The Gringo-Mexican War Over a Fan

On November 16^th, I moved to a new apartment by Politecnico in Mexico as you can read here.

And I’m moving out this week.

There isn’t too many weird things odd about the apartment itself.

It’s a shared space with other 2 neighbors but it feels like I’m the only one living here because all of them work late until like 9 or 10 AM. Then they go straight to bed.

And I don’t wake up until like 10 or 11 AM so I hardly ever see them since they leave for work at around 7 or 8 AM.

In short, it feels like it’s not a shared apartment and I’m the only one here.

Which is nice – more privacy and all that.

Makes easier for bringing girls back without anyone complaining in theory.

And that’s only a theory because I haven’t tied yet given that I’ve only been here a week as of November 23, 2021.

Beyond that, the apartment has various benefits.

It has one of the best showers I’ve had in a long time.

Arguably the best shower I’ve had in a year.

It’s so nice that, for the first time in a year, I can actually fucking enjoy it.

Just stand there and let the excessively hot water make me feel like I’m bathing in the lake of Hell auditioning to be Satan.

As I wrote here, showers can be hit or miss in Latin America in my 6.5 years of living down here.

The shower was shit.

Looking back at all of them, it’s roughly hit or miss.

Half the showers suck (too cold, bad water pressure, running out of water for some reason, etc) or they are good.

The one at this new place in Politecnico is really good. Love it.

I don’t even have to wait a few minutes for the water to get hot after starting it.

Comes out hot.

Which isn’t always the case in Mexico in my experience.

On top of that, it doesn’t have much of a bug issue.

Haven’t seen any cockroaches.

Absolutely no mosquitos whatsoever.

Which is great because I fucking hate mosquitos.

The wifi is good.

The living room is actually a bit charming to be in.

They have a pool downstairs that they use for clients and they always have good music blasting that can be heard upstairs.

That sounds like that would be annoying but it’s actually nice because their playlist is always spot on.

And the room has one of the best desks I’ve had in a long time. It’s perfect for working from home.

So what’s the problem?

A Few Issues with the Apartment

Well, the apartment does have a few minor issues.

For starters, the owners won’t give me or anyone keys to the building.

I got keys to my room but not keys to the building.

Meaning I basically can’t be outside past 9 PM (when the pool is closed and nobody is left to open the door for me).

On Sundays, the pool is closed also.

There is supposedly some neighbor that can open the door called “Guadalupe” but I didn’t need her to open the door last Sunday.

It’s definitely a detail about living here that they didn’t disclose to me ahead of time.

Didn’t know I needed to ask a landlord if I’m allowed keys to the place before renting somewhere.

Their reasoning to me was “well, it’s for security reasons. To make sure nobody can break in and steal shit.”

Which doesn’t make sense.

Why trust me to live here if you won’t give to the front door?

If I was some criminal motherfucker, I could just open the door from the inside when everyone is asleep to let friends steal shit.

Sure, someone could steal the keys from me and then they could break in..

But that’s assuming they would know which doors the keys open in the city and the keys clearly don’t have an address on them.

What are these theoretical thieves going to do – go up to every building in Mexico City – a place of over 20 million people – and test the keys on every door?

It’s literally “third world retard logic.”

Granted, I don’t care that much about this issue.

My plan here was to stay just for a month because, as I wrote in a previous article, I procrastinated so much on apartment hunting when getting ready to leave my last place that I opted for the place I’m in now for a brief time.

My plan was to just stay here for a month and ditch to a better location in the city with the extra time allocated for apartment hunting.

So the “key” issue wasn’t overly concerning to me since I was planning on heading out soon anyway and we’re already a week here.

Outside of that, the only other issue to this place is that it’s a tiny bit hot.

It’s not overly hot like the last place but you’d want a fan running like the one I have now.

Having said all that, it’s really not a bad place.

I like it.

If they would not be retarded about the keys and assuming I’d actually want to live here longer term, I could see myself living here for maybe 6 months?

That’s usually the time needed before I get some itch to move just because I like to keep my feet active.

The neighborhood itself isn’t touristy whatsoever but the surrounding area feels safe by my standards.

And, above all, it’s insanely cheap for what it offers.

Only 125 bucks a month and the deposit was about 65 bucks.

That’s cheap as fuck.

