A Mexican New Year’s Anecdote
On January 1st of the new year, we left the house for a quick sprint to the supermarket. Once there, Sigrid went into the store, while Jose remained in the car which turned out to be a good thing, because another truck bumped into the rear end of our pick-up leaving a nice round dent. The author of the bump was a young man (19 years old, as we later learned). The first thing Jose noticed was that the car had no license plates, and when Jose asked the youngster for some documentation – driver license, registration and insurance papers – he intimated that he had none, and he went on to explain that his father had just sent him to the supermarket for meat for a carne asada - and in the hurry he did not take any papers along. So Jose decided to call the police patrol that came, but not right away. In the meantime, the father of the young man had arrived. He explained to Jose that he was a Tecate businessman, in fact, he was the owner of a junk yard and a garage where our car would be repaired in no time – no problem there, he told the policeman whom he knew, by the way. The police left, and did not even fine the young man for driving without documents.
We were left to sort things out with the father of the young man. Finally, we all decided that we would go right away to leave the car where it could be repaired. We followed father and son and arrived at their business where people had already started the new year celebration, among others four policemen in full uniform. We were greeted by the wife and of course invited to try their barbecue, which we accepted. The young man and his mother joined us, and we had a pleasant conversation. Upon leaving, Jose passed by the table of the four policemen, helped himself to a glass of Tequila and said an amicable good-bye to everybody, not without insisting again that we would need the car by next day, Saturday, in the afternoon. Lo and behold, they did return the pick-up by late afternoon, not fully repaired, but with the promise to come and get it on Monday morning for the final touches. (They did indeed send a tow truck to pick up the car, and we got it back, fully repaired the day after.)
No insults, no angry shouts were exchanged – really, we learned again, there is, in Mexico, nothing so serious that it cannot be solved with a smile and a handshake, even a hug and a tequila!
However, I should add that this incident is just another example of the absolute impunity “enjoyed” by the Mexicans – you can do whatever you want to do, nothing will happen to you, and if by chance the law catches up with you, there is always a way out through corruption from the bottom up. The young man in this story was indeed not afraid at all that “something” could happen to him by way of a fine or his presence at the police station. His “Papa” would know how to handle this unfortunate incident. Full stop!
