Don't go to La Bodega

My girlfriend and I went to La Bodega, a restaurant in La Condesa, last night to celebrate a friend's birthday. She'd rented a private room there, and everything was fine until the time came to pay the bill. It had started raining and the restaurant's credit card terminal was out of order as a result. We managed to get together most of the bill in cash, but couldn't pay the last part. The management refused to accept any form of collateral to cover the bill and sent Sandra, the birthday girl, out in the rain to find a cash machine whilst the rest of us waited for her return.

Sitting there, virtually held prisoner by the restaurant management, we realised that what we had collected covered the bill, including rental, but minus the 15% service charge. Tips are optional in Mexico, and to our mind, good service did not include being detained for no good reason.

When Sandra returned, having failed to get money from any of the nearby cash machines, we refused to pay the service charge. An argument ensued, with the restaurant manager insisting that we had to pay the tip. I guess he didn't realise that most of the group worked in the media and were better informed than him. At this point, he suggested we left some ID and came back the next day to pay the remainder. Needless to say, his suggestion came too late, and we left, an hour and a half after we'd received the bill.

I feel sorry for the waiters, but the manager was an absolute fool. How many bad recommendations will his obstinacy have caused?

Metro Woes

Got to class late today because the Metro decided to go wonky; a journey which usually takes twenty minutes took forty. The passengers were beginning to get restless at one point (after the second ten-minute stop in a row). Who can blame them, when the only information you get is a recorded announcement saying that "the train will resume its progress soon"?

How about a bit more information? Something along the lines of:

1. An apology
2. A reason for the delay
3. An indication of how much longer we're all going to have to wait for them to resolve Point 2?

Still, it gave me an excellent example in class for how to put "he explained why they were late" into direct speech.

Mobile Madness

Seeing as it’s coming up to Christmas, I’ve decided to buy myself a new phone. I shop around at the Plaza de la Tecnología and think I’ve found myself a real bargain at about five hundred pesos less than in Sanborn’s. If only it were true. I go back to the shop to ask if they give invoices, only to discover that the bargain price I was offered was for another phone, and that it costs the same here as everywhere else. I tell the shopkeeper I’ll take it anyway.

‘Excellent,’ he says. ‘Follow me.’ He pops out from under the counter and leads me to the shop opposite. ‘They'll attend to you here.’ With that, he goes back to his shop and leaves me in the care of a gawky kid who’s probably his son. I have a bad feeling about this, but am now committed to buying the thing. Slowly, laboriously, the kid begins to write out a sales receipt. ‘You are going to give me an invoice, aren't you?’ I say. He looks up with panic on his face and mumbles something which could be a yes.

The slow, handwritten pace of the youth continues, and I try not to think about how much quicker this could have been at Sanborn’s. At one point, he asks me how much they’re charging me for the phone, but sees my incredulous stare and shouts across the aisle to ask his dad instead. I can’t even hear the answer, but the kid mumbles to himself and writes down something that sounds like the right price.

When it finally comes to signing the purchase slip, I start checking the details. The kid taps the dotted line with an impatient finger. ‘You sign here,’ he says, as if I’m some kind of moron. ‘Thanks,’ I say, as sarcastically as possible, but he’s already pulling the phone out of its box to instruct this idiot customer on how to switch it on.

As his uncoordinated thumbs unsuccessfully mash down on the buttons, I observe that maybe the phone hasn’t been charged up yet. He ignores the remark, muttering that different phones sometimes use different buttons. Suddenly, as if the idea has just fallen on him from a great height, he pulls the charger out and plugs the phone in. ‘It might not have been charged up yet,’ he explains.

He charges the phone for about ten seconds, dials a number to check the credit on the phone and hands it to me. I hear: ‘...will expire on February the fifth, two thousand...’ before the phone dies. ‘Perfect,’ I say. By now, I just want to leave. The kid pulls out the forms for the invoice and painstakingly starts to fill them in. If nothing else, I will have given this teenager a chance to practise his penmanship. I’m sure he hasn’t considered this.

At last, the phone is mine and I’ve only lost half an hour of my life. I thank the kid and he shrugs off into the corner of the shop; I expect he’s got blisters. Now I just have to wait until Christmas before I can use the thing.

Rush Hour

I’m late. I can tell because the queue on the platform is already backing up onto the stairs. I weave my way through those not yet brave enough to take the plunge and find a narrow gap between the wall and the mass of people waiting for the next train. I hang around at the back until it arrives. It takes its time.

Suddenly, the air whooshes and the train is here. People getting off have to force their way out of the doors and past those pushing to get in. It isn’t pretty. They are out and the first wave are in. There is a guy hanging out of the doorway with an enormous backpack. Slowly, he lifts it above his head and eases his way into the throng. I’m glad I'm not on his train.

The doors close, then open, then close, and a recorded woman tells the packed passengers to let the doors close freely. Eventually, after another dozen repetitions of her imprecations, the train shunts off. I’m in the next wave.

When the train arrives, I’m in the middle of the throng and propelled into one of the upright supports to the side of the door. My bag is somewhere behind me and it’s hard to breathe. I manoeuvre myself around the pole and feel the click of my mobile phone unclipping itself from my belt. Luckily, it’s trapped inside my jumper by the crush of fellow passengers. I breathe in and wiggle my hand round to push it back in place. The doors do their open/close thing a dozen times and then we’re off.

Taking advantage of the bumps and turns of the train, I slowly manage to turn further round the pole in my chest and pull my bag through the passengers behind me until it’s back at my side. It’s a bit more battered than before, but nothing’s fallen off yet. Every time the train comes into a station, there’s a build up of human pressure on my side, as the people by the doors have nothing to hang on to and are kept upright by their companions. We are the pillars of this establishment.

By the time we arrive at the end of the line, the train is emptier and I have found a seat, but because of all the times the train has had to open and close its doors, I’m really late. I sneak a glance at my watch: five past seven. The class started at seven and I still have a fifteen-minute walk ahead of me. What a way to start the week.

The Electricity Company

I am here as victim of my own stupidity. Believing that the electricity company maybe wasn’t as bad as everyone made it out to be, I decided to pay my bill via Internet. Nobody shot me, so I did it again. Big mistake. This time, the bill is ten times greater than it ought to be, so I had to cancel my day and sit here in Purgatory.

Purgatory is full of people sitting on uncomfortable plastic chairs. They are all clutching little tickets and glance at the turn counter now and again to check that it hasn’t changed. There is a forlorn little sign dangling over an unattended desk which marks the end of Purgatory. Apparently, it’s called Public Relations.

I occasionally see people who actually work here coming out to remonstrate with the customers. They are stern and hold out little hope of an early salvation. I could save myself by walking over to the fast-moving queue of customers to my left and paying my grossly inflated bill, but I have this perverse need to know why it’s so high.

I am not, of course, left alone with my thoughts; that could be dangerous. There is a large TV in one corner of the room, blaring out housewife television to a small group of unseated devotees. It is mind-numbing.

There is some excitement at one point, as a woman who has BEEN OUTSIDE returns to reclaim her place, despite having missed her turn. There is uproar. Even the old lady next to me, who not ten minutes ago was telling her son by mobile phone that she was thinking of leaving, is outraged. ‘What would happen if we all did that?’ she cries, ‘We'd be here all day!’ She seems to forget that we’ve already been here a hell of a long time. Eventually, howled down by a bum-weary crowd, the interloper retreats.

After nearly five hours of this, I get up, donate my ticket to the patient old lady with a son on the other end of her mobile, and pay through the nose. I just can’t bear the thought of sitting for another minute in Purgatory. I give up.