I haven’t lived in a place this cheap in a long ass time.

And the fact that it’s not run down at that price and in an area that feels comfortable really makes it a solid deal for a young man in his 20s who doesn’t care to live in touristy areas.

Having said all that, the reason why I’m moving out of this place this week has less to do with issues I have with the place and issue that some theoretical neighbor has with me.

Let me explain.

“I CAN’T SLEEP!”

On the second night of me living here, I went to the bathroom to take a piss.

Then I went back to my room.

Very soon after, I hear noise outside my room.

I open the door.

And see this fresa effeminate looking dude walking back to his door across my room.

Seemingly pissed off.

I closed the door.

Not sure what his problem was.

The next morning, I get a long winded text from the landlord saying some neighbor has a problem with me.

The dude apparently claimed that I “made a total mess of the bathroom,” that the room has a “weird odor” and that there is “SO MUCH NOISE” coming from my room.

I responded.

I obviously didn’t leave the bathroom in a total mess – I only took a quick piss with the toilet seat up.

How the fuck did I do damage to the bathroom?

Walk in. Piss. Flush toilet. Walk out.

That’s what I did.

I don’t leave anything in the bathroom area except my towel for when I shower in the morning and it hangs so it can dry.

So that can’t be an issue.

My only guess is that the flushing of the toilet woke the dude up and he got pissed.

That and maybe he’s a castrated individual who needs to sit down to piss.

I don’t know.

Then an odor in the room?

I imagine he got a whiff of it as I opened the door to check on the commotion outside my room that night when he was half stomping back to his room late at night muttering shit to himself.

Which, as a side point, I guess I can say I make less noise given I don’t run around the apartment at 2 AM angrily muttering shit for neighbors to hear.

 And I will be fair in saying there is an odor in my room.

It isn’t overly strong in my opinion but it’s there.

Granted, it’s not like I cook meth or anything crazy over here.

But, when I got the complaint the following morning that involved a mention of an “odor,” I tried to think “where could this odor come from?”

I shower everyday.

Don’t have anything wet or dirty laying around.

Throw the trash away in the kitchen.

In short, I concluded it must be from the humidity in the room.

As you can read here, a room with little ventilation and a lot of heat can develop an odor.

“It's known that humidity in the air traps odor causing molecules and causes them to not only travel farther, but also linger longer,” Dr. ... This results in a noticeable bad smell."

And the room doesn’t have any windows that can be opened.

So that must be it.

It doesn’t bother me any though because it’s not that strong but I guess Sr. Fresa got a whiff of it when I opened my door.

Then you have the noise complaint.

Which I found weird also.

Keep in mind, I do work at night until around 4 or 5 AM.

I’m nocturnal basically.

But what noise could’ve came from my room?

I have headphones in so there’s no music playing.

I haven’t talked to anyone during the night over the last week so no voices could be heard from my room.

I haven’t been unpacking my bags in my room during the night either or doing anything physically that could cause noise.

Literally, during the night, I have been sitting in a chair, listening to music with headphones in and just typing.

Anyone complaining of noise should be grateful that I haven’t taken the time to bring any chick back to my place to spend the night.

Especially someone like Jovi who, after enough tequila, really makes her presence known for even those in China to hear her perfectly.

But then the next morning came on the day that I got that long text about the neighbor’s complaints

I didn’t see the text right away and walked downstairs to get some lunch first before checking my phone.

The landlord’s wife, who sits downstairs by the front door, wanted to “talk with me in private” outside.

She politely explained to me that some unnamed neighbor complained VERY STRONGLY about the noise from my room.

The noise being his primary complaint.

What was the noise in question?

She explained that the neighbor described it as “fan noise.”

I do have a fan.

However, I will say that, when speaking a foreign language that you aren’t native in, you sometimes might doubt that you understood something correctly if it sounds so ridiculous.

This was one of those moments.

The dude, who doesn’t even share a wall with me, can hear the fan so loudly that he can’t sleep well?

It’s a fan – not a reggaeton song blasting from a bar next door.

So, in the moment, I doubted that I heard her correctly.

But she reiterated herself.

The fan keeps him up.

I explained to her that “give how hot the room is, I’d literally be sweating if I didn’t have it on.”

Which is true – it’s hot enough that it’d be uncomfortable to be there unless you had a fan on.

