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Published: January 7th 2009
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Tim Version:
* Bussed to San Miguel with an overnighter in San Salvador, stayed first night in a prostitute hotel.
* Moved 2 more times to different hotels, drank and watched the party start to crank for days, then slept through the big finale!
The version that doesn´t regret but still can´t believe we slept through the best part:
Leaving Tacuba, we headed back to San Salvador hoping to make the trip in a single day, but not in that much of a rush we arrived in San Salvador a bit late to make it to San Miguel, so headed instead for food and accomodation. When you really like a place, and really like who you´re traveling with, life takes on a much less rushed happier pace. Everyone we asked to San Miguel bus times gave us different times but the average was that there were no more until tomorrow. Bus times and routes are an interesting thing in Central America, with El Salvador being more organised but still not all that much... bus information survives in peoples minds through word of mouth and occasionally in organised places scribbled on rough sheets of paper. Its like a
hive mind, with no central core, but it always seems to work, and choppig of any branch wouldn´t stop the flow of info so it all kinda of works. Its just a bitch sometimes like tonight when whatever the real current times are obviously haven´t flowed through to everyone yet!
This time for a change we thought we´d try La Estancia in the Boulevard Del Los Heroes area near MetroCentro, a cool little place extremely popular with Peace Corps workers and the guide book says and we found out in person - American accents everywhere! The owner is a champion older El Salvadorian lady who makes you feel very at home too, and it really is more of a home than a hostel/hotel. One of the most amusing things staying there is hearing them often moan ad whine about how crappy the US news is and that its always the same and depressing, then watching them religiously get up every morning and watch it for hours like zombies! They may have their own opinions, but when it comes to watching TV all I saw was trained monkeys! We had a drink that night at a thankfully empty karaoke bar
around the corner with 3 or 4 very bored looking waiters, but didn´t get up to any singing - not enough beers for that!
Cruising on, the bus the next day to San Miguel was a cruisy long run, so I lived in Music land with my MP3 player and Eve slept. In San Miguel we had no luck with the hotels I knew, so when an offer came up from a rather done up looking lady to show us a hotel we took her up on the offer. Rather done up? Just a little too much! Which you find a fair bit in Central America in normal life, but when every guy on the street knew her, she started getting whistles, and her walk had just a little too much pep, we worked out she was a prostitute. Still, we needed a room, and she was friendly enough so we followed. The place she led us too was a bit off the track but it was a bed and Eve was seriously sick of moving around! When we checked out our room, it had neatly folded in the corner one towel, half a dozen sheets of paper, and
a condom, all neatly arranged! Confirming our suspicions and funny as hell to see was when the lady of the night asked the owner was this the correct price for the night, and seemingly baffled by us wanting a room "for a whole night", once it all clicked that we weren´t just there for the usual he exchanged the condom and towel setup for normal sheets and towels, and a full role of toilet paper.
The next day we switched outta that place as it really was quite shit, having the usual hole in the wall shower but with the shower falling onto the toilet and no room, it really wasn´t meant for staying long in. The next place we grabbed was much much better, but after finding the cheap room bed smelt like somethign I don´t wish to describe, we decided to splash out and took a room with air-con as well. We wandered the streets of San Miguel checking out the setting up for the grande fiesta the following day, and soaked up the happy party atmosphere. One family selling pupusas and other food we made friends with - well, to be fair, Eve did with their
kids and after that it was all quite cosey! They The 2 girls we mainly talked to were about 8, and I discovered that if you´re learning Spanish then this is exactly what you need! They don´t try and guess what you´re saying, if they don´t understand they just tell you! They don´t start conversations with preconcieved ideas of how its going to go, they just talk! And lastly, they talk slower and more clearly. Perfect little tutors!! We talked with them and drank a few beers and lived on far too many Pupusas con queso y frijoles for a chunk of time before decideding that´d do for the day and went back and enjoyed the luxurious air con and TV. Before we did though, we saw a bunch of boys in the park playing with little spud guns, which is no surprise considering the local icecream shop is guarded by a security guard with a loaded pump action shotgun, but the scary thing was how they were playing... the guns cock like real, you load them with clips, and it wasn´t cowboys and indians but instead street gang style warfare with the guy with the empty clip copping an
execution style death. Creepy!
The following day was the big party, and the place was in mad setting up mode! Bands were playing in all corners of the park, streets vendors were finding every crumb of room selling beer and food, and sweets! Wow! There was a talent contest running with no talent entering into it but it was amusing while painful to watch. There was so much sweet stuff for sale it made you´re teeth crash and your tongue water just looking down the street! Heh funny enough after trying many different looking ones I found that most had very little difference in flavour and mostly it was cosmetic, but they made for mesmering intricate sets of different coloured shapes and sizes on their stalls all around the place. We found our food family cooking again and ate from them while trying to mix extremely cheap vodka and licuados together with little success and so switched for beers. Beers here though make me fall asleep, and after adventuring around until around 7pm we were both nodding off where we stood so opted for a quick nap... that nap never really ended! We slept for most of the night
A more distant church
Can there every be enough churches? Yes, yes there can... and decided that we´d really seen what it was going to be like, and while cool it didn´t look that massive. And we were really really comfortable!
The next morning the damage was evident - people sleeping on the streets everywhere (more than usual), people staggering bleary eyed and still drunk, the whole town in cleanup mode and stalls emptied of their goods. It turned out that most vendors just don´t sleep that night, opting instead to live almost 3 days in total of no sleep, so when they finally crash they crash hard!! Seeing people staggering, stinking, and occasionally throwing up all over town doesn´t do wonders for the appetite but we grabbed some food anyway, and then a licuados at a cleaner aitconditioned place after to aviod the smell. In the paper we also saw photos of the party... IT WAS HUGE!! Floats through the streets, 5 times more people, and aerial shots showing the crowd! Turns out we left just before it got good and the crowd we saw besides looking like revelers were possibly just peolpe setting up! While we didn´t regret sleeping and thoroughly enjoyed each others company, we felt slightly sheepish at having
And painted on the church...
This however I like... it´s the Father from the El Salvadorian revolution missed one of the biggest parties in El Salvador, sleeping only 3 blocks away.
Ah well, always next time eh? I´ve got the real Carnaval in Salvador, Brazil coming up anyway so wasn´t too fussed...
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Robert
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San miguel
Hi, did u get that nice necklace in San miguel? and was the 3rd hotel, xpensive? coming to san miguel in feb.