The final whale performace of the season

This has been a truly amazing season for whales in Puerto Vallarta. In fact, it has been the best season since we moved here. Even the whale watching experts agree.

From late November until early March, almost daily we could spot them in Banderas Bay from our balcony. That is in stark contrast to last year when we saw only one or two. Perhaps the difference this year was that the water temperature of the bay was much cooler than it has been for several years.

The big surprise came yesterday, long after the “season” is over. In fact, we have not seen a single whale here for several weeks. But yesterday afternoon, a mom and her calf put on the most spectacular show we have seen, perhaps since we moved to PV. And it all happened in the bay right in front of us. Their show lasted more than 10 minutes. So, I grabbed the camera and rolled. Click here for a link to the YouTube video (edited down to about three minutes).

It’s almost like they are the last ones out of town, waving “adios” before heading north for the summer.

The hardest workers in the world

I saw the story on the NBC Nightly News last night. And while it was a bit of a surprise to me that it made the national news, I guess it should not have been. The report, which is now in several newspapers, found that Mexicans work the most hours each day compared to any other of the 29 industrialized nations. They also work later in life than those in most other countries.

A story in The News today, an English language newspaper from Mexico City, said the report runs counter to stereotypes and perceptions of the outside world, particularly opinions held by some citizens of the U.S. Indeed, when I was a child raised in San Jose, CA where there was a fairly large population of Mexican-Americans, it would not be unusual to hear that they were lazy, always taking siestas, and basically were not hard workers. I never understood that perception because the Latinos that I knew were quite the opposite. Not only were they hard working, but they were studious and devoted to getting the job done. My observations were reinforced throughout my career, working with some of the most devoted and talented photographers, who happened to also be Mexican Americans.

Now that I have lived pretty much full time in Mexico for three years, I have seen the Mexican work ethic up close. Most start work at 7:00 or 7:30 in the morning and work until 6:00 in the evening. The work week is Monday through Saturday. Though they often do not have the tools or resources that are available in other countries, they take pride in working hard to get the job done, even if it means improvising. For example, we had a new coffee maker that went out a couple of years ago. In the U.S., you would throw it away and buy a new one. Since imported items like high end coffee makers are extremely expensive here, we took our broken one to a repair shop. It took a couple of months, and they had to send the coffee maker to Guadalajara where they finally found the circuit board it needed. They fixed it (and they charged us nothing because the coffee maker was so new, they said it never should have failed!). And, they do it all with a smile.

It is all part of the Mexican experience that we truly enjoy. And we truly appreciate the work the Mexicans here do. Now, finally, they have received the recognition they deserve as being among the hardest working people on earth.

Goodbye America, Goodbye Mexico

Living in a foreign country, I have little opportunity to read a newspaper from the U.S. anymore, and I miss that. Usually a day after they are printed, some newspapers including USA Today, The New York Times, Dallas Morning News, L.A. Times and San Francisco Chronicle are available at a few stores. But they can cost up to $4.00 for a weekday edition, and close to $10 for a weekend edition … all for news that is 24-48 hours old. So, online reading has become my “newspaper” of choice these days.

However, occasionally, someone from the U.S. will come down to visit somewhere here in Mexico and sometimes they will bring the local newspaper that they picked up at the airport from wherever their flight originated. They don’t know the newspaper, which they forgot the throw in the garbage can or leave on the plane, is like gold down here. The first lucky recipient will read it, pass it on to another ex-pat, who passes it on to someone else. And eventually, usually a week after it was printed, the old tattered stale piece of news is finally tossed. It’s just another one of those obscure tidbits of life here. Which brings me to this story.

Last Friday, some owners here (who live most of the year in Iowa) had friends arrive from Des Moines, and they brought the Des Moines Register with them. Today, the three day old paper was gratefully passed on to me. I read it pretty much cover to cover. I have never been there but Des Moines seems like a pretty presentable city.

While most of the news from last Friday’s Register had passed its “use by” date, there was one article that was news to me, and it caught my attention. It was about the final day at the Electrolux factory in Webster City, IA. After 72 years of making washers and dryers, the plant shut down on Thursday. 850 people were out of work. Click HERE for a link to the story.

Electrolux is not getting out of the business of making washers and dryers. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. Electrolux is terminating the jobs of 850 people in Iowa and is opening a brand new factory … in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. It’s the same Ciudad Juarez that is now considered the most dangerous city in the world.

When I was still working, I went to Ciudad Juarez to do a couple of stories. It was back in the early 2000’s and Juarez was a bustling (and crime ridden) city. Despite its many drawbacks, it had several outstanding assets that were too good to be true for U.S. companies who cared more about profits than they did about people. First, it was on the border, just over the Rio Grande from El Paso. Second, NAFTA had just made commerce between the U.S. and Mexico much easier. And third, U.S. companies soon discovered that the employees in the U.S. who were making $15 an hour plus benefits could be replaced by Mexicans who jumped at jobs paying $15 a day, even though they provided few if any benefits. As a result, RCA, Philips, General Motors, General Electric, Krupp’s, and many more companies, abandoned US factories and workers, fled over the border, and set up shop in Mexico.

