Sometimes you just need HELP

It's just crazy here, I thought moving here my life would be easy & slower... Life is never slower!  The easy is debatable! Easy in that we have Pati, our muchacha (the term for a maid, who does not live in) 2 days a wk.. She is AMAZING!!   But the part of life that is not easy is the fact that I am not a native Spanish speaker, nor is it my 2nd language, LOL, heck, I am barely able to get my ideas across at times.  I am trying to manage more with my limited but growing vocabulary.  If I start the conversation, then all is bueno, but god help me when someone starts talking to me first, it's anyone's guess what the conversation is about!!   All my confidence flies out the window & I find myself stumbling & stuttering...& "lo siento, hablo un poco español" (sorry, I speak only a little Spanish) comes out of my mouth as a form of self-defense, uggg!

I have felt such pride at being able to successfully order lunch meat at the deli counter.. And the guys working the counter got to know me, they knew my limited language & worked with me.  Mexico is still a somewhat sexist culture, so it didn't surprise me that the Deli guys remembered me, the very pale, poor Spanish speaker with green eyes (everyone, and I mean everyone, around here has brown eyes.. ). But then the deli got new workers, all females, who asked rapid-fire questions after my carefully practiced order.. Huh?? What are they asking me? I was not prepared for this.. And repeating my order didn't clear things up!  Next thing I know the deli lady is slicing meat & serving it to me to taste.. So then I get it, she is trying to sell me something else... Now my questioning begins.. In its limited fashion... After struggling with trying to express myself, I have to fall back on my self-defense... Which is code for:. "Take pity on me deli lady, Why are you trying to sell me something else??"
The deli guys would never have tried a switch-a-roo like that on me!

Sometimes you just need HELP...
That's when I save lil jobs for Pati... It's things like calling a doctor's office to make an appointment.. I just didn't know the words -YET- to ask for an appointment, and how to answer all the Q's that would follow... I am glad to say that now I can schedule an appointment for the doctor (must be all the practice I have been getting between hospitalizations and illnesses..LOL).    I needed Pati's help with paying the gas bill, especially since I didn't realize the occupant letter in my mailbox was even a bill.  And it was further confusing because the bill said November & December... But after paying them, I was given receipts stating October & November..  Those are just a few of the little ways Pati has been invaluable!! Everybody living abroad should get a maid so they have someone to help them just function in society!

This country is all about hired help!  In fact, the apartment next to me, has 2 maids.  One that lives in and 1 that comes a few days a week.  Really wealthy houses have a nanny, a driver, a cook and a maid for everything else.  I have not met such a family yet, but I hear they exist.... (I am pretty sure I won't be rubbing elbows with those families, but still, I bet the family that owns Jose Cuervo, for example, has several staff).  

I am sure this country has more cleaning jobs than anything else!! It's amazing, in my complex, they rake the lawn every morning to get any leaves off the grass that fell over night... And the rake is hilarious, it is made from tree branches - it literally looks like the broom the Wicked Witch from the West rode in the Wizard of Oz!
The cleaning people mop floors and wash glass doors & windows of course, but they also wash -by hand-the concrete half wall that separates the walkway from the grass play area!!  And they have the power floor scrubbers that we see used in large stores  or in malls, that clean tile floors.. They use that machine to clean the concrete floor of the garage & the drive through road in front of our building!! They are power-scrubbing the street!!  Yet, amazingly enough, I still need to wash the bottoms of our shoes periodically because they are so black!! Must be because the rest of Mexico City is not scrubbing their streets!

Aside from cleaning, Pati is teaching me wonderful things - like how to make homemade salsas... I will never buy salsa from a jar at the store again!  We have also made a number of traditional Mexican dishes, and we have liked them all.  I have tried to reciprocate and teach her a few things too.  I made my kettle corn for the kids one day, she had never had it before, and so I made a batch for her too - and she watched me so she could learn.  Of course there are no Whirly-Pop pans here in Mexico, I culd not make my fabulous popcorn without it, but I bet she can, she can do anything.  One day I needed to make cookies in a rush, so I made cake-mix cookies, She was really surprised!  First off, she had never used a cake mix before, but to see it used for a cookies, and they were done in just a few minutes, she was in awe.  She is now a fan of my meatballs (thank you Joanne!).  She has helped me make them a few times and now she has made them at her home too.  I am glad that I can share a thing or two with her.  When Pati is here, I practice my Espanol with her and she practices her English with me.  It is working out well for both of us, because we all need a lil help sometimes.   

