Interesting How Some Things Change

living.boondockingmexico@yahoo.com

I have to admit that sometimes I believe we live in a backward society here in Mexico.  Oversized shopping malls that the middle and upper-class flock to and just down the street a mercado rodante or street market.  Monterrey's avenues and boulevards are jam-packed with new cars including Teslas, Ferraris, Lincolns, and Cadillacs and on the edge of town, a horse or donkey is pulling a cart.  

Here we sit during the COVID crisis, ordering groceries, gifts, and necessities online.  I recently ordered a spark plug for our Honda generator, bed linens, and did Christmas shopping without leaving the house.  Yet we drive an hour south of our house outside the Monterrey city limits and people live (quite well) in cabins with fireplaces and wood-burning stoves.

I told you recently about the saga of the Best Buy electronics retailer and the closing of their 52 stores in Mexico.  A lot of very disappointed Mexicans.   We had also purchased a new printer on the cheap.  It's one of those HP $50 USD jobs.  We had purchased it on November 12 and it sat here in a box and never opened.  I kept saying, "open that box and test the printer because the guarantee is only 30 days".  It was never opened until December 13 and was after the announcement of the store closing.  It didn't work from the get-go.  The rollers wouldn't pick up the paper.  We fiddled with it but no go.

We attempted to return it saying that all the stores have been closed on weekends as part of the COVID lockdown and we were only a calendar day late.   They wouldn't buy it because unbeknownst to us, printers only have a 15-day guarantee because they are mechanical products.  We came back home and I never made a big deal out of not testing when we first got it.  We rarely print anymore but we do scan and make copies.

Juan wasn't going to accept defeat and throw $50 down the drain.  I thought it was a worthless venture as the stores are now closed and it just sounded like a huge waste of time.  He got on the phone with HP in Mexico City.  They have a major call-center there and a help desk.  The first guy helped him run some diagnoses and determined that yes, it was a bad unit from the factory.  

Put on hold for a short period, he came back and asked Juan if he could hang up, attempt to print something but take a video of it on his phone and send it via email to him.  That took a few minutes and the phone rang.  The technician confirmed the call center operator's diagnosis.  He asked us to hold again and said he would talk to a supervisor.   Next thing we know he gave us instructions via email and said a new printer would be shipped in 15 working days.  Kind of a "well that's fantastic" and an "arghhh" for waiting so long to get it.  

Tuesday night at 8:45 we were watching a movie and I heard the doorbell ring.  We had the bedroom door closed and the television on so Juan said he hadn't heard anything.  I got and checked the security cameras and lo and behold there as a DHL van sitting in front of the gate.

The delivery driver had the new printer!  We exchanged printers, he slapped on some pre-printed labels, and off he went.  We were shocked.  less than 3 working days.  We can't find anyone to fix an electric outlet, replace a few patio floor tiles, or chop down a tree unless we hire someone from Monterrey or pay through the nose and that still takes up to a month to get it done. 

It's an odd place sometimes, but you've got to love all of the contrasts, the culture, and the people.  After 35 years of living here, it can still surprise me sometimes how diverse it all is.