The cost of producing TVs and toasters and tiddlywinks suddenly dropped, and profits on those products, shipped back to the U.S. soared. CEOs were elated, shareholders were ecstatic, and the Mexican workers were happy to have jobs. In fact, they were so happy, there was an exodus from smaller towns across Mexico to Ciudad Juarez where the factories couldn’t hire enough workers (at $15 a day). The only losers, the American work force left in the unemployment lines.

What surprised me a bit about the story I read in the Register regarding Electrolux moving to Juarez was that from what I understand, the rush to Juarez is pretty much over. Turned off by crime, many companies are reluctant to move to Juarez. And many of those that were already there, have done to their Mexican workers what they did to their former U.S. workers. They have shuttered their plants and are relocating … not back to the U.S. but to China. Like it was in U.S. cities where manufacturing was the backbone of the local economy, the impact has been devastating in Juarez. Thousands of Mexicans who fled poverty elsewhere in the country with the promise of “good paying” jobs from U.S. companies in Juarez have been abandoned. Even when we were there nearly a decade ago, the luster of Juarez was starting to wear off as acre after acre of once bustling factories and distribution centers were empty. America’s loss, became Mexico’s loss … and China’s gain.

There are still obvious advantages to locating in Juarez for major corporations. Shipping costs to the U.S. are low, and the employment costs are cheap. And the companies argue that had they not tapped into a lower cost production model, they would not be able to compete in a global market where China continues to undercut many competitors. It would be nice to be able to say that you are proud to buy products made in the U.S. But increasingly, the challenge is to find one.

Lessons on living from a dying friend

Most of you never met Alan Wood. It’s really too bad. What happened to Alan is also a downright shame. I remember vividly to this day the phone call we received from Alan on a Friday night in January, 2007. At age 57, he was in great shape, ran regularly, and went to the gym, not one ounce of fat on him. Yet, despite all of those good things, he had not been feeling quite right for a while. He had some tests done. He called that January night to tell us the tests had come back. He had pancreatic cancer. His doctors gave him six months to live. He lasted only five and a half.

I remember Alan today because April 1 is his birthday. He would have been 61 today. But I also remember Alan today for another reason. It is because of Alan that I am here, living a pretty relaxed life, on the beach, in a cool resort town in Mexico, doing what I want to do, when I want to do it. It’s called living the good life. And three years ago, it replaced the daily grind and pressures of going to work, answering to bosses, meeting deadlines, commuting, and having a few scant hours to do the things I really wanted to do.

In his final five months of life, Alan was really too sick to enjoy much of anything. He still would come, on occasion, to the country home we shared with him in Guerneville, along the Russian River north of San Francisco, but as his health deteriorated, those trips became less frequent. However, during those times, we had a lot of opportunities to talk. His sole message: “Whatever you do, don’t let what happened to me happen to you.”

Like most of us, Alan worked, and worked hard, during his life. He bought a home in San Francisco back in the 1970s and was able to pay it off. He was half owner of the home we shared in Guerneville and it was nearly paid off. He had a new car. He paid for it with cash. He usually planned a couple of good vacations every year. And he really wanted to leave work. His accountant told him he could, and he could retire comfortably at an early age. But Alan figured he’d work longer, into his sixties, to assure that he would have more than he really needed as he grew old. If only he had known. If only any of us had known.

One weekend as his health was failing, Alan said he wanted to talk with us. That’s when he asked us to use him as an example of what not to do … remember “Don’t let what happened to me happen to you.” He told us to realistically look at our finances, and consider what life would be like if we quit work right now. If it means not being able to buy a new car every two or three years, that’s OK. If it means not spending hundreds of dollars every couple of months for new clothes, you won’t need them anyway. Maybe you won’t go out for dinner twice a week, but you’ll have the time to make some pretty great meals at home and have a fun time doing it. And imagine, just imagine, not waking up to an alarm clock, not commuting, not doing reports. It would be almost like being on vacation for the rest of your life.

It was all welcome advice. And as we researched what Alan was telling us, we discovered that with some minor adjustments, we could do it. So we did. Within a year, we both quit work, sold the big home in the Bay Area, moved to a smaller place in Mexico, and never… not even once .. never looked back.

So today on his birthday, I remember Alan with fondness, and with great thanks for his words and wisdom that changed my life. And while you likely never had the opportunity to meet him, it would make Alan happy if he knew others still now hear his advice … and achieve what he never did, before it is too late.