It's just a car...

'Ya know, driving in Mexico is one of the things that I dislike about living here.  It is absolutely crazy, it's dangerous, it's actually unbelievable at time, to see the things that happen, right before your eyes...in front of your car.  But it had been a badge of honor - to me at least - that I had been able to avoid a car accident so far.  The other expat wives have warned me, to be prepared, that when it comes time to turn in my vehicle, my husband will have to fill out an accident claim form to go along with it.  "It's just inevitable," they have said, but I was soooo hoping to be the exception.

Really?  What was I thinking?  What would make me so special and exceptional that I could avoid doing - or having happen to me - what others could not?? This is after all, as I just said, the craziest place I have ever seen drivers, well... umm... drive.  They are driving cars, trucks, motorcycles & scooters... They just don't do it the same way we do back in the USA, and they don't even do it the way that the Mexican government intents them to.  Depending on where you are in Mexico, traffic laws are somewhat obeyed, like here in Santa Fe, where we live.  But in other places, there really are no traffic laws, other than WATCH OUT!

For example, There are very few traffic lights here in our city.  And a traffic light is almost always at a very large TOPE (toe -pay).  A 'tope' is a speed bump.  These speed bumps are used to control traffic in the city, instead of stop signs, or traffic lights.  These speed bumps are pretty serious, you will really hurt your car if you do not slow down for these.  Really, you are supposed to STOP, before going over these.  This allows cars in opposing lanes of traffic to make a left hand turn in front of you for example, because you will take a moment to brake before the speed bump and then have to go over it slowly.  It also allows cars to merge into your lane because these speed bumps are strategically placed in certain lanes at certain places in the road... Really, there are just a ton of these things!  For me to get off of my residential street, to join other traffic, I have to go over 6 speed bumps!  It used to be 7 speed bumps, but since 2 bumps were only 5 feet apart, they decided to remove one, whew, that's really going to help save my shocks!  Driving 3 miles to school, there are 14 speed bumps, the kids counted one day...think maybe it was a lil reminder to me to take it easy on them, because they tell me the bumps feel VERY DIFFERENT in the 2nd and 3rd rows of the car, LOL.

So drivers must "obey" speed bumps, but that is basically it.  The few traffic lights, some people stop, some do not, some stop briefly, check for walkers, and then proceed through the red light - but at least they let walkers cross the road!  Turn signals, to change lanes; I am, for a fact, the ONLY person in Santa Fe that does that!  Turn signals, to indicate a turn... There are a few of us out there, but I can tell you who is NOT USING THEM... the terrible drivers who decide to make a left hand turn from the far right hand lane, thus crossing over, in front of 3-5 lanes of traffic!  These drivers, mostly Taxis and Buses, just completely disregard everyone else and put others and themselves in danger.  They usually do this at a red light, where walkers were crossing so cars had to stop, and while the light is still red, they cut out into oncoming traffic.  The other day, I was stopped at a light, behind a car.  There were 2 cars next to me, but since the lanes for traffic are hardly marked on the road, they were not too close to me.  A small taxi came from behind all of us, squeezed between all of us and on the red light went zooming through and make a huge left-hand turn against on-coming traffic - causing 5 lanes of traffic to come to a screeching halt so as to not hit the taxi!  And to think, not a single honk, AND that someone was in that taxi, paying for the fare and to have their life jeopardized like that!

But on any other day, there will be crazy honking, usually to let you know that you should go, and stop waiting for 'your turn'.... Here, you need to 'make your turn,' 'create your turn,' just 'TAKE your turn,' or you will get run over by others!

