Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Guanajuato, Mexico - Trip, Expat advice

My wife is a trip advisor for an online site. She gets the following request consistently: "I want to move to Mexico can you help me?"

And, that is the extent of the request.

Whether it is to simply visit the country or move to it, they will write her and issue this general concept: I want to visit/move to Mexico. Can you help me?"

HELP YOU WITH WHAT? ... My wife wants to scream!!!

I get this too.

On my WEBSITE I have a contact form. I also list an email address in two of my books about moving to Mexico. Readers, and believe me I am thankful they bought my books, will write me and say something along the line:

"I sure would love to live in Mexico, any ideas?"

What the hell is that suppose to mean, anyway?

My wife and I have pondered this behavior for years now: WHAT ARE THEY ASKING, ANYWAY?"

Here's another one:

"I've just booked my ticket for Mexico, can you tell me what there is to do?"

First of all, "Where in Mexico?" And secondly, "Why would you book a ticket to a place with not an idea in your head as to what there is to do?"

I wonder if these people have ever heard of LONELY PLANET or any other of the myriad guidebooks there are that will tell them exactly where to go and what there is to do"

The wife and I have often mused that these people must want something for nothing, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

They want information and want it for nothing. They want freebies. So they ask this general question that is absolutely impossible to answer: "I will be in Mexico on such-and-such date....can you give me an itinerary?"

The last I checked Mexico is a huge, gigantic country with loads and loads to do depending on the region you want to visit and when you want to do it. But it does not seem that these folks realize that. They must believe, we guess, that Mexico is all the same homozygous place from sea to shining sea with not a variation from shore to shore. At least that's what their hideously constructed question imply.

I get this too from people who claim they will be rolling into town (Guanajuato) to live the rest of their lives and then proceed to ask me where they should live, what social activities they can participate in, and where they can find a good doctor.

And, by the way, they are moving into a town where English is NOT widely spoken and they cannot utter enough Spanish to save their lives--literally.

So what do they mean with their impossible to answer general question?

Your guess is as good as mine!

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Please check out my new GUIDE book, A WALK THROUGH MEXICO'S CROWN JEWEL: A Guanajuato Travelogue...Click Here.

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