Day 18: San Salvador

You would not believe the amazing bus we rode from Guatemala City to San Salvador! It was like riding first class in a really nice airline. There were attendants, meals, movies, and incredibly plush, comfortable seats. It was fantastic. $27. Eat that greyhound! The 6 hour trip in that King Quality bus went by sooo fast compared to the 2 hour trip in a cramped "Chicken Bus" between Antigua and Guatemala City. Those buses are left over U.S. school buses (the ones that aren't good enough for Americans anymore) with 3 to every seat and the aisle comleted filled with people standing in cramped conditions the whole way.

From now on it's King Quality all the way.

Our first impression of San Salvador was that the people here have a much more comfortable life than the people of Guatemala City. Things are much cleaner here, and the streets, even though there is barbed wire and protective walls around most of the houses, seem more tranquil. Our suspicions were reinforced by a visit to the Taiwan embassy, who told us that things are really great in El Salvador and that the standard of living is like in the U.S. People even use U.S. dollars here. They have their own currency, but according to the Taiwanese press person (who, I should mention, was unable to even mention the names of 2 important newspapers in El Salvador) it's better for the economy to use U.S. dollars. Can't say that makes a whole lot of sense to me, but please let me now if you are able to follow that logic.

We decided to visit the National University of El Salvador next. 2 Weeks ago there was a peaceful demonstration there aginst the government attack on the autonomy of the university. In reaction, there was a massive repression by the police, involving guns, tear gas, helicopters and a subsequent fear on the part of the students and the professors who spoke out in solidarity with them. We wanted to hear how the students were doing now.

We managed to find the student journalist group and spoke with a representative there. He told us that contrary to what the Taiwanese Embassy may have told us, 75% to 80% of the people of El Salvador live in extreme poverty, on average earning something like $130 per month for a "household" of 4. I put household in quotes, because he said that it is totally normal for most of these people to live in a house made of cardboard, plastic, and branches. Earlier we had eaten at the student cafeteria and been astounded at the low price of $1.25 for a full plate of food and a bottle of water, but now it seems really expensive for someone supporting 4 people on $130 a month. The journalism student told us he would be happy to show us one these poor neighborhoods, and in fact, felt that is very important that we see what life is like for these people and get the word out. We will be going sometime this week, either with him, or with someone from a Buddhist Humanitarian organization that is working with victims of the latest earthquakes.

Before we left, he wanted to show us some interesting murals around campus. Hopefully they will be available by the time I post this blog at

http://picasaweb.google.com/ogoldberg

I'm having some problems uploading though, so you may have to wait a little bit.
As a product of the Civil War in the 1970s and 1980s, the murals are all quite revolutionary, and once again we see Che Guevera's mug prominently displayed everywhere we go, only this time Fidel Castro is quite often up there with him, which is quite interesting as we haven't really seen much of that up until now.

One thing you may also see in those pictures is yet another car with a swastika on it. We asked our friend why we keep seeing swastikas in Central America. Are people here facists? Do they hate Jews? His answer was no. He said that people simply think it's a cool looking symbol, and really have no idea what it means. He says that the people of El Salvador are terribly ignorant, and really need to be better educated. This was circumstantially proven when we subsequently quizzed a passerby as to the meaning of said swastika. His response? "That's the symbol of Russia, right?"

When I told him it was in fact a symbol of the Nazis, he said, "Right. That's what I said: the Russians."

How quickly we forget such important lessons. Don't you dare think that the world will be ok if we just sit by and watch ignorance like this spread through the world's communities like a virus. We need to always be working on the vaccine, and we can't ever stop, because the virus is always changing, growing and getting stronger. We must do the same.

Ok. I'm done with my pedantry now.

Susanna and I want to help our journalist friend here in El Salvador get published. The media and government here are so repressive that only one message has the opportunity to get expressed, the message of the Right Wing. We are going to try to get him and his fellow students the chance to get published regularly in alternative media around the world. Hopefully, using the money from these articles, they can eventually build their own independent media organization to counter the big business and big government monopoly on opinion, and truly educate the people.

Tomorrow we are meeting up with a local poet that our good friends from Guatemala City told us about. They were so nice and told us about so many people and so many things. I hope to keep in touch with them.

The owner of our hotel is also a poet and a journalist with revolutionary tendencies. He says that he was friends with Che Guevera. Awesome...even if it isn't true.

Looks like the whole photo thing might not work out for today, but I'll try to get them up as soon as possible.