking, I get a lot of inside information, stuff that I tell you guys about, and a lot of stuff that I can't. I mean, I like telling it like it is, but not enough so I lose my head over it, you know what I mean? Anyway, there's a nice big barbecue going outside the pool, and we're sitting around the fireplace. Yeah, they have a fireplace outside the pool, and that should give you an idea what kind of money this guy has.

[05:30] Anyway, we're sitting around the pool, and the subject came up about an article that appeared recently saying how many accidents bus drivers get into down in Latin America, and how so many of them don't have their papers in order, have either an expired license, the wrong kind of license, or no driver's license at all. Not to mention the fact that 30-40% of the buses on the street are operating illegally, and how even the buses that are legal are in deplorable mechanical condition. And since there's no government agency checking that, the owners only do repairs when a bus actually breaks down and can't be driven anymore. Down here, like I said before, there's no such thing as preventive maintenance, it's just not in their vocabulary. Anyway, to prove that point, it's been estimated that 70% of all Latin American buses would

[06:15] not pass your basic first world safety check. And since these bus drivers are paid not by the hour, but by how many people they pick up, they maximize the amount of people they pick up by driving super fast, running red lights and taking corners recklessly, and passing at will on straightaways and on curves. And even though they break every traffic law, the cops never pull them over. And that's probably because the cops drive exactly the same way too. And because of the crazy chances bus drivers take when they drive, and their buses are in such horrible condition, bus drivers have by far the highest rate of accidents per kilometer driven than any other kind of driver on the road in Latin America. In fact, they have five times as many accidents as long haul truck drivers who down here don't have much of a safety record to brag about themselves.

[07:03] Now in another part of that news article that we were discussing, it said that 50% or more of bus drivers who get into serious accidents end up abandoning the scene of the accident and just disappearing altogether. It turns out running from the scene of an accident is an epidemic down here and not just with bus drivers. So anyway I'm talking with this group of about 10 lawyers, and I explained to them that no one up in the first world in his right mind would run from the scene of an accident. Because the story's gonna be all over the papers, it'll be a huge embarrassment. He's probably gonna go to jail and therefore he'll lose his job too. Not to mention he'll end up in court, he'll get sued heavily by the party that's been damaged and his life as he knew it will be over, just because he made that one stupid split second decision. Besides all that, it's just not the honorable thing to do.

[07:51] And after I said that, that's when the conversation with these Latin lawyers got interesting. One by one, these Latin lawyers told me that what they recommend to expats and their clients with money was that under normal circumstances, in your regular fender bender, you should always stick around, call your insurance company and wait for them to come by and let them handle all the details, or as I mentioned before, just offer to pay off the guy if he's driving a junky piece of crap. That is, if you want to eliminate a lot of wasted time and aggravation and just get on your way. But, here's the kicker, those lawyers said, off the record of course, with a wink and a nod, if you hit a pedestrian, whether it's your fault or not, whether you were inattentive and just hit him, whether he just popped out of nowhere in front of your car and you plowed

[08:38] right over him, even if it's a bunch of kids out in the street playing soccer and one of them slips, falls, or gets pushed and you end up running over him, it doesn't matter. 10 out of 10 of those lawyers said, unofficially of course, you really should just step on it, get the hell out of there and don't look back, because in their experience, if you do stick around, even before the case gets to court, you're screwed. The police will always take your car and put you in jail right away, and you might end up sitting in jail for a week or so, depending how good your lawyer is, and of course it depends on how seriously damaged the pedestrian was that you hit, and if he's dead, even a good lawyer might not be able to get you out of jail before your trial, which could end up being a couple months down the road. So here you have it folks, something you're never going to read in those glossy travel

[09:24] magazines, that lawyers down here unofficially recommend that if you hit somebody with your car, you take off, and you take off good and fast, because 95% of the time if you stick around, you're going to get screwed, no matter whose fault it was, and if you run, 95% of the time, you'll get away with it, and of course, here at the Exped Files, we're not recommending or endorsing doing this at all, I'm just telling it like it is and bringing you the unvarnished truth. Now I've never hit a pedestrian myself, so I can't actually say what I'd do in a situation like that, but down here in the third world, you often find that doing the right thing isn't exactly the right thing to do, if you know what I mean. And to further complicate the story, that's why lawyers always recommend down here to expats and to locals with money, that they don't register their cars in their own names.