And, as a side point, I’d like to ask why is it that most Mexicans don’t seem to believe in the concept of air conditioning?

I can only recall one place I’ve been to that had it and the rest no.

Seems like a foreign concept to folks down here.

Anyway, let’s not piss all over Mexico too strongly today – it’s a great country. Tacos! Tacos!

Jokes aside, she understood right away when I said “it’s very hot.”

Assumingly past clients have had the same issue and made it known.

Anyway, we left it and that.

I walked away still confused regarding if I truly understood her right because it sounded so ridiculous to me.

“Really? The fan is loud enough to keep him awake?”

I’ve never heard of anyone being kept awake by a fan in another room.

It almost made me wonder if this was some xenophobic cunt who just doesn’t like foreigners and came up with a reason to dislike me.

Or if the flushing of the toilet was what woke him up somehow and he made an exaggerated list of things about how I’m the devil.

Like the complaint of a dirty bathroom (literally I only took a piss with the toilet seat up. Can’t imagine much damage was done, huh?).

At any rate, the fan does seem to be the central issue regarding why I won’t be staying here much longer.

It’s escalated.

The Most Hated Fan of Mexico

I got a morning text from the landlord yesterday morning.

Here's a bit of it.

Basically, the complaints are the same minus bathroom issues.

Noise of the fan and an odor.

And, as you can see by the chat, the landlord even looked into the idea of changing the small window of the room as you can see here.

It’s not a real window which is why I said this room doesn’t have any windows.

You can’t open it obviously.

The landlord wanted to change it so it could be opened and brought the idea to my attention a few days ago.

Initially, I had reservations about the idea since Mexicans tend to half-ass a lot of things.

I could easily see some employee half-assing the job at making an actual window where it wouldn’t close properly.

Allowing mosquitos to enter in all times of the night – interrupting my sleep and annoying the fuck out of me.

But I agreed to it anyhow.

Though, as you can see, the landlord couldn’t get the approval.

Not sure who the “vecina” was that denied the idea.

Must be this mysterious “Guadalupe” character if I had to guess.

At any rate, as you can see in the chat above, the fan is such an issue that apparently even all of the neighbors complain about it.

Which was a tiny bit weird when said “all the neighbors” because I’ve only seen two people living here.

There’s the fresa dude mentioned before and some brown chick next door.

Who seems nice and didn’t have issue with the fan.

I even asked her last Sunday when I caught her eating pizza in the living room if the fan is an issue in the middle of some small talk.

She said no.

And I’ve literally never had anyone else complain about the use of a fan before in any other apartment I’ve lived in.

But I do wonder if there’s something else at work here.

The Landlord Has Issues?

As I said, the place is only 125 USD a month.

I can’t imagine that the landlord is making much of a profit on such a small amount of money.

Maybe hoping to out price the competition?

But not leaving him much to earn per month after expenses.

In my chat with the landlord, he seemed particularly concerned about my use of resources after just a week here.

Specifically with the electricity bill.

When he knocked on my door a few days ago to inquire about changing the window, he walked into the room and commented on how “having the light on increases the costs!”

And pointed at the ceiling.

I looked at the ceiling in the moment.

The light was off.

There was enough natural lighting and there is until about 6 PM in November.

So I keep it off until then or later either because I don’t need it or I’m outside anyhow.

But yes – the light is on then from say 8 PM until 4 AM normally.

With the fan on also.

You see, you do have some landlords who take issue with us folks “working from home.”

That we drive up more costs.

The types most concerned about us will say in Spanish something like “you can’t be in the room ever! Only to sleep and that’s it!”

You do have some who genuinely, for whatever reason, want to rent a place out but don’t want you spending more than 6 to 8 hours in the room when you are sleeping.

A minute later and they get pissed about the EXTRA ELECTRICITY BILL!

It’s such third world logic – if you got a problem with the extra bill, just charge me for it.

Perfectly understandable.

Why not charge more for it instead of losing a potential or current client?

And this landlord anyway – even though I told him beforehand that I work from home – seemed to not understand how that could impact the electricity bill until after the first week of living here.

And it wasn’t just him coming into my room and pointing at the ceiling where the light wasn’t turned on and going “THE ELECTRICITY BILL IS HIGH!!”

With the lights turned off in the moment anyhow.

