#843 – The Expat Files: Crime, Culture, and the DSM in Latin America

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

[00:00] South of the border, down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came out to play and now 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 All right Here's something strange and interesting that I've noticed that's been happening here in Latin America over the last couple of years as it turns out If you were to walk up to a cop, I'm talking about a while back three to five years ago anywhere in Latin America and say

[00:46] What's the most frequent kind of robbery that you come across? Well, he'd say without a doubt car radio theft man. Was that a huge business? I can vouch for that. I've had my car radio stolen three times, but never in the last five years Why because that kind of crime has practically gone away I don't know anyone who's Complaining about it anymore or anyone that's ever happened to in the last couple of years and you don't read about it in the paper Or see it in the internet around the blocks or anything either that kind of crimes virtually Disappeared and man it used to be such a huge business in every medium and large Latin American city There was a section usually in a pretty scruffy even dangerous part of town where you'd see Kiosk after kiosk just filled with all kinds of used radios almost new ones too All with a rat's nest of wires hanging out from behind each unit selling for something like 50 to 25 cents on the dollar

[01:37] And in fact, you could probably buy your own radio back after you've had it stolen But that business these days has slowly dissolved to nothing and now of course number one in the theft business cell phones So look out for that and be alert in my own case I haven't had a cell phone stolen in over 20 years now The crazy thing is the thieves weren't after my phone They stole my briefcase and had my cell phone And you know one of the early jobs and in the 20 something years since then I've never been robbed Hmm, I think maybe for you more recent listeners I should tell that story because it's very slick the thieves were quite astute and here's how it happened You know in the old days when you had to pay your electric and phone bill at the phone office or electric company office I'd walk in to the nearest electric company branch office usually located in the strip mall or regular shopping mall and this

[02:25] Particular time I went in paid the bill came out got back in my car and started it up all of a sudden Little guy walked up knocked on my window remember. I'm in the parking lot now, and it's a gated guarded parking lot Guards at the entrance gate to hand you a ticket and let in guards at various points at the regular entrances Supposedly well monitored, but you can't assume anything But because it was a strip mall in a busy city people who were walking around everywhere from executives in suits to shoeshine boys I'd say 80% of the people didn't have cars They were taking chicken buses or from the neighborhood so lots of low-income people and working poor if you know what I mean So anyway this little guy knocked on my window, and he was holding up a receipt and pointing to it a bit frantically He wanted to tell me something so I cracked the window down a bit, and he said mister

[03:14] You dropped your receipt, and I thought for a second. Oh crap, but then at least he found it right So I opened the door stepped one foot out, and he backed up about a foot still holding the receipt in the air Then I got out a little farther my doors a little wider open, and he backed up another foot Well, I took another step closer to him and saw the receipt wasn't mine somebody else's I said hey not mine Got back in the car started the engine started backing out of my parking spot and realized My briefcase which was sitting on the passenger seat was gone And you know in that second when something like that happens you're kind of confused And I looked in the back seat on the floor all around and after about 30 seconds passed I realized man

[04:01] It's just not here. Then you get that flash of adrenaline panic. You know the feeling and it ain't good I Knew something was fishy and had to do with that little guy in his receipt So I jumped out of the car looked around and man people walking everywhere. He was long gone Here's the part that made me realize that practice this one before now at that time I was driving a brand new Toyota 4runner also a big mistake I learned my lesson having a new car like that in Latin America That's another story, but here's a word of advice Don't drive a big-ass brand new car or SUV like that because the cops will hassle you You'll get pulled over here and there and search and you'll just be an obvious target for gypsies tramps and thieves as they say But that's a lesson I had to learn for myself the hard way

[04:47] Because you know when I first came down and settled into a particular country after roaming around for five years or so I thought hey, I deserve a nice new car. Oh and another thing that's a big car and Latinos Don't care much about personal space. So I was forever getting nicked and scratched in parking lots It was total frustration almost all the time. I had to park the thing I must have had the bumpers recromed on that thing three times in the first year Yep, that was one of the last years that 4runners had actual chrome bumpers and they were heavy metal They weighed a ton but they did dent in scratch and parking lots and even though it costs maybe 50 or 60 bucks They have them completely recromed very nicely, too. It was a terribly frustrating experience So my advice skip the new big-ass cars and go with something like a small pickup truck or a Toyota