[10:14] By that, they mean you should register your car in a company name. Up north in the first world, people do that all the time, they have a corporation and they register their houses and boats and cars in it. Down here they have almost exactly the same thing, and it's called a Sociedad Ananama. Down here, any name you see with the two letters S period A period after it is a Latin American company or Sociedad Ananama. For example, Blue Mountain Corporation up in the first world would be translated to Montaña Azul SA, and the SA stands for Sociedad Ananama, in other words, it's a corporation. And that corporation can hold houses, cars or boats or anything you want, just like a corporation in the United States or Europe. Only down here, these SA, Sociedad Ananama corporations, offer even more protection than

[11:04] any first world corporation does. But I'll talk about that on another show, so stay tuned. Now those latin lawyers at that little party I went to, told me something about these corporations also off the record. They told me that if you're driving a vehicle and it's in your name, and you get into a hit and run situation, and somebody happens to jot down your license plate number, which believe it or not, is rare and almost never happens. Anyway, if it did, they could track that car down to you. And then the only way to avoid getting prosecuted would be to have a good lawyer and lie. Yes, they said lie. In fact, they said lying in court is a very standard option down here. It's done all the time, especially in cases where it's one person's word against another. And they told me that the courts are so corrupt that if you actually did end up in court for

[11:53] a hit and run, because they tracked your license number, and the damaged party could produce witnesses saying it was you that was involved in the accident and took off, well, my fine little group of lawyers told me that it would be just as easy for a client of theirs to produce an equal number of persons or more to support your alibi. Just like everything else in Latin America, eyewitnesses come cheap. But instead of going through all that trouble, instead they said you get yourself one of these essay corporations, register your car under it, and then if you end up in a hit and run situation, and someone does get your plate number, if the police investigators happen to check back on the records, they'll find that that vehicle is not owned by a person but a corporation, which makes it infinitely harder to pin down a hit and run on an individual.

[12:39] And by then it's pretty much case closed. Now down here in Latin America, we have one of the highest rates in the world of car accidents involving pedestrians. In fact, down here it's been shown that you have an 8 times or 800% greater chance of hitting a pedestrian if you drive a car down here than nailing one up in the first world. And there are plenty of reasons why this happens. One is that Latins don't like to use marked crosswalks. In fact, they cross at will wherever they want. And worse yet, even on the busiest of roads and superhighways, where almost everyone drives a hundred kilometers an hour or more, it's not unusual at all to see a person or a group of people darting right out across the road in packs. And it's not just young agile kids and their pirated Nikes running that race. You'll see old ladies with baskets of tortillas on their heads, and old guys stooped over

[13:27] toting bundles of logs on their back. They're all trying to scoot across. You'll be driving along on a superhighway at a hundred kilometers plus per hour. And you'll see people darting across the road up ahead, even jumping hedges and fences and concrete barriers. Stuff that the government has put up between lanes because people have already been killed. But barrier or no barrier. The local people in the area don't care. They'll jump that barrier day or night. In fact, you'll often see people who've made it halfway, sitting on the barrier, waiting for a break in the traffic so they can whip on over to the other side. And speaking of pedestrians getting bumped off in traffic, here's something else you almost never see in the first world. Except, of course, close to the Mexican border. You drive just a little ways out of any city down here, and you're bound to see any number of little crosses planted alongside the road.

