As I mentioned in the last update on Fraulein, the drama escalated to a point where calling in Santiago was my only hope of pre-abogado resolution.  True, Santiago does carry a gun, but the real purpose in taking him is because he grew up in HueHue in the ’50s and ’60s and retired here about 10 years ago and, to the point, understands how things really work here.  Besides, suing this guy and putting him in jail for defrauding me doesn’t get me my car back, and it won’t even make me feel any better.  After all, el abogado doesn’t work for free and I just want my !@#$%&* car back.

Of course, I wanted to call the taller to make sure he would be there, but Santiago says, “That’s not how it works.  First, he won’t answer the phone.  Second, you don’t want him to know you’re coming, and third, if there is something really nasty going on you’re more likely to discover it with a surprise visit.”

We arrive in San Felipe and Santiago strikes up a conversation with the mechanic.  He’s pretty aggressive at first, really grilling the guy on how many months the car has been there, missing parts, asking for more money after we supplied the parts he said he needed, etc.  The old mechanic held his own, with lots of gesticulating about pressure, valves, the car not having enough ‘oomph’, etc.  I was only catching about 50% of what Santiago said and about 30% of what the taller said.  What was clear to me was that Santiago was engaged in a dance of sorts, and I’m not just referring to the way he moves when talking as if he were involved in some sort of native feria, but a well-understand and time-tested dialogue of posturing and negotiation.  Stuff that for better or worse has been eliminated from all but the most grand transactions in the US.

I could see him gradually easing up on the guy, and the guy gradually letting his guard down as the conversation continued.  They were rehashing all the old things, and then throwing in new pieces of information here and there.  It wasn’t unlike the negotiation at the mercado, except far more complex and lengthy.  About 10 minutes into it-with only the occasional short explanation by Santiago-it started raining harder than it has since Agatha.  The tin roof on the shop made it impossible to hear anything, but I could tell from the increasing frequency of smiles and laughs that Santiago was getting on well with the guy.  Before long I could hear them commiserating about the Catholic Mafia in Antigua and other pejoratives that I can’t print here, more than one of which was launched in my direction.

Another 10 minutes of this and the heavy rain and I had figured out that the ‘missing’ part that had been ‘found’ was not so much found as ‘replaced’, through a ‘friend’ of the mechanic’s in the city.  That had cost me Q1200, something Gunther had forgotten to mention.  The odd thing was that this same ‘friend’ of the mechanic had also been able to locate the eight valves that needed to be replaced, the same eight valves that Gunther explained he couldn’t find in the US or Germany.

It was these valves that presumably keep the pressure inside the transmission that allows the parts to work at maximum efficiency, and the cost was Q3,500.  So then Santiago asked an interesting question.  “Don Marco wants the original parts back when you’re done; that’s no problem, right?”  The mechanic paused for a moment, there was a fijese, and then, “Sure, no problem”.  I realized that a great deal had just taken place; the mechanic had gotten the message that if the original part were to go missing like the earlier one, it might raise questions about the ‘new’ part, which just happens to be in an ‘inaccessible’ part of the ‘box’.

Next Santiago suggested that if the part was with a good friend of the mechanic’s, it would be no problem to install it first and try it out before paying for it.  That led to another 5 minutes of conversation or so, and then I caught up to the mechanic saying, “Well, if you think you can get the money together, I can get the part from my friend, perhaps for even less than Q3500″.

That launched an entire additional round of conversation, with Santiago explaining that we had given Gunther the money months ago to buy all these parts, and the problem wasn’t with our money, but with the mechanic losing parts, etc.  They rehashed everything again, apparently like chewing a piece of tough meat sufficiently, at which point the mechanic agreed that he would install the part ‘manana’, which seemed very timely indeed considering he didn’t have the part yet, and that he would take a few days to test it, and if we were happy, then we would pay.  (Perhaps even a reduced price).

We all shook hands, with smiles all around, and left San Felipe.  I immediately called Gunther to give him an update and to let him know that once the car had been fixed and we had all the old parts in hand, he could go ahead and pay the mechanic whatever we owed him.  He agreed, but kept expressing that he was uncomfortable with how things were going.

Well, he had good reason to, because five days later the mechanic showed up at Gunther’s telling him he was tried of the gringos taking advantage of him, how he was losing money on the deal, and that he would never install a part without getting the money first, etc., etc.  He then told Gunther that he was going to throw all the parts in the trunk and push the car out into the street and abandon it.  My first instinct was to call Santiago and a few other locals and show up armed and ready to tow the car.  We had obviously caught the guy in one big scam to sell me old parts as new (or not even change the parts and sell them as new), and he was going to keep milking this as long as he could, which had come to an end with our friendly visit and insistence that we get the old parts.  At the very best, he was completely incompetent and was unwilling to admit it until we forced the situation.

But assuming we towed the car out, we’d have no idea about the location of the parts or the condition, and jerking the car off his lot still wouldn’t get me anywhere.  I did have clarity about one thing; we couldn’t trust this guy and there was no reason to expect anything good to come from additional good will or patience.

(to be continued)