It was just a little story about a bunch of guys building a giant Christmas tree of metal. I could just waltz up to the construction site, talk to a few workers, record some crane noise and be done with it. Should have been a piece of cake, right?

Workers celebrate their creation of the world's tallest Christmas tree in Mexico City. Photo by Grant Fuller.

Well, not this Christmas. Not at this construction site. Not in Mexico, where bureaucracy and official-ness are king and queen. Stymied on multiple fronts by security telling me not to move a muscle, by confused workers who didn't want to get in trouble, and by a hazy language barrier between my Spanish and the Brazilians' Portuguese ... I decided to wait for the boss to hook me up. And boy did I wait. By the end of my three-day stakeout, I estimate that I'd spent at least seven full hours simply waiting for them to speak to me. They were busy, sure. But I, too, have a job to do.

In Mexico, going through the official means to get what you need is often a recipe for disaster. I've learned that the hard way on multiple story assignments. Unreturned phone calls, unanswered e-mails, misleading information, unnecessary attitudes, chronic lateness, and bold-faced lies are all part of the game. People seem to enjoy making it more difficult than it needs to be. You just have to learn to deal with it, and circumvent the official route whenever possible.

So I needed a Christmas miracle to get this one done. And lo and behold, I eventually cornered the tree boss for an interview. But guess what happened? Perhaps predictably, we ended up cutting him out of the script completely. Sigh. Just my official Mexican luck.

What "Christmas miracles" have you discovered recently, as you seek to cut through the clutter of the season?

Listen to Grant's story on Mexico's giant metal Christmas tree.