[14:15] A lot of them, along with a tiny wreath and a few odd flowers on them. And you can find any number of these little markers, sometimes with names and dates etched on the crosses, showing exactly when that person got bumped off. One afternoon in Panama, when I was driving from the Atlantic zone to the Pacific zone, I counted 37 of those little crosses stuck along one stretch of road. But pedestrians crossing every which way isn't the only way they get killed down here. There are a lot of other ways for people on foot to get bumped off by cars. On Friday and Saturday nights, you have the problem that some of the local men spend just a little too much time at the cantina and get a little too drunk. So every Friday and Saturday night, as soon as it gets dark, you have to look out for the odd drunk or group of drunks arm in arm, swaying back and forth along the shoulder of a road, any road.

[15:02] And sometimes they'll make it all the way to the center line. So you can imagine if you're coming around a curve pretty fast, just think of how quick your braking response time is going to have to be. In fact in my time down here, I've seen hundreds of guys like that, mostly again on Friday and Saturday nights. And usually, I only spot one guy like that a weekend, but one guy on a dark road standing in a center line is enough to scare the crap out of you, believe me. Now like I said, there are some places where a lot of pedestrians have been killed. So the governments of every big city put up these walkways called pasarelas, so that pedestrians can make it over busy roads in complete safety. That's the idea anyway. But they only build these things, which are expensive, after quite a few pedestrians have bit the dust. Pasarelas are basically overhead bridges for pedestrians.

[15:49] However, like I said before, the average latin on foot doesn't like to use designated crosswalks, and these pasarelas often take a pedestrian far out of his way when he's trying to cross a busy street. And the average latin isn't going to walk three or four blocks out of his or her way when they can sprint across the street when there's a break in the traffic. So you get about half the people using those pasarelas, and about half the people making a break for it. If you're a driver, it's kind of like that game Grand Theft Auto. Only when you hit a pedestrian in Grand Theft Auto, you only lose points. You don't actually kill anyone. So you might be asking, if there are these pasarelas and you only have to walk a block or two or three out of your way, you'd think that would be a special convenience for women and children and people carrying goods and old people, of course. Why wouldn't everybody take that pasarela?

[16:35] Well, like most things in Latin America, the logic seems simple, but in reality, it isn't quite as simple as you'd think. It turns out that the vast majority of pedestrians would take those pasarelas, except for the fact that those are ideal places to get robbed. In fact, there are certain pasarelas in every big city in Latin America that women and children and people carrying goods almost never use, because certain gangs and criminal groups just hang there, looking for victims, especially at night. And these groups of thieves and criminals keep an extra eye out for expats, gringos and first-worlders, especially first-world backpackers who look tired and a little worn around the edges, the kind of people who have their guard down. So all you expat, expat wannabes and third-world vacationers out there, beware of pasarelas,

[17:23] especially when they're in densely populated areas in cities. And since I started off talking about hit and runs here, this is a good time to talk about motorcycles and motorcycle accidents. Now if you have a car down here and you commute every day to a job, and if you're living in one of the medium-sized or big cities, I guarantee that you're going to see at least two fatal motorcycle accidents a week. Not that it's going to happen right next to you, but I guarantee that every week, there'll be a couple of gaper's blocks, and there'll be a motorcycle in pieces, and the guy driving it strewn all over the road. I can't tell you how many times I've seen motorcyclists dead laying on the side of the road. And until I came down here, I never saw one up in the first world. And by the way, I also have to mention that every expat I know has developed a deep-seated hatred for motorcyclists.

[18:09] And you'll figure out why in a second. And I should mention helmet laws down here. They do exist, but a lot less than half the cyclists ever use them, and their passengers almost never do. And by the way, like I said in a previous show, every single day of the week, you'll see motorcycles with three, even four people on them, usually families, mothers and fathers with their babies. It's something that us expats, no matter how long we're down here, just never get used to. And of course, there's laws against it, and they even have public service television announcements warning people against doing it. But three and four on a bike is a long-standing custom with the lower classes, and until somebody starts enforcing the law, they'll never change. So like I said, it's common to see motorcycles in pieces splattered all over the place down here, especially in the rainy season.

