re: ATM

I can think of a couple of situations like that, but first just a clarification that I didn't really live in Latin America (unless you consider California a part of that), but I've met a lot of different people through my mission and vacations and being married to a Latina of Mexican descent.

That said, I agree wholeheartedly that any tourists, especially Americans, pretty much look like ATMs to any vendor or individual dead set on separating you from your dollars.

I have three experiences to back that up. Two are similar because they deal with transportation. The last one has to do with souvenirs.

• Our family of four was down visiting my wife's mom and extended family in a suburb of Mexico called Neza (for short—it's a longer Aztec or some such name that I can neither pronounce or spell, but everyone calls it Neza anyway). Her uncle decided to take us into Mexico City to the Zocalo and surrounding area. I can't remember how we got there, but on the way back, we came in three separate taxis. The one her uncle rode in was charged less than 100 pesos for the trip. The second one was charged just over 100 pesos. The third one, the one I was riding in, got charged 150 pesos. Same distance, following right after another. When her uncle found out, he was fit to be tied, which was kind of humorous and sort of made up for it. :)

• A friend of mine from work and I flew into the Cancun airport. We were going to meet up with my wife and sons who were staying with her family in Neza again, but we wanted to go tour some of the ruins in the vicinity first. At that time, you got off the plane onto the tarmac and walked into the airport. Upon reaching the entrance, there was a literal line of taxi drivers asking where you were going and then telling you how much they would charge. However, they were all heading to the main hotel strip in Cancun, and we were wanting to go south to Playa del Carmen, so once we told them that, they weren't so interested. But to get from the airport to the hoteleria was a couple kilometers, or so, and they wanted a couple hundred pesos, which even compared to the trip I described above was highway robbery. But as we went through the airport, the amount would go down, until it was around 100 pesos for the ride we didn't want. Finally, we got out the door and into the parking lot, and my friend suggested we just keep walking to the main road. I'm not sure what he thought was going to happen, but as we reached the main road and maybe walked a hundred yards, an empty tour bus showed up, stopped, and asked us where we were going. When we told them, they said get on, they were headed that direction. We got charged 10 pesos each, and had the entire bus to ourselves. :)

• I can't remember which trip this was, but we were in Teotihuacan, another area of ruins, but this one not far from Mexico City. It has two of the largest pyramids in the entire world. Vendors are all over the place once you get inside. The same souvenir could vary in price depending on where on the site you bought it, and who you were. My wife kept trying to haggle, and I would just walk away and pretend I didn't know her because if I didn't, the prices started out higher. At one point, we came across a group of younger men who were selling something and basically chanting, "Almost free, just like Kmart!"

re: resteeming

Well, I hope I wasn't the only one to do that, and honestly, it's the least I could do. I didn't have any advice or suggestions, so hopefully getting it out to more people would help. This place can be incredibly generous and knowledgeable when it wants to be. :)

re: second chances

Oh, I have no doubt that you give out 70 x 7 chances on a regular basis. There does come a point, though, where forgiving does not mean standing there and taking the abuse, large or small. Sad thing is, people don't seem to realize that a little bit of kindness over a long period of time will produce much more lasting wealth, and a network of friends, than forcing bottled water on anyone could possibly provide.

That said, circumstances are always relative, and you live according to what you know and what you believe. If you believe the world owes you, or that a certain segment of that world has done you wrong, more times than not, you'll go try and get what you think is rightfully yours, and then you blame others for lack of success.

It certainly doesn't help that the resources of Mexico and most of Latin America are in the hands of the very few, and that most will live in poverty even America's most poor will not experience. Still, common human decency is pretty much fundamental, and even if one government has done something to cause problems in some other country, as you stated in your post, that doesn't mean the citizenry wanted it or supported it. Especially with a house as divided as ours has been over the last couple of decades.