Published Benicia Herald March 12, 2009

On dream houses in Mexico and life lessons

Six months in Mexico wasn’t all just carefree fun, though the bodysurfing and inviting friends to come visit for a week sure helped. I was in charge of building a second beach house on the vacant parcel that my dad just bought next to our first house, so there were building chores to occupy me on a regular basis. Meanwhile, Melody passed the time creating several stained glass windows for the new house and baking bread. It was 1988, and my dad and I were at the height of our developer thinking ways, so our plan was to build this second house as an extra one to sell, just like they were selling houses a short ways up the coast at Punta Burro. A big difference, said my dad, was that “our house will be a lot more sexy.” And with that statement I had one of the most unique design directives I ever received.

I knew just what he meant, so, while he sent checks down from California, I directed Mexican workers to create a house of stone and brick with arches and a cantilevered balcony overlooking the tiled living area below. Add in Mel’s stained glass windows in highlighted locations and I dare say that we created a house that was pretty darn sexy.

It proved to be such a comfortable and livable house that my parents decided not to sell it but instead use it as their own home for the fifteen years of winters they spent in Mexico prior to my dad’s passing. That they found satisfaction in this cute but modest house repudiated the idea that we needed to use their remaining vacant lot to build them a big “DREAM HOUSE” complete with all the loaded expectations that accompany such an endeavor.  A life lesson not lost on me, to be sure.

Here are the steps for building in Mexico:

The first hurdle, of course, is to get the land. It’s a huge task involving multiple trips with much travel to many different areas to decide your favorite and meeting different Mexican realtors, most of whom speak excellent English, a point of pride for them. For non-Mexicans to acquire land within fifty meters of the shoreline, a "fideicomiso" trust is set up in which the foreigner (you) holds the land via a trust held by a bank.

Once you have the land, the next step is to get the design of your house correct in the ways that designs always need to be correct: with the right amount of roominess in all the proper places and with the flow of human life considered and enhanced. Be aware that life in the tropics has its own demands, with open spaces inviting breezes in some places and other spaces closed and screened against insects.

Then you need to find a local builder to construct it. Big projects such as hotels and resorts get built along that stretch of coast; therefore there are high-powered builders at work in the region. But people like us with smaller projects must seek out builders that are lower down the food chain. 

You don’t get bids. You don’t even usually get a builder with an established crew of regulars; at least we didn’t. What you look for is the right lead guy, a "maestro," someone noted for his skill and integrity, and then he brings on some other local workers of varying skill and they all just get paid by the hour. In our case, every worker walked to work from somewhere in town always wearing rubber flip flop sandals, always arriving on time. We usually had two or three "albanils" (masons) and about five or six "ayudantes" (helpers.)        
    
The work schedule with its numerous holidays was determined by the union, an unseen but constantly felt presence. The rate of pay mandated for low level ayudantes was $6 per day. (Is it any wonder that there’s an abundance of Mexican laborers waiting in front of Home Depots across the USA?) At least they had an abundance of union-mandated paid holidays to make up for the meager wage. Skilled albanils got $15 or $20 per day. These were 1988 prices.

My job was to lay out for them the construction details for that day in passable Spanish and then run all manner of errands, including trips to get cash from the bank in Puerto Vallarta and numerous drives with my lead maestro to suppliers in nearby towns (and not-so-nearby towns) to arrange for delivery of brick, stone, cement, rebar, doors, and so forth. There was no phone service at all in our little village of La Cruz in 1988 so we used a shortwave radio to contact friends in Vallarta. (Total connectivity is available nowadays, cell coverage and DSL.) I’m not sure how much a phone would have helped anyway. It makes for a fond memory now to recall that I spent time in the tropics using a shortwave radio – not terribly convenient at the time, but off-the-charts for the adventure of it all, at least by my usual standards.

Concrete was all mixed by hand on site by simply making a pile out of the dry-mix on the ground and then adding water in the middle like a flattish volcano and stirring from the middle outward with a shovel, adding more water and mixing until there was a grey blob of concrete on the ground ready for carrying in buckets for use in the house.

There came a special concrete day, spoken of almost reverentially by the locals, called the "losa" (slab), a day when a massive amount of concrete was needed all at once, in our case for the entire second floor slab. Many cubic yards of concrete would be mixed by hand with the help of an additional twenty or so local workers coming to work just for that day, the Mexican version of an Amish barn raising. Pay bonuses were standard because it was a laborious day indeed. They would break into seven or so teams each working their own pile of concrete and then carry it in buckets on their shoulders up a ramp. There was a constant parade of rubber sandaled feet heading up the slim plank to the second floor where the buckets were dumped next to two smaller teams of finishers who worked the concrete into place and smoothed it.

