A Guatemalan taxi cab!

Arnoldo, a former gate guard at the school here drives a taxi cab. It's a mid-'80's Hyundai Excel that has seen better days and probably came to Guatemala like so many other cars, as salvage from the south eastern states to avoid the heavy duties levied on vehicles.

I met him again when I brought Petra to the market last week. When I asked him where his taxi was I found out that it was broken.

This past Saturday, after an hour to find the parts at a used parts place we were able to tow strap the car from his home to the school to work on it.

I found out that the rocker shaft had sheared in half! Once we started into repairing it it was obvious that the failure was probably directly due to poor maintenance. The oil in the engine was the same consistency as grease due to all the dirt in it!

We got it fixed and after doing a preliminary setting of the valves I asked that he start the car so we could see if it was running and we could get it warm enough to properly set the valves. Well, he had to first refill the leaky radiator that was tied in place with some old rags because the supports were broken off! It took nearly a gallon of water just to fill!

While we were warming the engine Arnoldo asked why the shaft had failed and I showed him the old shaft and how the old rockers were very stiff and the oil residue on the shaft looked like it had been on the barbeque! I suggested that perhaps an oil change was in order to avoid another similar failure. I also suggested that perhaps he should come again next weekend and maybe we could put in a "new" radiator that doesn't leak before his engine is ruined because the existing radiator leaks so badly.

I noticed too, that the tires were so bad that there are places where you can cut yourself on the exposed steel belts of the tires!

Anyways, about 3:00 in the afternoon Arnoldo was once again able to go and earn a living with his taxi cab after he added another 1/2 gallon of water to the radiator!

Pray that he will return to fix his radiator before he is once again unemployed due to car breakdown.

Now, before you say "Why doesn't he maintain his car?" you must understand the thinking of a Guatemalan. We in Canada and the USA are accustomed to think long term, a typical Guatemalan thinks only of today. I can drive the car home today so it is OK! Perhaps they take the words of Christ too literally when He says in Matthew 6:34 "do not worry about tomorrow for tomorrow will worry about itself".

I hope he will take some of what we talked about to heart and think about doing some preventative maintenance and repairs before it is too late. Remember too that here the parts cost are similar to home but the money he earns is much less. He took some friends of ours who were visiting from Germany two years ago, on a tour of the city for the day and charged Q300 or about $50 which included his gas.

When our photo gallery is up we'll post some pictures!