Rain!

We just had our first rain storm of the season! Lots of clouds, thunder and lightning flashing across the lake. Of course the rainy season doesn't start until July, and our friend Sandy has said that the rainy season definitely starts on June 13th!

This was so welcome. We've been having weather in the 95-96 F range, without a/c for about a month! The evening rain must have dropped the temperature into the 70's in short order. The breeze under the living room ceiling fan was decidedly cool, very cool. I had to put my tee shirt on! I almost considered putting on long pants too!!
 
At the least we should sleep through the night. Last week we couldn't sleep b/c of the temps and the nightly partying in the Plaza until about 3 am!

Our good friends, the globetrotting Sandy and Sharon want to visit Guatemala this December and want to know if Carole and I want to go with them. We'd like to go and see more of the Mayan ruins sites, but I have some security concerns. I'll do some homework before we have to commit or not.

We seem to have settled in for the most part. We recently opened a bank account at BanamexUSA (owned by CitiBank) in California. Today we opened another Mexican bank account at Banamex here locally, a sister bank to the CA bank. It went smoothly today, considering that we're in Mexico. Mexican banks do a strange thing here. If you open a joint bank account, only one name will appear on the statement. Period. You need an FM-3 or FM-2 visa and your passport to open a Mexican bank account at any bank. Carole got here FM-2 first so we opened our HSBC account in here name. A month later I added my name to the account. Time passes and we need a bank statement to show proof of residency...only Carole's name appears. We get along great with our landlords, have no lease and they pay all the utilities which are in their name of course. We figure out a way. More time passes and I need to take out more money from our account than you are permitted via ATM. No problem, you go to the teller window and present your ATM/debit card. I do that, the teller brings up the account...uhh...Carole Morgan...? I'm her husband, we have a joint account. Uhh...she needs to sign and make the withdrawal...umm...is she with you...? We have a joint account. "It doesn't matter, that how we do it." We live 10 miles from town and the bank. Carole just happened to be in the car. She was a good dooby and came in and signed for me. Wells Fargo made some changes to transferring money to Mexico, essentially resulting in us having to pay twice the fee to send the same amount of money to ourselves! Banamex does not charge a fee for this in their special Amistad retiree account. So, a new Mexican joint bank account, but then I was going to have to do it so that I could have one with my name on it for proof of address purposes. Also, either of us can withdraw money from this account without the signature of the other! We have so many damn bank accounts now! I'll close one of the two WFB accounts and keep the minimum in the other, just in case. I'd like to close HSBC account but Carole needs it for proof of residency. We'll keep a minimum in that one too. I'm so glad that life is simple here...

We are going to apply for the Mexican healthcare (IMSS) system soon. Our friends say that the banking process/issues was a walk in the park by comparison to applying for IMSS!  Bring a book, every legal ID you have, a bottle of water, and your patience. Oh, btw, the IMSS clinic in Chapala near us doesn't like gringos and has been dropping them off of the plan indiscriminately, which is illegal. But to whom do we complain? Our good friends Fred and Barbara, who live in Jocotepec (Joco) about 25-30 miles from us says that the Joco IMSS clinic doesn't do what Chapala's doing and the doctors speak ingles. Fred says that we can use his address...Sharon and Sandy do. They live in Ajijic. We'll take in Fred's electric bill for proof of address...it's done all the time...it's Mexico,   where almost everything is possible... for a price or a little white lie...