Hell’s Half Acre

(use the Spanish pronunciation; “eeesh cafe”)

It is a really cute name for a coffee house as down here, “X” followed by “c” results in the “eeesh” sound and many words start with “X” (Mayan words). Maybe you had to be there.

Anyway, it occurred to me today that there is so much tolerance in Mexico for red tape and bureaucracy in government issues and legal issues because day to day life is full of constant bureaucratic issues. A few days ago we went to Costco to pick up some items. They had a sale on Accuvue contact lenses, and since the Bauch and Lomb lenses I purchased at City Club (which only took 2 months to arrive, but who’s counting…) just aren’t giving me clear vision, I decided to get 4 boxes of Accuvue and count the B&L’s a loss. I can’t even begin to imagine what I’d have to go through to return the B&L’s. Our membership had expired in February and we were currently Executive Club membership level. We knew we had some large purchases last year and it turned out the membership more than paid for itself in 2% reimbursement but this year we wanted to go back to the “Gold” membership. At Mexico Costco, you can only renew your membership at the cash register (not in Membresia/Membership (does that sound crazy to you? unfortunately it makes perfect sense to me…) so I told the Optician that I wanted to purchase the lentes de contacto, get the 25% discount (their sale), and renew my membership but drop it down to Gold level. She pounded away at the computer for a while, made a phone call and left for a bit, finally coming back and telling me that I would have to renew at Executive but could then immediately go to Membresia (see? they DO have a function!) and drop my membership level down. Ok, still making sense. So I pay the $930MN for the renewal, ask the Optician to apply my reimbursement to the purchase (which she does not do) and then finish our other purchases, forgetting to ask the cashier to apply our reimbursement to the purchases. Off to Membresia and after much hemming and hawing and paging and calling, Patricia, the answer lady shows up. She tries to convince me that the Executive membership is really what I want and that I shouldn’t downgrade. She says I’ll save money with Executive. Twice I have to assert that I really want to downgrade and I provide really good reasons. Now I find out why she didn’t want me to downgrade; she says that since I JUST renewed the system doesn’t recognize my renewal for refund. It recognizes it for purchases but the amount I paid ($930MN) won’t be in their system until the next day. Can I come back the next day for my refund and downgrade? Well, if I lived closer than 80km away from Costco, I could. She then tells me that I should just hang tight and keep Executive for a year and if it doesn’t work out cheaper, she’ll refund my $600MN after that year. I don’t believe for a minute that a) Patricia will still be working at Costco in a year, b) will remember her promise in a year, or c) will comply with her promise. So I ask for it in writing. “Oh, no, not necessary” she asserts, “you have it in your membership contract”. MEMBERSHIP CONTRACT? I didn’t get no membership contract! So she gives me a copy and shows me where it specifically does NOT state what she promised but she says it is pretty close.

So today we went back to downgrade the membership. I was remembered by two of the staff in Membresia and didn’t have to tell my sordid tale, unfortunately there was a “buena noticia” and a “mala noticia”. They could DEFINITELY downgrade the membership. Unfortunately, I had to spend my reimbursement first. Their hands were tied as long as the reimbursement was outstanding. Fortunately, Jamie was standing in line for food and I was able to convince the cashier that I COULD use my reimbursement, to please just get a supervisor, and then ran back to get the new cards. Unfortunately, after our experience at City Club this afternoon, where we expected to make the purchases we used to make at Costco, we just might have been able to use the Executive membership.

We had an amazing day of accomplishments today; we took the car back to the taller electrico (who fixed the car the night Chris and family arrived) and he diagnosed the current problem as un-related to the work he did and requiring a part from Ford; went to Ford to try to obtain the part (they can’t get it; only in the US), obtained a part from Ford we’ve been trying to get in Playa del Carmen Ford for over a month un-related to the electric problem; returned a battery to City Club (that is about 10 pages worth of bureaucracy) and exchanged an item; found the Most Amazing Tamales anywhere in the free world, roadside in Cancun; added minutes to our phone; and downgraded our Costco membership. Getting that much done in one day down here is almost miraculous.