The plumber, Sergio, arranged for an albañil (cement guy), Alejandro, to do the tear down and build up of the falling-apart building at the rear of our property. Alejandro is the guy who installed the mother of all doors and the utility sink. Alejandro was an on-again, off-again kind of worker. We wondered what he'd be like as a guy in charge of a job. We had to stay home a lot waiting for him to get here. The week before we left for Chacala, he had this pile of grava delivered. As you can see, it filled the sidewalk, part of the street, and pushed the front door open. That same day, Luis, one of Alejandro's cohorts, spent the whole day, from 9 to 7, hauling it to the back of the property. About 11 a.m. I asked him if he wanted a Coke, the fuel that drives Mexican workers. He did. Around 2 p.m. I asked him if he wanted lunch. He did, so I went up the street and got him a take-out lunch. Alejandro came over at 5 and upbraided him for not working fast enough. Alejandro shoveled one load of stone into the wheelbarrow to show him how to do it.
On Friday before we left we convinced Alejandro to take a key to the house, hoping most of the dirty work would be done when we returned. He said he hoped it would be done. Below is what we came home to.
The sand delivered:
A lot of 2-foot deep holes dug around the building:
The dirt and stone from the holes:
The roof almost gone:
The door gone, but the walls still there:
The back yard a mess of debris, empty food containers, and plastic coke bottles:
Sergio, the plumber/patrón came by at 9:30 the next morning. He looked at the work and was not pleased. He said he had come by twice the week we were gone and found not enough men working, a man without tools (he had to give him his own tools), and Alejandro nowhere to be found. It was clear to me that Alejandro thought he was the patrón, ordering truckloads of stuff and telling his tool-less peon, Luis, what to do. He had even asked me if we wanted to deal with him or Sergio. Sergio, on the other hand, had told me that he paid Alejandro and was definitely his patrón. We were in the middle of all this.
Anyway, Sergio called Alejandro and told him to get over here right away. We were uncomfortable hearing their conversation. At the end we paid Alejandro for 3 days (for Luis) and for 2 truckloads of debris that was hauled away. Nothing for Alejandro. He didn't work, said Sergio. (Of course he didn't. He was patrón for 2 weeks). Sergio summarily fired Alejandro and called later and brought over a new albañil who will start Monday and who says it will take him 6 or 7 weeks to get the job done. We will pay him by the week.
Alejandro was fired, but he had to come back and get his few tools and his wheelbarrow. He came that night. He said nasty things about Sergio and told me Sergio said that I complained about his work. Not true at all, I said. Not publicly, anyway. I paid him for a little more than a day's work because I felt sorry for him. But it was good for him to be gone if we were every going to get the building finished.
The pecking order here is as bad as in Britain. Or Spain. Or countless other places where there exist patrónes by any other name.
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