[05:38] RAV4 mini SUV make sure they're a couple of years old, too Believe me. I've had all kinds of styles shapes and models of cars in Latin America including full-size SUVs which I don't recommend and those small compact cars. I don't recommend those either I still say it's a pain in the ass to drive a compact car because there are just too many damn potholes and Sometimes a corner will flood out during the rainy season Of course, then you're stuck or you're really screwed if you're in the thick of it In fact, I've been in that situation three or four times now in a compact car when there's a mini flood going on outside When the water is so high, it's actually above the seal of the lower door panel. Not good That's why something like a small pickup of a RAV4 with bigger wheels and higher suspension will always get you through that stuff

[06:26] Okay, of course there are other mini SUVs that work fine like a Suzuki Vittata Ford Escobar as Latinos like to say Ford Escape Every car company's got one or two models in that category Then of course, there's the bigger SUVs like the Honda CRV and Honda Pilot Hyundai Tucson Santa Fe Kia Sportage, etc. Those are very popular cars here. They've got big wheels and high suspension So they'll get you through practically any pothole or water problem They're fine in that respect except the parking if I get about it the bigger the vehicle the more dings bumps and scratches You're absolutely gonna get but where were we? Oh, yeah, talking about the clever way my cell phone got robbed All right. So as mentioned I discovered my briefcase was missing

[07:13] I jumped out of the car looked around the parking lot couldn't see the little guy that had shown me my Supposedly lost electric bill. He claimed I dropped that was the scam because you see he knew that once I opened the door on my car and obviously it was an expensive new car So you figure this gringo is sporting a briefcase, too So there's something valuable in there for sure. He and his accomplice knew yes Of course, he had an accomplice that when you open a newer model car It's got an alarm system on it and automatic door locks, right? But when you open the driver's side door all the other locks pop open That's the way the system works. You open the driver's side door and the rest of the locks automatically pop open

[07:59] Well, they knew that because as soon as I opened the door and stuck a foot out the other guy the guy I never did see stealthily slipped in the passenger side door and ripped off my briefcase Simple as that and after that, of course, I was mad at myself, but I thought you know, that was pretty slick Who'd a thunk nothing crude like you'd expect no gun in the face No threats, no pushing no grab-and-run physical contact the whole thing done totally on the sly So then what was in that briefcase? Well, not much some unimportant papers pens Earbuds and a good old clunky flip phone which brings us full circle to the number one crime here in Latin America That's stealing of cell phones And of course, it's an ongoing battle between cell phone companies and the robbers because with most high-end cell phones

[08:47] Anyway, once they're stolen you can track where they are and you could have the service completely cut off and the phone disabled In fact in just the last three or four months I've been with people who've had their high-end cell phone stolen and they were watching it move around the country Like some kind of video game which isn't much good for your state of mind because you're never gonna get it back And it's only gonna piss you off more knowing it's exact whereabouts and you're powerless and can't do a thing But still it's the number one crime in Latin America and it's got to be worth their while Eventually, they open it up and crack the software and resell it or part it out I don't know how but I guess that's what they do which brings me to a weird subject the psychology of Latinas and their cell phones It's true. Every person in Latin America wants to have the latest and greatest cell phone, too, don't you not me

[09:36] Here's what I don't get. You've got the average Latina working at a beauty parlor or as a bank teller, whatever She's making three or four hundred bucks a month her prized and most expensive Possession is for sure her high-end Samsung or iPhone Usually an iPhone 6 or 7 or Samsung Galaxy 7 or 8 whatever Always one or two models below the latest one or at least a year old and man Can these women batter and beat those phones almost every one of them's got a crack in the bonfire the screen or a dozen Dents and gouges the corners all mung up from dropping it multiple times The crazy thing is they're always riding public transportation and chicken buses because they don't have cars They couldn't afford one But you know number one on their wish list is to get the latest iPhone Samsung LG Hawaii

[10:24] 8 9 10 plus or whatever it is and of course the latest greatest models are 700 to a thousand bucks these days We're talking three even four months salary for one of these girls not to mention every single woman I've ever met has had her cell phone stolen at least once just ran into one of the other days She's had it stolen four times though. Just recently I did run into a Latina that's really on the ball She's had her cell phone stolen a number of times So now she has two different models a high-end Samsung that she uses at work and at home And when she's out and about in the city walking around with things to do taking public transportation and such She has a low-end much older Samsung cheap phone round a hundred bucks And when she showed me the two phones and explained it all to me. I said wait a minute