[18:55] But the most dangerous few weeks of all in the entire year, where you see by far the most car accidents and the most splattered motorcycles, and for that matter, dead pedestrians, is in the two weeks that come right before the rainy season finally arrives. And in Central America, and in the northern half of South America, that would come in late March and early April. In that time of the year, sometimes you're better off not driving at all and staying home, especially if you drive a motorcycle. Now I don't recommend expats driving motorcycles down here. Even if you're filthy rich, love speed, and just have to have a Harley, a BMW, or a Ducati. I still say forget it, it's just not worth it. And I'll give you the reasons why in a little while. But right now, I want to tell you why those two weeks right before the rainy season are so dangerous.

[19:40] Well, it's because in those two weeks, you get the first few spatterings of rain. After six months of complete desert-like dryness. Which means for one thing, people have completely forgotten how to drive when the road is wet. Just like the first few snows up in the first world, there are a hell of a lot of accidents. Because people just aren't used to it, but forgetfulness and inexperience aren't the primary reasons why it's so dangerous down here in those few weeks. It's because during that long six-month dry season, little by little, tiny layers of dust, vaporized oil from the burning of diesel, and microscopic rubber particles from the wearing down of your tires on the road have penetrated into the pores on all the road surfaces down here. Now when that stuff is dry and all mixed together, no problem. You don't even notice it, and it might even help your traction.

[20:28] Now when the first few intermittent showers come, right before the rainy season comes in full force, all those microscopic particles of dust, rubber, and oil lift up out of the pavement, mixing with the new fresh rain, and suddenly there's a fine oil slick on the road. And that means after you hit your brakes, the same way you've been doing for the last six months of the dry season, you're very lucky if you don't rear end the guy right in front of you. That's when you see those 5, 10, 15, and 20 car pileups down here. It's always during those intermittent showers right before the beginning of the rainy season. And it's no surprise that that's when most pedestrians get whacked too, including wandering drunks on foot. And by the way, down here, drunks are called perachos or bolos. And believe me, when you're down here, you'll hear those two words a lot.

[21:14] Anyway, personally, I've been on the streets right before the rainy season kicks in, and those newly created oil slicks do their dirty work. And I did sideswipe a few guard rails, but luckily I never rear ended anyone, because I do practice what I preach and I stay well behind the guy in front of me. Because like I said, insurance companies down here report that nearly 80% of all accidents involve a rear end collision. So the easiest way to prevent it is just give a lot of space to the guy in front of you. I know, easier said than done. Especially if you're a first world girl or guy in a hurry. And you know, for expats, that's one of the hardest habits to break. We just love to be aggressive in traffic. And though that might get you there faster up north, down here it'll only get you in trouble. And that's why in one of my upcoming shows, I'll be doing a segment on the things that

[22:00] expats have to overcome mentally and psychologically, in order to live happily ever after down here in the third world. Because there are some dyed in the wool, first world traits that we have to overcome, or you just won't be the happy camper you thought you'd be. So stay tuned for that. Now mentioning motorcycles again, down here, those things are a real danger to anyone driving a car. Because unlike up in the first world, you see them now and again. Down here, they're everywhere. In fact, there's 20 times as many motorcycles per capita as there are up in the first world. That's because when the average guy makes $200 or $300 a month, he can't afford a car or gas for that car. Though piece of junk motorcycles that actually run, go for around $100 down here. And a cheap rice burner with a tiny 50 or 100cc motor can get well over 100 kilometers

[22:49] a gallon. So even for the low end of the population, having a motorcycle is an affordable dream. But that means us expats have to dodge 20 times as many motorcycles on the road than we're used to dealing with up in the first world. And because 98% of those motorcycles are driven by people who live in laminated houses and don't even have hot water, which goes a long way to explain their devil-may-care attitude when in traffic. Not to mention the low value that they put on their own possessions, and by association, the low value that they put on yours. Especially when they're motoring right next to you in traffic, or when they lean their bike against your car in a parking lot. Which happens all the time and makes expats red hot. Cyclists down here have no respect for cars, or what a car can do to them in an accident. So they think nothing of weaving in and out of traffic like rats in a maze, and in fact