So, I have had a couple of scrapes on my car, that were not my fault:   No esta mi falta!  I was driving next to one of the big, green, public transportation, city buses.  I really don't like those buses.  They usually stop on a dime without warning, so it is bad to be in a lane behind them,  they spew black smoke from the exhaust (choke, gasp - hello pollution), and in general, they feel they own the road, because they are huge and practically indestructible - by a car, anyway.  So while driving next to the big green monster, it started to merge into my lane - without a blinker, or a honk to warn me!  It scratched my side mirror as I was bringing my car to a stop before it took off my whole front quarter panel.  So the passenger side mirror is damaged, but it still works, whew!  Very minor, and NOT MY FAULT!

 

Then while driving to school one day, a lane of the road was blocked off.  Seriously, they do as much road work here as in Michigan, but there is no nasty winter to ruin the roads in the first place.  They seem to make up work, for the sake of having work to do.  So a huge Suburban was in the lane that was blocked off and it needed to merge behind me.  Traffic was creeping along and she jumped the gun and crept a bit too far and hit me.  And then she had the nerve to honk her horn at me and wave her hands all around, as if it were somehow my fault!!  I was in shock, really, this just happened?!?  But since it was rush hour, and we were jammed in 1 lane, there was no getting out to look... Later, all that I saw was her paint on my bumper, thank you 5mph impact bumpers!  Again, Not my fault!

But today, today is totally different.  And while technically I was driving the car, and I was the one who hit something, I must start off by saying, NONE of this would have happened, if the parking lot payment and exit procedure were not so flawed!  Danielle was supposed to go back to the Allergist to have her skin re-tested today - 6wks after the initial testing, to check the validity of a few suspected allergies (I do not, repeat DO NOT want to have an egg & Gluten allergy in my house!).  Well, there was an error in scheduling, and the doctor was in fact at the other hospital today, so Danielle's appointment had not been properly recorded, so we had to reschedule.  So we left and we had to get our parking ticket validated and pay it, in the hospital, at a parking vending machine.  I inserted the ticket, it said no charge, because we were there such a short time.  We got in our car and drove to the exit gate, put the ticket in, it said, no exit because no pay. GRR!!!  I called for assistance about 10 times, no answer and now another car was behind me.  This meant I needed to back up and go back to the hospital and re-validate the dang ticket!  So I motioned to the car behind me to back up and he did.  I started to back up and then the assistance button started to say: HOLA?? HOLA?? and 2 parking attendants were walking up and I was trying to back up and all the distraction and BAM !!!!! I hit the stupid wall and I heard the CRUNCH!

So I jerked my car forward to disengage myself from the wall, and the attendant was asking what was my trouble?  Really, smoke was coming out my ears ,and I could not formulate full Spanish sentences - I was speaking Spanglish.  "Machine said SIN CARGO, gate says NO PAGAR, now I hit the wall!!"  The attendant looks at my ticket and tells me, ever so calmly, that it took me 1 minute too long to get to the gate, so now I have to pay.  I asked if he would just let me go, I already damaged my car, I am not backing up again!  He told me to pay him the parking fee and he would raise the gate... About 5 cars were honking now as I searched my car for exact change to pay the parking fare.  In the meantime, Danielle had gotten out to look at the car.  She said it was "NOT GOOD".

Well I didn't see the car damage until we got to school, she was right, it is not good... I had my pity party and now I am moving on.  I cannot allow myself to be angry anymore.  There are far worse things that could happen today, so a giant scratch/dent in the car is not cool, but the car still runs just the same.  I am really lucky, actually, speaking of cars.  Lots of expats wives around here have husbands that work for the American Embassy.  They only get 1 car for the family, so many wives do not have a car everyday at their disposal like me.  Another expat wife here has a driver, WOW, am I jealous!  I am afraid to go places sometimes because the driving is crazy here, did I mention that??  Well, come to find out, drivers have certain days and certain hours, and if those don't fit your need, you have a problem.     

So the lesson, as always, continues to be, ACCEPTANCE.

Accept where I am, accept all that "where I am" means... the good, the bad and the crazy!