by Karen McConnaughey
I know I mention Jose, our gardener, and his wife Vicki (our
housekeeper) a lot, but to me they embody everything that is good and fine and
wonderful about living in the Lake Chapala area of Mexico. They take care of us…yes,
because we pay them, but also because they care about us. I don’t know how the discussion
started, but one time Vicki and I were having a conversation about a neighbor
of theirs. Vicki talked about how this woman had no children and she was seriously
ill, and that Vicki would help her out by getting groceries, cleaning her house
or making her food among other things. She was relating it not because she
wanted me to know how good she was, but just in a matter of fact way of that’s
what neighbors do here…they take care of one another. I was a little overcome
by her story and later came up and slipped $200 pesos into her apron pocket and
just said, “para su vecina” (for
your neighbor), and started to walk away. “Senora
Karen,” Vicki said. I turned and she hugged me and said, in Spanish, that
before she met us she had never known any Norte Americanos very well. She
wanted me to know that she loved us and she would never leave us. She would be
with us forever. Needless to say, we both had tears in our eyes at the end of
that conversation.
Vicki and Jose take care of us in so many ways. They’re
always afraid we’re being taken advantage of. Once we had some workmen here who
Vicki thought took much too long and did not do a good job. After they left, she
said that whenever we needed anything, we should ask her. If Jose couldn’t do
it, they would find someone good for us to use.
So now when we need something done, we ask them and, for the
most part, Jose has been able to help us. For instance, Jose painted almost the
entire inside of our house, repairing walls and ceilings at the same time. In
some cases, he had to chip out the cement and go down to the brick. Then he put
in chicken wire to enforce the wall, re-cemented the area and repainted it. He
did all of this for around $300 USD. And, honestly, we tried to pay him more,
but he wouldn’t hear of it.
Last year he and his uncle worked for four hours in the
blazing sun to water-proof our roof before the rainy season came. They charged
us $600 pesos (less than $60 USD) to do this. Bill insisted they take $800
pesos, and Jose finally relented!
Part of our next-door neighbor's house wall is also our
garden wall...it separates our two properties. They’ve lived there a couple of
years now. One day they came to talk to Jose about his watering of our
bougainvillea that were planted against our wall…and actually his house! He
said when we water the flowers, the water soaked into their house and created
some problems. We immediately asked Jose to pull out the vined flowers. We
wanted to be good neighbors. Then over the next few weeks when Jose had time,
he built a cement barrier curb against their house so that water would not leak
in. He did an excellent job. Of course, have I mentioned before that Jose built
the house that he, Vicki and their two daughters live in? He built it from the
ground up with a little bit of help from relatives. He is an amazing young man!
And, Vicki occasionally calls him lazy! Go figure!
Well, just recently Jose came to our rescue again. When we
moved into our house in Lake
Chapala, there was no one
living behind us. In the six years we’ve lived here, a house has been built by
a Mexican family. A few days ago, the man of the house came to talk to Jose to
let him know that the water cascading into our back terrace from the roof and
rushing out the drain in the back wall was gushing into their home. Oh my! This
time we asked our friend and co-worker Tere to help out with translations about
what we needed to do. We knew with our minimal Spanish, we might not get all
the nuances right of what was needed to do to fix this problem. The three of
them (Bill, Jose and Tere) even went over to talk to the neighbor. This
happened on a Monday and during the past week, Jose dug a trench in our back terrace
(carefully taking out the existing tile to reuse later), put in a new grate, cemented
the drain and diverted the water to our septic tank! He cut a hole in the
septic tank for the PVC pipe and cemented it in nice and strong. Before he was
entirely finished, but after the cement dried, we had a really hard rain, and
for the first time, we didn’t have any water coming into our bedroom from our
terrace either. Before, that small drain coming off the terrace couldn’t always
get rid of a torrential downpour at night fast enough, and it would spill over
through our terrace doors. It was never enough to be a problem…just a nuisance.
Over the last seven days, Jose worked on this task, off and
on, depending on his regular work schedule for a total of four days, and used
all his own tools, of course, and did an absolutely magnificent job all by hand…as
you will see from the photos. And, you will see by the number of photos I took
that I was immensely proud and amazed at the speed and quality of work. I
didn’t get involved very much in the decision-making about this job. Okay, I
will admit…I hated the very thought of it. I imagined the terrace would never
look right again, but I knew it had to be done. After, we are good neighbors…no
matter where you live, you try to be a good neighbor…right? So problem solved. Karen’s
happy. The neighbor is happy and all in seven days…before we had another big
rain, so no more rain in our neighbor’s house. Everybody’s happy, because it
looks beautiful. See for yourself below…You can’t even tell what’s been done!
And for his extraordinary efforts, Jose asked for a grand
total of $600 pesos, and, again, wouldn’t take more. Less than $60 USD for all
that hard, demanding and quality workmanship. We figured he wouldn’t let us pay
him more, so since we knew he had visitors this week…oh yes, did I mention he
was also on vacation???...we bought him a double pack of his favorite Tequila,
Pueblo Viejo, as a thank-you gift. It was something we thought he could enjoy
with his friends and family while our village’s Saint’s days were going on.
Bill and I consider ourselves very lucky in so many ways.
Here we are retired from the American rat race, but working at a job we love.
We knew so little about this area when we moved. As I look back, I think it’s
true what Bill and I always laughingly say, “God takes care of idiots.” We did
very little research, saw one house, bought it and moved within four months of
making the decision to retire to Mexico! What could possibly go
wrong? :-D We never even considered what we would do as retirees living in Mexico. We
never even considered there was a possibility of working here…it never entered
our minds. After moving here though, we just plunged into the community,
helping out where we could, picking up a little money here and there…Bill with
his tai chi and me as copy editor of one of the English-speaking publications
down here. We kept busy and we made friends and took advantages of
opportunities that came our way.
Because of our interactions with the community, we have met
the most wonderful people, and Jose and Vicki have to be at the top of that
list. To whatever events collided to give us this wonderful life in Lake Chapala,
I want to say, ‘thank you, thank you, thank you!’ And I also give myself credit
for saying ‘yes’ at all the right times. There were times when too much
over-thinking could have squashed our dreams forever. We are very fortunate
indeed to be living the good life in Lake
Chapala, Mexico.
I hope you’re able to join us some day. And, no, I will not tell you where Jose
lives or give you his phone number. I’m not THAT good of a neighbor! :-D
Karen McConnaughey: Operations Manager for FocusOnMexico.
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