[23:39] you can count on a certain amount of physical contact if you're in a traffic bottleneck or you're stopped at a red light. Because that's when every guy on a rice burner is going to try to work his way past you. And that's why every car from the radiest 30-year-old Nissan Sentra to a bullet-proof Mercedes SUV has tiny little scratch lines along the door panels. Because as these little guys weave their way through on these motorcycles, they're always brushing up against the side of your car. And though Latin drivers down here are all too used to that, it's something that drives expats absolutely nuts. And when you first get down here, and it happens to you, and you roll your window down and you call out the guy with your choice Spanish insult words like bruto, tonto, or idiota, well the guys on the bikes, they have no idea what you're upset about.

[24:25] To them, they're just doing what they always do to work their way through the jungle. But to you, it's an insult, a big one. But that's something you'll have to get over if you want to live down here. And for all of us expats who have made the transition successfully, it's always a bit of a bumpy road at first, especially if your Spanish sucks. But like everything else in life that's worthwhile, you decide it's okay to lose a few small battles. Because you know in the end you're going to win the war. And since I'm talking about motorcycles here, every big city, believe it or not, has a Harley Davidson, Ducati, BMW, and other high end motorcycle dealerships. Now personally I think it's a great idea to take a Harley or Ducati or whatever and go out on a long road trip, because the scenery down here is tremendous. But as an expat looking at this from a lot of angles, and a guy that knows people with

[25:12] Harleys and BMW bikes down here, I can tell you it's an awful lot like owning a boat. It's a lot more stressed than fun. It's got what I call a negative pleasure to pain ratio. First of all, if you think that car drivers don't respect bikers up in the first world, you might as well be invisible down here. In fact, a wealthy latin friend of mine who drives a Harley, a guy who played the weekend warrior with his Harley buddies for a year or two, leather pants and all, lost his leg after he got hit by a garbage truck down here. Now that's a heavy price to pay for being a first world wannabe, isn't it? And driving a high end bike down here is a clickish thing. Harley's, BMW's, Ducati's, and big boar Honda's are not bought by the average population. It's that upper 2% of the latin rich who buy those things, and then they're only weekend

[26:01] warriors who end up buying all those expensive leather Harley accessories, along with trick paint jobs and chrome doodads for their bikes, yet they never do their own maintenance or polish their own bikes. They have their bodyguards do that. It's a whole different scene down here. They are truly third world guys with money to burn, who have no clue as to the Harley lifestyle up in the first world. Though they just gotta have one, because they watch US cable TV and they see that Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jay Leno, and Kevin Costner ride one, so they must be cool. It's just another cool first world thing that they can do on weekends to impress their friends. I mean a lot of these rich guys have 20 and 30 thousand dollar beautiful Harleys parked in their garages. But these Harleys aren't their pride and joy, they're untouchable little babies, like they represent for true blue Harley owners up in the first world, who won't let anybody even

[26:50] touch their bikes, and would never let anyone else wash, wax, or polish it. For these third world rich guys, it's just another thing to sit in a garage for the bodyguard to wash and wax every once in a while, along with the boat, the boxer, and the jet ski. And though the Harley and BMW motorcycle owners down here do look the part, and they have all the right clothing and accessories, and they have their clubs and occasional weekend rallies, don't ever confuse them with real motorcycle aficionados up in the first world. They're just bored, wealthy pretenders jumping on another first world fad. So my advice to expats is, if you absolutely have to have a high end motorcycle down here, keep out of the city and stick to deserted country roads, you'll live longer. You've been listening to The Expat Files, living in Latin America, and don't forget

[27:42] you can email me on anything at all about Latin America. The Expat Files at gmail.com, that's theexpatfiles at gmail.com. See you next time, nos vemos!