Garage Sales (Subastas)
The Mexican people love their faith, family, music and cuetes or fuegos artificiales (fireworks) and they particularly love garage sales or subastas.
We have had several of these events over the 18 years we have been here and our daughter and her friend had another one today. The enthusiasm is unbridled and while my daughter went to put up the signs for the garage sale her friend arrived to start to display the goods for sale. He called out to me and asked for the key to the garage as people were already at the gate and planning to scale it if they were not let in at once.
It then is an absolute frenzy of clothes, shoes, electronics, DVDs, jewelry, an exercise bike and purses all flying in all directions. They wanted my Miracle -Gro which I keep in the garage and some old Christmas movies I had earmarked for friends and two of my buckets got sold and we had to fight to retain a table and ironing board which were not for sale.
One of the favorite questions was “Are there any more cositas (little things) inside the house you want to sell. My advice to you is not to let these bargain hunters get inside your house or it will be stripped down as if a swarm of locusts had been through.
We have always had success beyond our wildest hopes at these garage sales and today was no different.
The whole thing is over in a matter of hours and it is the morning rush that will clean you out. Even when the doors are closed and the signs taken down people will still show up at the gate hoping there is something less for them to pick over happily.
I suggest you have plastic bags, all items on hangers with prices and lots of change.
I also suggest that you do a garage sale with at least one other person because at its height you will need more than one person to handle all the questions and sales.
Wear casual not particularly flattering clothing because these sale hounds literally will want the clothes off your back.
If you saw the movie “Trading Places” with Eddie Murphy and Dan Aykroyd a garage sale here in Ajijic, Lake Chapala is very like the final scene in the pit of the stock market when the orange juice futures were released. Hectic is a very euphemistic word to describe the carnage. Profitable but carnage nonetheless.