Nearly a week into our 3-week trip and I finally have the time and patience to update my site on what we’ve been up to in El Salvador. We have a DSL connection in the condo we are staying but most of the time it’s soooooo slow. I’ve fallen asleep a few times in my chair waiting for the pages to load…no joke. It definitely makes me appreciate the high-speed cable connection we have back home.

more photos from El Salvador

El Salvador is absolutely beautiful, green and lush with nature, has a spectacular tropical climate and the people are very warm and inviting. San Salvador, the capital of El Salvador has changed so much since the last time I was here, which was about 8 years ago. It’s changed for the better in many ways…better roads and infrastructure, less homelessness on the streets. In general, from what I can see the standard of living has most certainly changed for the better. I definitely notice more of a middle-class that has developed and broadened the gap between rich and poor. Of course, this does not change the fact that nearly 80% of this country is living in extreme poverty as with most Central American countries. And since the currency here is now US dollars, the prices for nearly everything have shot up drastically, making it much more difficult for people here to afford every day things. For example, we found it outrageous that the prices for the same brand electronics are actually more expensive here than the states. Eating at a fast-food chain is about the same price as in the US. I find this crazy, because the people here make far less than people in the US. Just another negative effect that capitalism has on poorer societies.

Here are some highlights of our trip so far:

• I had what seemed to be an ordinary insect/mosquito bite on my arm last Monday when we were still in Los Angeles. The next day, which was the day we were leaving for our trip, I noticed it was a bit swollen and some watery liquid was slowly dripping out of the area of the sting. Realizing this was abnormal; I stopped at a pharmacist and got some over-the-counter stuff for it (that of course did not do shit). Well, within a matter of a few days it turned huge, quite nasty in appearance, became badly infected and had caused a serious allergic reaction all over my body, which appeared to be other bites in various sizes on my arms, hands and back. Luckily, I was referred to a specialist here in San Salvador and she diagnosed it as a flea bite that had become badly infected as well as an allergic reaction. She prescribed some meds, gave me a few injections and fortunately I’m almost all healed up. What was really scary about this situation is that she said that she’d never seen such a bacterial infection before in El Salvador and that I was lucky that it had not become much more serious, as I’d waited too long to see a doctor (5 days). I’m very relieved, to say the least.
• What’s really cool is that we have our own fully furnished 3-bedroom/3 bath condo here. It belongs to my dad and is in the same building of his condo. Obviously, we don’t need all the space, but it’s really comfortable for us and we can come and go as we like and stay up as late as we like without disturbing anyone. My father basically bought a few condos in the building as an investment and to use when he has guests from out of town.
• Both Lars and I have been visiting a dentist since we arrived. We realized getting work done here will cost us only a fraction of what we would have to pay in the US and we both had some necessary work that we’d been putting off because of the expense. For example, a dentist in California estimated that it will cost a minimum of $6,000 to work on Lars. The dentist he is seeing here will probably charge about $700 for the same work. So far we’ve visited the dentist’s office pretty much every day since we arrived. Lars’ work is much more extensive than mine; most likely he’ll have at least 6 more visits before we head back home. We know it’s not the best way to spend our vacation, but the money it’s saving us in the long run is well worth it.
• Today for the first time we drove around the city on our own. Although we were lost initially, we eventually got a feel of our local surroundings and hopefully now we can venture out on our own. It beats having someone else drive us around. We are hoping to have a few day trips outside of the city when we can manage to have a day without dentist appointments. I’m positive we’ll manage with the limited Spanish we speak.

I haven’t had too many opportunities to take photos since we arrived, as our schedule has been kind of hectic and sporadic. But, I managed to take some and have uploaded the ones from my Powershot digital to my flickr. They include some shots from a day trip last Sunday to the nearby beach of Salinitas. More to come shortly….