You and your business partner have been working your tails off trying to get a bunch of modern, Mexican-style duplexes off the ground. You've poured too much money to think about into hiring Mexican workers to build this duplex complex. You all have not only hired locals to do all the work, tolerating the cultural problems when Gringos and Mexicans work together, but in the end you will have an upscale duplex to offer as modern housing to the Mexican people.

One evening you two think you deserve a treat. You go to a restaurant in Guanajuato you've yet to patronize. You get there, you begin walking upstairs to the dining room where the Mexicans are sitting, only to be stopped by a waiter. The waiter tells you that the two of you have to sit downstairs near the kitchen. You ask why. He is hesitant to say another word and, in fact, doesn't.

You insist on being seated in the room where the Mexicans eat but your protestations fall on deaf ears and stiff necks. Screaming ensues. The screeching gets you nowhere at all.

As you begin to leave, another waiter who is more sympathetic to your plight confesses to you outside the establishment, away from the prying eyes and ears of everyone else, that the owner of the place hates Americans. The Americans, if they want to eat there, have to be segregated from the Mexicans.

The shocking part of this is that the gringos who live in Guanajuato's Gringolandia tell me I am making this up. They call it a fiction. They say that since they've not experienced it, it could not have happened. Yet, I was told this story from the two gringos to whom it happened. They are respectable retired professionals who would have no reason in the world to make up a story.

Isolated Event? Nope. Stay Tuned!

Submitted by: Douglas Bower Notes From South of The Border Survival Tips To Maximize Your Expat Success