David(MTY)
Feb 24, 2003, 10:24 AM
Post #2 of 2
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Re: [gurley] Might this be a "niche" for me?
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Hello Rose,
I admire your interest in wanting to live with your husband "south of the border" and keep a simple life, before retiring. Perhaps you can find something worth following up in these comments:
You spoke of doing offering nutritional counseling to "Mexican poor". I hope you pursue this idea further. You probably will find for the most part that the "Mexican poor" won't really want your help, although they are the ones who most need it. Several years ago, I had an interesting situation in that I chose to eat with factory workers in my company in our subsidized cafeteria, and less frequently make the daily long lunches with my managerial colleagues. Food was US $0.65 for a full lunch. It had about 100 fat grams, and there wasn't much of a selection. I asked the cafeteria to kindly have steamed vegetables. They never missed a beat and fit it in their routine with no additional effort, and it was really good. I felt like I was getting special treatment, so I asked them to please always have a side of vegetables available in colorful asthetic splendor for everyone with a little popeye sign smiling as he knocked out Brutus with Olive watching. I was amazed at what Mexican ingenuity could do on so little $ on presentation and taste. No one ate it, and it became scrap. They eventually asked me if they could stop losing money, and we had a meeting at human resources to see if we could do anything else. We couldn't figure out anything, the employees were just not interested in eating any vegetables no matter what we did. We had a few focus groups, and then decided to spend our efforts elsewhere. Human resources explained to me what had become obvious, that employees, without exception, just wanted to bulk up on fatty diets, or else food wasn't food to them. And concepts such as replacing fat with carbs, even with training's creative input were not expected to be successful.
I suppose this is a single example, but it is first hand on the disinterest faced among 300 good and fun people, who I never thought of as "poor", just in bad economic situations. Many of them didn't buy the cafeteria food because it was too expensive (it was actually the best bargain in town), even on their salaries starting at double minimum wage, so they could send their children to school and pay their rent and expenses at home.
Now, if you honestly wish to do something to help economically challenged families, that would actually be, in my opinion a very nice way to work up to something that you could be proud of and hopefully give you the footing to start earning, is to start with charitable organizations. Perhaps you want to get involved with some church groups. There are always some with nice señoras that do things like bring cloths to folks in the hills, who you might get friendships with, and work from there. You might end up doing other charitable work and helping the church out provide nutritive meals, or even help the señoras themselves loose weight. This is a nice way to contribute and build up from getting from A to B (but hopefully not dropping A).
In addition to the church, I highly recommend you check out the D.I.F. in communities nearby to those of your interest. DIF has the role of social workers and support of the family. It is government run, and you managed to work something out, you should expect no renumeration.
You present your high qualifications as support for doing what you want to do. I don't know the situation in Chapala, but here in Monterrey, the well to do have a generous share of Nutrólogos. The ones I have met are extremely good at what they do and could be impressive members of the ADA. (By the way, membership in the ADA is helpful to your case in my opinion). Then there are all kinds of Mexican M.D.'s into all kinds of natural products. While the doctors are a mixed bag of competence and offering (some being very good) they have a niche and are professional doctors, which you are not. Many well to do people in Monterrey go to Weight Watchers or "Quitakilos" a similar program widespread here. Itis quite established. I would suspect that Guadalajara has a similar situation, perhaps with even more emphasis on natural products.
In order to compete on a reasonable level, you should consider registering your degree before the Secretariat of Education and then getting a "cédula professional" if available in yours or and allied area. The cédula will require an accredited university in the Mexican system basically verifying your competence. You may be required to take a class or two. Most people go to the Universidad Autónoma de... in their area. That will put you on a level above others doing what you want to do, who have no formal training, and in plenty of cases, no value to add.
What you propose can be done if you have the degree of commitment necessary. Like any community, honest work like this requires you will need to contribute and invest in it before you can bear the fruits. This will take some time, and if your heart is not in it, could just be a frustrating experience. Think medium term, say three years. But if you truly are cut out for doing this, I am betting you will find your personal and financial rewards and you most probably will end up doing something you wouldn't have expected, and Mexico will be more than just a nice place to live.
The expat servicing is of course an option to pursue, and if you move to an american colonia, I don't think it is much more different than moving to a small town when all the dust settles. In any case, regarding your immigration and work questions, I recommend you do not put them before getting a simple FM3, which once you learn the lay of the land, perhaps with the help of a competent attorney, you can pursue as needed. You've already established that you have no one to flat out hire you, and that is what most of the visas are intended for. You need to define your situation instead of putting the carrito before the caballo. Perhaps your best bet will eventually be as an independent professional on your FM3 (or FM2). But at this point you don't really know, and rather than worrying about how to get paid work permission it will be infinitely more easy to find out what your first paid work will be and then take it from there. Someone who has volunteered in Mexico and shows that on their visa upgrade application certainly is an asset to our country and is usually recognized.
PS I don't know if you are aware that Type II Diabetes is far more prevalent in the Mexican population than in the corresponding US one, to the point of being on par with an epidemic. Definitely (but very sadly) something to consider as you go through your options...
(This post was edited by David(MTY) on Feb 24, 2003, 10:34 AM)
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