Chelsea has needed a work desk since we arrived in Bucerías. On our first full day here, I drove to Walmart and picked up a card table until we could get our bearings and find a permanent solution.
I walked to furniture stores nearby and drove to several others. Local places didn’t have any, the sizes were wrong, or they were crazy expensive. For several days, we scoured Facebook Marketplace, Amazon, and Mercado Libre – essentially the Mexican version of eBay. Finally, we found a simple one for a price we felt was reasonable on Amazon Mexico and placed the order on June 22. The estimated delivery date was July 5. Almost two weeks, but she was okay with that. We moved into our new location on July 1. Every day I checked Amazon for updates. There was no tracking since it was being sold and shipped by a third-party vendor.
On July 5, there was a new order headline, “Llegando hoy antes de las 8 PM,” the Spanish version of arriving today before 8 PM. As a dutiful husband, I drove to the previous address around 9 AM. Close to 1 PM a DHL van stopped outside of the house.
YES!!! The day isn’t going to be a total waste and I can be with the family. Nope. The driver dropped off a package at the neighbor’s house and left. Chelsea texted to see how I was and wanted to know if she should bring me lunch. I told her I wasn’t hungry and I’d let her know if anything changed. At 2 PM, she brought over some food and decided to stay with me for a bit. I texted a friend we have made here around 5 PM to let them know what was happening and that Hobbes wouldn’t be able to go swimming with her children. She was also waiting on a package and let us know that deliveries regularly occurred late in the evening.
I checked the Amazon site again. Still arriving today before 8 PM.
I had already invested eight hours. There was no way I was going to give up now and have some driver leave a note saying, “We couldn’t deliver your package since no one was home.”
At 7:59 PM, our friend texted to say her package was just delivered. She lives on the same street as the Airbnb, just a couple of blocks over. We gathered our things, and ran down to the street to wait for the truck. And we waited. And we waited. No sounds of a truck coming or going.
I decided enough was enough. I would drive where our friend lives and find out what was happening. Nothing was happening. There was no truck to be found. I circled the block hoping to randomly find the vehicle that was sapping my emotional energy. No vehicle. No desk. No delivery.
It was well after 8 PM, so we went home. Amazon’s website mocked me, still assuring us our package would be delivered today.
I contacted the vendor, who passed along tracking numbers for a company named Redpack. I hurriedly found their website, entered the numbers, pressed enter and saw…”En Preparación.” You don’t have to be able to read Spanish to know that our items hadn’t even shipped.
I contacted the vendor again, let him know we were in the process of moving and asked if he could update the shipping address. He replied that he had taken care of it. Great. That was on Monday.
Friday came with no new updates. The Amazon website offered us a chance to request a refund, so I did. Soon afterward, I left the condo and drove to a woodworking shop I had already visited when this odyssey began. They still didn’t have any desks the size I needed, but this time I asked if they could make me one. The sales lady went to the back and returned with someone else. For the next 20 minutes or so, we used pantomime and random Spanish words to communicate what I wanted. He responded with long strings of sentences that I didn’t understand, but I agreed to.
If I have any grasp of what occurred, he is going to build me a desk the size and color that I wanted, and it should be ready next Friday. Oh yeah, it will be considerably less expensive than the one on Amazon Mexico. It’s also possible I will get there Friday and have ordered a dining room table that seats 12 or a bookshelf. I’ll provide an update next week and we can be surprised at the result together.