¿A qué hora se cierra?

The first day we spotted the home we bought, we noticed the Tecmodinamico almost directly across the street. We heard the tink-tink-tink of someone tapping a metal object. Our first thought was ugghh...that's not a pleasant thing to have right across from your front door. Before we had even made an appointment to see the house, I casually walked to the front of the building and asked ¿A qué hora se cierra? What time do you close? The men looked up puzzled while a woman seated at a desk, without a glance my way, stated something like "cinco y medio."  I figured she was telling me 5:30 or so. I look back and think how rude that must have appeared to the shop owners. They surely knew that we had nothing for them to repair. Obviously we were inquiring to see how adversely the appearance and noise made by their business would impact our living across the street. We discovered that the previous owners of Las Lechuzas had approached the owner of the shop to see if he would sell the property. His response went something like this: Why would I sell the business? We just remodeled the building! Quite certainly he mumbled other words under his breath. We now smile and wave occasionally  but I hesitate to walk over and introduce myself because I feel embarrassed. The truth is that we are not bothered by any noise made by their work, and around 5:30 or so they roll the doors down and go home. Our street looks just about like every other street in the Centro. This is what we see when we look out the front door,  but we don't spend our days peering out. The door is merely a means of  entering or exiting our home.  We could have chosen the nicely landscaped country club community of north Mérida, or for that matter a solidly Mexican colonia.

We chose El Centro, warts and all,  and not once has the tink-tink-tink of Tecmodinamico interfered with 

a siesta or an afternoon swim.

We do spend a good deal of time peering out at this