At day’s end it was quite satisfying to have the concrete down and all the guys cashed out. As was usual right after getting paid, some of the workers would return with a case of cold cerveza and I’d be invited to sit in the shade with them and enjoy a beer or two while the sea breeze gently rattled the palm trees overhead. We all had the next day-and-a-half off and life was good.  

Fast forward to the present, twenty years later, and I often reflect wistfully on my six month Mexico adventure. I discovered that a sense of purpose combined with fun and adventure is a potent combo, one that invigorates a human life quite like nothing else can. A life lesson, for sure.

Current Edition:
June 23, 2010 - Confessions of a Lighting Junky

Archive:
2010
May 25, 2010 - A Day in the Life of the Architecture Student
May 4, 2010 - Job Site Tips I Learned the Hard Way
March 25, 2010 - More Than Just a Pretty Picture
February 18, 2010 - A Benicia Sense of Place
January 27, 2010 - Aging in place

2009
December 24, 2009 - Why we travel: the hidden Puerto Vallarta is there for the taking
December 1, 2009 - Paradise stolen: greed and redemption on the Mayan Riviera
October 25, 2009 - The new rules for downtown
September 20, 2009 - Ongoing adventures in city life
August 23, 2009 - How to almost miss out on architecture school
August 2, 2009 - Visiting Italy in the movies
June 26, 2009 - Secret weapons of design
May 24, 2009 - Germany, the war, and why we like life in Benicia
April 23, 2009 - A hundred and sixty years in Benicia
March 12, 2009 - On dream houses in Mexico and life lessons
February 15, 2009 - Building a House in Mexico - the Reality

January 15, 2009 - Phil Joy's house move enters the home stretch

2008
December 26, 2008 - Fireplaces: New Rules
November 27, 2008 - A Benician in L.A.
October 22, 2008 - Why I'm Doing My Addition Now
September 17, 2008 - Why We Travel
August 20, 2008 - Americans in Paris
July 30, 2008 - Front Porch City
May 30, 2008 - On turning fifty, crescent moons, and Frank Lloyd Wright
April 22, 2008 - Building green, getting real
March 27, 2008 - Benicia versus the country club
February 27, 2008 - Stone arches totally rock
January 23, 2008 - These are a few of your favorite things
January 6, 2008 - Another vintage house is delivered to Benicia


2007
December 16, 2007 - How First Street keeps us together
November 22, 2007 - You, the tile shop, the decision
October 23, 2007 - A Benician in New York
September 19, 2007 - Figuring out how much your building project will cost
August 21, 2007 - Why we travel: The city of Prague is a marvel – who knew?
July 22, 2007 - The “it” moment with my new house
June 20, 2007 - Dreamhouse for rent
May 20, 2007 - Artist Open Studios Reveal Creative Undercurrent Alive in Benicia
March 2, 2007 - Haiku Moments and Performance Art in the Comfort of Your Own Home
April 22, 2007 - Once in a Lifetime Adventure: Say Yes
January 28, 2007 - Countertops: We Live in a Stone Age

2006
December 31, 2006 - The Day the Thompson-Joy House Came to Town
December 3, 2006 - The Revenge of Unpaid Carpenters (And Other True Stories)
October 29, 2006 - A House Move for the Ages
September 24, 2006 - My Best Five Seconds at Design School
August 17, 2006 - Getting Bids: "The Rules"
July 23, 2006 - Benicia's Growth Rings
June 18, 2006 - The Well-considered Window Seat
May 14, 2006 - Hearst Castle - Residential Design Mind Blower
April 16, 2006 - San Francisco April 1906: Ordinary People in Extraordinary Times
March 17, 2006 - Dog Handling at the Ititarod

February 12, 2006 - Your House's Defense Against Rising Energy Costs
January 8 , 2006 - Not Your Father's Living Room

2005
December 12, 2005 - The Best Design Book Ever
September 23, 2005 - Further Adventures in the Eternal city
August 28, 2005 - Lessons from Rome
July 31, 2005 - Roadside at the Tour de France
June 9, 2005 - My Accidental Getaway Room
May 8, 2005 - Lighting Basics: It's the layers
April 10, 2005 - Architecture School: The Reality
March 13, 2005 - Southampton Concrete Slab Floors: What's to Know
Jan. 30, 2005 - Some Basics to Know Before You Build

2004
Dec. 26, 2004 - News Flash: Good builders earn their money
Nov. 14, 2004 - The Wonderful Failure That is Benicia
Sept. 26, 2004 - Energy Laws and Your Building Project
August 14, 2004 - Architecture Goes to the Movies
July 11, 2004 - What's Really Up with a 2nd Floor Addition
May 30, 2004 - Home Design in Earthquake Country
May 2, 2004 - Sightlines Make a Huge Impact
April 11, 2004 - Meeting of the Minds in Your Design
March 21, 2004 - Welcome to the New Column