Diferencias Culturales

Carrie wanted me to update on some of the cultural differences, so here goes.

First of all – driving. Now, some of you may think you have seen bad driving in your day, and that no one in the States uses turn signals, blah blah blah. In Mexico, most, no all, people adopt a policy about stop signs that goes something like this: “If I’m not going to die by running this stop sign, then I’m running this stop sign.” And I’m fairly confident that many of the cars have the blinkers taken off of their cars to reduce weight, because NO ONE uses blinkers. Something that all Mexican drivers use though, and very frequently might I add, is their horn. For some reason, honking seems to make the driver feel better about himself – even if he was the one that caused the reason for the honking! It’s ridiculous.

Second – Seat belts. I firmly believe that there are only about 6 people in the whole city of Monterrey that use their seatbelts while the drive. The city has about 4 million people in it – that’s 1.3 x 10^-6 or .0000013 percent of people that use their seatbelts. Yes, it is the law to use your seatbelt, just like it’s the law in the states. Most of the taxis I have been in do not even have their seat belts any more. It’s like the drivers didn’t feed the seats enough and they went and ate the damn belts. No one knows what happened to them.

Third – Taxis. The taxis in Mexico are extremely cheap. They start out at 7 pesos, which is about 65 cents. Here is an example. It’s a 45 minute walk to school. Or I could take a cab, without a seatbelt, mind you, for about 25 – 30 pesos, depending on where I catch him at. That’s like 2 – 3 bucks, each way. There’s no way you could get a cab for that cheap in the states, anywhere. Also, almost all of the taxis are either made by Nissan or are VW Bugs. I can’t tell you why, because I don’t know.

Fourth – Pop/Soda/Coke/WhatEverYouWantToCallIt. Here in Mexico, you can buy pop in two fashions: Glass bottle or Plastic bottle. Essentially, the plastic bottles are more expensive for the same about of liquid, but easier to transport/save for later/etc. I can get essentially 12 ozs(or a can) of Diet Coke for 3 pesos, which is basically a quarter. Even better, if I bring a used glass bottle in to the gas station, I can get it cheaper, because they recycle all of the bottles here. And not only is it cheaper, it tastes better. That’s right, the Mexicans don’t fool around with that High Fructose Corn Syrup crap, hell no, they use only the best sugar cane. Diet Coke here tastes like regular Coke in the states and Regular Coke tastes completely different than anything you’ve ever had related to a Coke product, but it’s really good.

Fifth – Pay/Public Phones. These don’t operate like they do in the US. In the US, as you all know, you put 50 cents into the machine and make your call. In Mexico, you have to prebuy your minutes. Kind of like a calling card, but it only works in these payphone type things. These payphones have a slot and you put your card into it, like a credit card and it automatically takes away X amount of pesos, depending on how long you talk. Pretty straightforward, but just something different.

Sixth – Air Conditioning/Electricity. The cost of electricity is apparently astronomical compared to the cost in the US. Therefore many families don’t have AC and even those that do don’t use it very often. When I first arrived here, I didn’t think there was an AC unit in the house, so I just gave up hope. However, one night last week, Senora came and closed all of our windows and I suddenly felt a very cool air blowing on my feet and it was coming from the duct near the ceiling! I was very excited to feel this, for it meant we had AC. We only use it at night, when we’re sleeping – because as everyone knows, trying to sleep while it’s hot is almost impossible. The Mexicans are also a lot more energy conscious than we are. I mean, I have to turn off my ceiling fan if I leave the room for more than 5 minutes. I have to turn off the light if I don’t really need it. I turn off the TV if I’m not watching it, but just have it on for background noise. It was kind of difficult to get used to, but I’m doing ok with it now.

Well I think that’s all for now. I hope that gives you some insight into the life of a Mexican. Also, I was told by an informant that all of my former colleagues at Intrust now have the address to this and to not bash on any of them. It is with great displeasure that I hold myself back from this, as I had planned to make today’s post purely with propaganda and blasphemy towards the employees of Intrust. Burk, I’m watching you…

If you didn’t catch the sarcasm in the last paragraph, you may want to go and buy a baseball glove, it might help.

Scott