Mexicans Can Fix Almost Anything!

By Kathy Koches

 

FIX IT Shop

I love Mexico and the Mexican people. Besides being kind, warm and generous, they possess the most amazing ability.  They can fix almost anything!

The other day I was sitting at my vanity table in the bathroom, which of course has tile floors.  As I picked up my purse, my hand-held mirror went crashing to the floor. The mirror itself did not break, but the handle snapped right off! Now neither I nor my husband  are what you would consider  “handy around the house.”  In fact I have been forbidden to ever again use Super Glue, having once glued several of my fingers together. However, I naively thought this would be an easy thing to fix.  I tried regular Elmer’s glue, which of course did not work, and then my husband tried Super Glue. I was about to toss the mirror and go purchase a new one, when Fernando, the handyman who does work around our property, came by. I asked him if he could fix my mirror and he just smiled and said, “Si, Senora.” 

The next day he arrived with my mirror, handle re-attached, and handed it to me with a smile. He had simply drilled a small hole in the mirror frame and another in the handle, inserted a tiny dowel, and applied Super Glue to the whole thing. Who would have thought of that? Apparently most Mexicans! 

Another time our microwave decided to act up. When I pressed the start button, the display flashed the word “CHILD” at me. I wondered if this was some safety feature to prevent children from using the microwave, but no matter what buttons I pushed, I could not make the display disappear.  Enter my savior, Fernando. He apologized that he must take the microwave home, but he returned the next day with the fully functioning microwave.  Yet again, he amazed me with his ability to “fix anything.”

When our old TV decided to quit working, we called our friend, who had been a TV repairman in the US prior to retiring to Lakeside. He came over and took a look at it, but told us that even if he could get the parts, which was doubtful, it was a 20 yr. old TV and probably not worth fixing. We decided we would buy a new one, so he and my husband carried it out to the curb, thinking that the trash collectors would pick it up later that day. They came back in the house so he could pack up his tools, and when he left some five minutes later, the TV was GONE! Just like that – it had disappeared. Someone saw it, decided they might be able to fix it, and away they went.

Unfortunately, America has become a society used to disposable things, and when something breaks or does not function properly, most people simply discard and replace it.  Not so in Mexico: Things here are repaired, recycled and reused. I find this a delightful and fascinating situation.  Some of this is due to economic necessity, but I think it goes deeper than that. Mexicans have not become the unthinking consumers like their neighbors north of the border.  They are conscious of the need to conserve resources and not wantonly waste things. 

We could learn a lot from our Mexican neighbors and friends.

 

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