[11:12] That means you have two phone numbers, right? She said yes two different sim chips two different numbers Then she said that doesn't matter because I hardly ever use the phone at all It's all what's up and the very cool thing about what's up She said is the fact that you always retain the original what's up number No matter how many phones you have or how many times you change your phone so then where are we going with all this? Well, let's just say there's a cognitive disconnect with Latinos and Latinas relative to their actual lifestyle and purchasing power and their most prized possession the cell phone I'll tell you I've tried to have a logical conversation with any number of mostly Latinas about the craziness of having a smartphone that costs three or four months salary only to run the risk every single day of

[11:59] Having the thing ripped off But they don't get it and when I ask them why all they can come up with is the newer phones take better pictures But you know I can beat that argument up all day long They conquered the pixel thing a couple of generations of cell phones ago Even cell phones from a few years ago have better cameras than the public deserves They're all so good these days. Most people can't even tell the difference I mean unless you actually need to take photos because you got a media job. You're a model photographer Real estate agent or newscaster or something It's a fact that on your phone screen the human I can't tell the difference between a six megapixel camera or a 12 or 20 megapixel camera unless it's blown up To the size of a 60-inch TV, but you'll never win that argument with a latina, so don't even try

[12:45] Oh in the second and final argument You'll get for wanting to move up to the next model is that it's got more memory because after all the old one It's only got 32 or 64 gig Of course ain't never realized you can go on Amazon and buy a 256 gig mini SD card for 25 bucks shove it in your phone and you could download one or even 200 HD Hollywood movies, but that logic won't work on a latina or latina either And of course once again it all comes down to an incomplete education because look suppose you take a high-definition photo on your iPhone 8 That photo could easily take up two or three megabytes of data So then why do people take pictures on their cell phones to save them themselves you think no

[13:30] They shoot them up on Instagram Facebook Twitter. What's up, etc. Etc It's all about transferring videos and pictures to anti social media people live for that stuff And the thing is what most people don't seem to realize at all is that your camera Won't even send a picture of two or three megabytes to most anti social media sites It's way too big a file So your smartphone being somewhat smart will knock it down to a much smaller size Let's say a hundred K think of it. That's 120th the size of the file as the original photo So you take that beautiful two megapixel photo of your latest bowel movement and you send it off to all your anti social media buddies Now your phone is smart enough to knock the file size way down

[14:15] Automatically in many cases to 5% of the original file size But wait a minute. Oh, but I'm sorry You need an iPhone 10 or a Samsung 9 plus because it takes better photos, right? Well better photos always means bigger file size that translates to more megabytes of data And as mentioned social media sites don't like big megabyte chunks of data So your beautiful gigantic mega pixel sized photos will never make it to anti social media Not in their original ultra high definition form. They won't sorry, but let me warn you once again Don't ever try that logic on a latino or latina in the end. This is true with human nature It's not about better picture-taking. It's about the coolness factor of having the latest and greatest model

[15:04] Just like a five-year-old Nissan Sentra will get you from point A to point B. Just like a Ferrari will What would you rather have which brings us to this completely unrelated email, but really worth hearing I'll admit it's slightly incoherent and you'll see why soon enough He says Johnny is the world going crazy or is it just me? On this emails from Scotty. He says Johnny I can personally give you 400 reasons why I'm getting my plan be going getting out of Dodge and moving to Latin America He says Johnny. My parents were retired with both tenured professors at the University of Wisconsin-Madison That's where I grew up all my adolescent life. They were wired to think psychiatry was for everyone My dad was in the psych research department and thus he had lots of friends that come over to the house

[15:55] Who were also of that bent? When I was six and started school, I would cry a lot in wine and fuss. So my parents sent me to a shrink Why not? There are great university teachers insurance policy paid for it. So every week I went for about four years and I quit not because I was cured but because dad got promoted to department head and we moved to the University of Michigan You know Johnny it took me a long time to realize that going to a psychiatrist on a regular basis Was not what the whole world did I thought it was like the dentist you just go on a regular basis now I have to tell you I heard you say that in your family your mother always had a lot of books around the house Well, I lived in that scene too and every year a new DSM was on the coffee table

