The upper class San Salvador
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San Salvador,
El Salvador
Tuesday, December 11, 2001
The wounded leg was sore this morning, I changed the bandage before leaving our hotel in La Liberdad. I slowly walked to the bus stop, still not willing to spend money on Taxi. I don't remember when was the last time we took a taxi...probably in Belize. The bus to San Salvador was full. Juliette found a seat, while I sat on the engine cover right next to the bus driver. At least I had some leg room. The ride was short, no more than 2 hrs. By the time we arrived at the final stop, my legs were tired and my bum were numb from sitting on the overheated engine. Blood was showing through the bandage I changed this morning. Just then I started to worry how I'm able to travel in this condition? We travelled only 2hrs by bus and I'm pretty much ready to drop dead.
As we looked at the map of our Lonely Planet to find where we are, and where are we going to find a hotel, suddenly a nice man on a pickup truck said in broken English: "which direction r u headed, I give u a ride." I didn't wanna to trouble the gentleman seeing his entire family where in the truck (his wife in the seat next to him and his two daughters on the back seat of the pickup truck). But we were really lost. So I answered unsurely, "Universidad" and show him the map in our guide book. We jumped on and he drove off. The city view from the back of the pickup was different than anything I have experienced, to my surprise, San Salvador was much cleaner and greener than Guatemala City and the traffic was not too bad. He drove very fast swerving from lane to lane. After about 10min we arrive at the gate of the University of San Salvador. We got off, thanked him very much. Once again in our time of despair, we always find nicest people in this world. While we still trying to find where we are, we decided to eat some lunch at a chicken restaurant(somewhat equivalent of KFC but more upscale) and looked at our LP to find our hotel.
After lunch, we took a Taxi (finally I no longer wanna walk no more) to our hostel in a relatively wealthy district of the city and checked into a dorm room. So many backpackers were in the lounge watching Pulp Fiction. In the afternoon, we went for a walk (Juliette) and limping (me) in a modern shopping mall. Christmas was close and the mall had a very festive feeling; giant Christmas tree at the entrance, people buying presents everywhere and there was even a Santa Claus entertaining the children. Me and Juliette both were shocked at the upper class feeling here, we felt out of place, not because we were foreigners but because WE looked poor and homeless compared to them, totally not what we had expected San Salvador to be. But hey, back home, we were brainwashed about the third world countries living conditions without realizing the broad spectrum of the people living there, and these people work hard to obtain the wealth they deserve.