He’s reminded me a few times like you can see in the texts above.

At any rate, how do we summarize this?

A Summary of the Issues

While I don’t have many issues with the place itself, it seems like the place has issues with me.

Particularly with a neighbor who seems EXTREMELY sensitive to even the smallest noise.

Seriously – a fan is an issue for you?

I even lowered the fan speed to the lowest level and I still got complaints about the noise after.

I’ve been outside my room late at night to take a piss many times and could barely hear it even when literally outside my door.

So this is one sensitive motherfucker.

I’ve even tried accommodating in other ways like not flushing the toilet until right before I go to bed at around 5 AM.

That way “it’s not dirty” but I don’t somehow wake the motherfucker up several times during the night.

And with the fan?

I can’t help it.

I’m not going to fucking die of sweat with it off given how hot the room can be.

And it’s on its lowest level.

Here’s a pic of it now.

Yeah, it looks a tiny bit broken.

It’s a cheap ass fan that sold for 5 bucks in Walmart almost a year ago.

It works anyhow.

And there’s a pizza box next to it that I keep in case it accidently falls down (hasn’t yet).

That way, in theory, if it falls down, then it hits the box and not the floor.

Lessening the risk of extra noise that will make the fresa neighbor wake up in horror.

I’ve taken steps to minimize any noise possible!

Still not enough though apparently.

Then, on top of that, clearly the landlord predicts that he won’t make much of a profit from me if I’m working form home and having a fan on.

Which is a bit dumb – why not just ask for a tiny bit of extra money to cover the extra unpredicted costs?

Especially when I told him beforehand that I work from home before I even began living here.

At any rate, the amount of complaints that I have gotten about the “fan noise” has been so fucking ridiculous over the last week that I agree also that it’s time to move.

It’s distracting me from work on my porn affiliate income website and I don’t want to fucking bother with the bullshit about a fan.

So where do we go from here?

The Next Week

Well, as you can see in the chat, the landlord gave me options.

Leave after the first month (something I planned on doing beforehand).

Or leave now and we give you 100% of what you gave us (rent and deposit) by this Friday of November 26^th.

I chose the latter.

The dude said he’d give it to me “in hand” and not some bullshit like “oh I leave and hope he sends me the money after but doesn’t.”

So, if he gives me the money in hand, then I’ll gladly walk out the door.

I guess it means a free 10 days of rent but also I can’t see myself working in this environment if I’m going to consistently get a daily complaint about “fan noise.”

Which really is the center issue here for everyone.

That pesky fan.

And, on top of that, as I said, I procrastinated too much before the last move that I chose this area to live in instead of somewhere else that I wanted to.

I had been casually looking at apartment offerings before this drama happened so I already have a few options in mind.

While I don’t value living in a highly touristy place, I do value having a nice park next to me.

And I’d like to move to an area that has a nice park.

By next Friday, I hope to have moved to Claveria of Mexico City that has one of my favorite parks that you can read about here.

I’ve already put myself in contact with a few folks and it seems likely at this point.

So that’s all.

I know I said before that I was going to take a small break from writing so I can focus on certain pressing matters (like handling some packages coming my way, working on my porn affiliate website, etc).

Which, on the topic of making money from my other websites, I kinda feel like Jack from The Shining these days every time I get a complaint from Sr. Fresa about the fan as you can see here.

“YOU’RE DISTRACTING ME! LOSING MY CONCENTRATION!”

But with this latest development, I’ll have to postpone the break until Friday since I’m not going to get much done anyhow as I look for a new place to move to quickly.

And, if I do move to Claveria area by that park mentioned, I'll probably stay for about 6 months at most assuming it has no surprises like this place has had.

I was talking with a friend of mine named Blayde about this recently and he commented on how "he could never move as much as I do."

And, while I do like moving around, moving for a second time this quick does make me feel an itch to stay put for a tiny bit longer in the next place.

We'll see anyhow.

Anyway, that’s all I got to say.

Just a small update on my life.

I might post another article or two in the coming day or so before my month break from writing actually begins.

Leave any comments below in the comment section.

And follow my Twitter here.

Thanks for reading.

Best regards,

Matt

PS: I got to take a piss after writing all of this. Wish me luck that I don’t wake the fresa dude up. I’ll even tip toe to the bathroom.