Unwanted visitors

Visitors are always welcome down here in Mexico. Well, almost always. I’ve had two unwelcome visitors this past week. They are not pretty stories, but they are part of expat life, so here goes.

The first visitor was–apparently–la gripe (“gree-pay”), or as you know it NOB, the stomach flu. Last Friday afternoon I went to my club for a nice tuna filet with a sashimi appetizer, as my wife and I have done for almost eighteen months now. It was delicious, but later in the afternoon my stomach started making “possession” noises. Oh, bad sushi, I thought, and prepared for the worst just before it hit. Then when I stumbled back to bed, I noticed I was shivering! Sure enough, I also had a low grade fever and chills. So probably not food poisoning, but rather something viral: la gripe.

The next two days were solid misery, as I only left the horizontal position to go to the bathroom, or take the dog out. My dog was as useless as you might think; he just stared at me and said things like “you’re not going to lay on the couch all day again, are you?” Maybe I imagined that. But I bet that was what he was thinking. Anyway, the fevers (and hallucinations?) broke Sunday morning, and I got the other symptoms under control by Sunday night. Monday I felt very weak, but not sick. By Tuesday I felt well enough to go to Spanish class.

Yes, of course, I rushed my recovery and now am slowing down again to let nature take its course. How I got sick remains a mystery, and I have not been to the doctor, so other possibilities (mosquito-borne illnesses) are in play. What this has to do with being an expat are all the offers of assistance I received from friends. I did finally accept Basil & Ernie’s offer to pick up meds and electrolytes, which saved me a trip out I really could not have accomplished. But I had offers of food and help from Lorraine and Barbara and John & Catherine and many more. Once again, that sense of community comes to the fore when you need it most. Gracias, mis amigos!

The second visitor was brief but equally annoying. After Spanish class on Tuesday, I stopped by Lorraine’s casa (she of the great Italian cooking) to pick up some prepared meals I had previously ordered. I pulled my car over directly in front of her front gate, got out, opened the door and walked no more than ten feet in…I could still see the back end of my car through the gate. Lorraine and I caught up for about five minutes, then I departed, put the food in the cooler in the back, and started driving home. I noticed I could hear road sounds, like the window was open, but it wasn’t. I looked at the dash instrument, and it indicated the passenger door was ajar.

Since I was at a stop light, I leaned over and pushed it as if to open it, and it barely budged: it was partially, not fully closed. So I tugged on it, the door engaged, and the instrument light went off. The light turned green, and I started to drive. Then it hit me: I am home alone, and no one has used my passenger door since my wife left for a stateside visit last week. ¡AY!

I glanced at the passenger seat where my smartphone used to be. Nope, not there. I pulled over and searched the car. Nothing. I drove back to the Spanish school, where I know I had it out on the desk and put in in silent mode: not there. I returned to Lorraine’s and it wasn’t lying in the street. She even asked the neighbors if they saw anything, since she lives in a close-knit community and they were as upset as I was that someone had probably stolen it: nada. Someone may have  followed me, waiting to see where I stopped and if I locked the car. Someone may have just walked by and seen the phone sitting there, heard our voices and could tell we could not see them. Either way, someone gently opened the door, took the phone then pushed it (quietly) closed, though not all the way. Either way, it’s all on me for not locking the car!

Thus began my afternoon of customer service with T-Mobile. Since we have US cell plans, the process was challenging. It went well at first: I got on the T-Mobile web site and opened a chat window which promised immediate access to a service rep…which turned out to be a computer program pretending to be named Emele! You could tell by the stilted syntax and odd questions (“Anything else you would like to bring up while I am accessing your records?”). That said, the computer “agent” had pretty good artificial intelligence and was able to assure me that my line was deactivated and no other lines were affected. She could not handle my simple request for how do I go about replacing my phone, asking whether I wanted to upgrade that phone (ummm, its stolen) or do I have insurance (well you would know better than I, wouldn’t you?). Suddenly the chat window closed and I was back in the dark. Emele had had enough!

I video-chatted with Judy and asked her to handle the issue from the States, since I was going to have the new phone sent to her anyway. But apparently I am the primary account holder and never gave her more than something called “standard access” which means only I can deal with T-Mobile. Lucky me! I went on the T-Mobile website and changed her access from standard to “full” but that didn’t help. I think Emele was still angry at me. So Judy found some more customer service numbers, and after many voice prompts and shouts of “HELP” the system recognized that I needed to talk to a real person, and one arrived on the scene.

Once real humans got involved, it all went quickly and smoothly, and we even ironed out the account holder issues. It did involve a comical situation, as I talked on a Mexican landline phone to the service rep in the States, who sent texts to Judy in the States, who confirmed the texts and read back the pass codes to me and the service rep via a video chat I started with Judy on my tablet. In the end, the details all worked out and I will soon get a new phone. The Good Lord provides…even cell phones!

As to the thief, well, I hope they get some value out of the phone (even though it was pretty old), probably at the local pawn shop, as my friend John King reminded me. Petty theft is a fact of life where poverty and (relative) wealth co-exist, and the only inarguable point in all this is always, always (did I say always), ALWAYS lock your car.

A supportive community always ready to help, and someone with sticky fingers. No different than many places, but also parts of expat life in Mexico.