[16:46] I don't recommend you ever buy that one or even look at one for Christ sakes or leave one out for your kids That'd be the worst thing you could do. Those things are absolutely toxic Do you know what a DSM is Johnny? It's the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders It's the handbook used by all psychological health care professionals in the United States and in much of the world And why I'm bringing this up because I think I heard you mention it very fleetingly on a recent show That's what prompted me to write this in the first place. So like you Johnny. I was also a voracious reader I remember on one of your earlier shows You said you read everything in front of you as a kid including the Drano bottle while sitting on the crapper Well me too and thus the DSM sitting on that coffee table

[17:33] I cracked it a million times and I tell you Johnny that book ended up effing up the minds of modern society And it did me too for a long while. Anyway, until I found the alternative media. Thank God for that Unfortunate thing was that my parents and their shrink viewed it as a kind of a Bible when the DSM first came out in 1973 it was truly a revolution in organizing the various sicknesses in psychiatry and it was a gold rush for the drug companies But no one was wise to it back then when you think of it who before 1973 had ever even known the names of the big drug companies except for Listerine the Smith Brothers cough drops which were really just cherry candy Pepto bismol, mercuricrome, Vicks, maple rub and Bayer Aspirin

[18:22] Who'd ever heard of Merck Abbott's labs or Burroughs welcome in reality They were tiny little almost mom-and-pop corporations back then and now they're in the fortune 100 and rule the world so it all started in 1973 when that DSM came out suddenly Unknown drug companies that hundreds of new mental disorders outlined right there in that book Professionally preferred and redacted and University sanctioned after all diseases and disorders real or fake need their cures Real or fake so in 73 for the first time drug companies could invent medications for millions of new patients They could treat for newly named disorders that never existed before and it took off like Applestock the first edition was 65 pages in 1973 in

[19:11] 1980 134 pages by 1995 494 pages and now the latest version which came out in late 2013 947 pages is published by the American Psychiatric Association and you can get it for 99 bucks probably on Amazon and according to the latest fifth edition there are currently 400 known medical disorders with many Subcategories the problem is reading through the thing scares the shit out of you It's a huge book packed with so many disorders some of them Unbelievably weird like fraud or ism which is rubbing against a non consenting person in public transportation vehicles while Fantasizing that one has an exclusive caring relationship with the victim

[20:00] Oh, and it goes in great detail. For example with fraud or ism It says most acts of frontage occur when the person is between 12 and 15 after which there is a gradual decline in frequency I'm not making this up. Johnny. I'll tell you if you're a hypochondriac You don't want to read that book. You'll go to bed that night and never want to get up again Which is by the way also a disorder in the DSM. All right me Johnny here again. Yep, Scotty I've heard about the DSM and really I defy anyone to pick up that thing and start reading and not see some of those symptoms in Themselves like for example, I have restless leg syndrome. I've always had it That means I'm just sitting around and bouncing my foot up and down not like a maniac and when I catch myself I generally try to stop it

[20:45] But you know, I guess it would tend to scare females on the first date green guys Anyway, though, it hasn't seemed to hurt my chances here in Latin America, of course Ladies female green guys, you have that too, you know, so naturally when I heard it had been included in the DSM I looked it up. It says get this restless leg syndrome usually occurs with thin Hyperactive males they tend to have short attention spans that are 80% male Where are those gender equality people when you need them, huh? All right, then Scotty says Johnny. Did you know that recently? Random questionnaires with a list of psychiatric disabilities were placed on hundreds of college campuses Including a half a dozen Ivy League campuses the results more than 50% of the people who took the questionnaire

[21:32] Felt after filling it out and reading about the syndromes that they themselves were suffering from a mental disorder Yep, that's right. 50% of college students thought they had some kind of mental illness In fact, the questionnaire itself tended to depress the people who were taking it Then Scotty says that was recently at my parents place for Christmas and they have the DSM 5 sitting there on the coffee table Latest version as usual in a half an hour. I had diagnosed myself with 12 different disorders including general anxiety disorder arithmetic learning disorder oppositional defiant disorder intermittent explosive disorder dream state disorder and reactive detachment disorder to name a few and reading on to the newest sexual

