Too Bad Irving Wasn’t Driving
Posted on March 18, 2010 - Filed Under Guatemala, Personal, Simple Life | 2 Comments
Irving has the ability to get out of just about anything. It’s a terribly annoying trait when applied to you, but when he uses it to get out of trouble with the cops, it’s very handy.
You’re probably wondering why he’d be in trouble with the cops and the answer is that he was robbed a while back and lost everything, from the tarjeta de circulacion for his motorbike (proof of ownership) to his cedula. He has nothing. And, in true chapin-style, he hasn’t started the very lousy and long recuperation process, though he does have a police report.
Since cops feel the need to stop random people here every five minutes rather than going after the morons who pass on corner on hills, we’ve been stopped several times. Irving explains everything to the officer and until now, has escaped without a single ticket, despite not having any papers for himself or the motorcycle.
Our car conked out a while back and so we have had to rely on the moto while we waited for me to get paid in order to fix the car (yet another blog post there!). Irving has been taking me to Zumba, used the moto to go shopping, etc. It’s a pain because we can’t take the kids, but it worked.
Until yesterday. He lent the motorcycle to his cousin to go pick up the car battery so we could start the process of putting the vehicle back together enough to get it to the mechanic shop in Jocotenango.
Four hours later and his cousin still wasn’t back. Irving went to check and it turned out that the cousin had been stopped by the cops on the main calzada by the market and they had confiscated the motorcycle since he didn’t have the ownership papers. He DOES have regular papers, but they figured the bike was stolen (He does have a criminal look about him) and promptly took it from him and gave him a Q1,200 fine.
Which leaves us without any transport at the moment. Irving has to present the paperwork for the motorcycle before he can get it back, which will take a while, though the car should be ready in a couple of days . . . according to the mechanic, which likely means more than a week!
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2 Responses to “Too Bad Irving Wasn’t Driving”
Talk to Me, People!
Oh dear, that’s not good at all! I hope things get sorted out quickly. I don’t know how we’d survive without transport. Good luck.
[...] car sat. Irving’s cousin (the same one who cost us the motorcycle) stole a couple of things out of it to [...]