Summary: -Whether you’re on (or off) the gringo tourist trail, certain local Latins will try to take advantage of gringos and Expats especially since we don’t know the language, customs or traditions. A Latin who does look to take advantage of people is called an “aprovechado”Now funny enough, Latins themselves are very attuned to the tricks of ‘aprovechados’ in their own neighborhoods and stay clear of dealing with them. However, we gringos often don’t realize we’ve been snookered… until some local clues us in much later. Now for a few examples..-Gringos often wonder why Latins are so short in stature. Is it genetics? Indigenous Latins are especially short…often 2 or 3 inches shorter than the average Latino (who themselves are a few inches shorter than average first-world Americans and Europeans). Why so short? Especially when Native Americans up near Minnesota and Cleveland can be quite tall. Aren’t the Indigenous tribes of Latin America from the same basic stock as their much taller cousins the Native Americans? Why the big height difference? It doesn't make sense... or does it?-If you come down, be prepared to see some pretty strange and repulsive hairdos. No, I don’t mean strange doos worn by the ladies… but by adolescent boys and young men! Try not to laugh, but Latin girls don’t like these hairdo's on their young men either. So why then do these young Latin men go in for it? A better question might be…why do young Latin men with just three miserable facial hairs proudly cultivate them? It’s the macho thing of course. It seems that the lower-class Latin boys down here do the same idiotic macho things as their undereducated Latin male counterparts do in the barrios of Boston or Cleveland.-Thinking of going to the June 2014 World Cup in Brazil?If you do, get ready for a truck load of grief… financial and otherwise.-My January 2014 “Expat Wisdom” seminar is filled. For those of you who wanted in on that and didn’t sign up in time, you’ll have to wait some months and see if I’m going to do another (maybe, maybe not).-Follow the link on the main page at www.ExpatWisdom.com to schedule a private consultation with me. If you want to discuss the details of living, working, playing, doing business and/or retiring in Latin America, now you and I can talk about your situation one on one