[22:18] Dysfunctional diagnosis. I think my lucky stars. I don't have Let's see if I can read this right genital pelvic pain penetration disorder think if I had that one I'd be swallowing lead and here I thought after not visiting my parents for a long long time that I was pretty much normal After reading a half hour the DSM 5 I was much crazier than I imagined or maybe the shrinks who put these things together Are bat shit crazy? So the nagging question is are we all crazy? I mean take my sister ever since she was a kid when she's daydreaming or watching TV or something. She unconsciously massages her left earlobe and my cousin Gino a Constant nose rubber and frequent picker and I think Johnny half the world loves to pop bubble wrap

[23:06] Yes, I think there's way too much of that I'm sure there'll be a pill for it soon and my father says and you know It's so nice to have a lived hard shrink father that knows everything He says if you have an obsession that interferes with your life. It's an illness He says if you for example Just keep ordering things just to pop the bubble wrap or you pop the wrap before you even look at what's arrived in the Amazon Box you've got a problem And you're really screwed if after you pop yours you go after everyone else's too Oh, but there are some psychiatrists and psychologists that don't believe in the DSM crap or the scientific basis of psychiatry in general For example one specific research psychologist from fourth in college wanted to use an experiment to demonstrate that Psychiatric evaluations were as useless as they were idolized and so he devised a unique experiment

[23:54] He co-opted seven friends none of them who ever had psychiatric problems and gave them pseudonyms and fake Occupations and then all at once they traveled across America each to a different mental hospital in five different states on both the east And the west coast one was a strictly private hospital an expensive one all others were supported by state or federal funds Here's how it went down at an agreed time each of these people told the duty Psychiatrists that they were hearing a voice in their head that said the words empty hollow and thud That was the only lie they would be allowed to tell the psychiatrist Otherwise they behaved completely normally and you know what all eight were immediately Diagnosed this insane and admitted to those hospitals. They were all given powerful

[24:42] antipsychotic drugs and they discovered there was only one way to get out they had to agree with the Psychiatrists that they really were insane and then pretend to get better now get this when dr Rosen I'm reported the experiment and had it written up in the scientific journals. There were some pandemonium He was accused of trickery. In fact one very famous mental hospital challenged Dr. Rosen hand to send some more fakes their way guaranteeing. They'll spot them this time So he agreed and after a month the hospital proudly announced they had discovered 41 fakes that's when dr. Rosen hand revealed he'd sent no one Aha, then Scotty says and Johnny There's a children's picture book in my dentist's office Brandon and the bipolar bearer written by a woman named Tracy

[25:29] Algala in it little Brandon flies into a rage at the slightest provocation Other times he's silly and giddy his mother takes him and his bear to the doctor who tells him he has bipolar disorder Brandon was sad and asked the doctor if he was gonna get better The doctor said yes, if from now on you take this medicine He said Brandon you could start taking it right away He asked Brandon to promise he'll take his medicine whenever he's told to by his mother From then on Brandon did just that Brandon is eight I rest my case Johnny signed Scotty with a PS that says I am beaming down to Latin America for your seminar I plan on permanently staying once I arrive and we'll be going for permanent or temporary residency in Guatemala

[26:15] All right. Thanks for that Scotty, but did you say you're beaming down to Latin America shortly Scotty? Hmm. Let's see now in the DSM. I think they'd call that fantasy hero displacement disorder syndrome That's when you deeply associate yourself with and develop characteristics and or voice of a fictional Sci-fi character and or action figure but Scotty this is Latin America and we really don't care about the kind of stuff So by all means beam yourself down Scotty and I'll bring the bubble wrap and speaking of my upcoming July 2019 Exped insider seminar will be taking place in two countries again, partly in Guatemala and partly in El Salvador But when you make your flight plans, you'll be flying in and out of Guatemala City In fact, I'm putting together the details right now and I think by the 1st of April

[27:00] I'll have the sign-up sheet and all the info Including everything you need to know about those famous John Galt post seminar trips and how to kill two birds with one stone That has come down to the seminar Stay a couple days longer and apply for permanent or temporary residency in Guatemala It's still one of the cheapest and easiest residency programs in all of Latin America And remember you only have to be in the country one day a year to maintain your residency and after five years you get a passport So do send me an email the expat files at gmail.com if you want to get on my early bird discount list You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America If you need some help with your own plan B, you can schedule a one-on-one phone call with me But first download my free plan B questionnaire at www.thenewexpert.com

[27:46] Better yet, if you want to get your plan B going from right up there in the States Just sign up for my 9-hour expat essentials course Get the perfect plan B blueprint by going to the expat files.com slash academy Los bemos