tales from central america
Ok. Here's some explanation to go with my video-photo travel blog.
The first day we arrived several of mi esposa's family members came to hang out at our hotel pool. One of mi esposa's tias was giving her a lecture on how to be a good wife. She said that her husband stays faithful because she always "takes care of herself" and "is there to keep her man happy". Her aunt also warned that if my wife was not careful I would be snatched up one of the many women in El Salvador looking to bag themselves a gringo. This tia also said that I look like David Beckham. Trust me, there is no resemblance between yours truly and Mr. Posh Spice. People who know me can attest to this. Well, the tia is a Real Madrid fan, so that explains the Beckham reference. She scowled when I told her I dig Barcelona more than Madrid.
This is typical in Latin America, where many women still buy into the idea that they exist solely to please their men. They pass on this subservient gender ideology to the next generation. My wife kindly smiled at her aunt's suggestions but in her head was thinking "fuck that noise". It's sad how women reinforce their own gender inequality. Some ideologies are hard to shake I guess. For a similar example check out Frederick's post labiaplasty and American consumerism.
. . .
December 24 is one big party in San Salvador. My father-in-law, his girlfriend, my wife and I stopped at three different house parties before settling at our final destination of the night at the home of my father-in-law's best friend. Several of the tias there lured me onto the dancefloor where I did my best to keep up with the salsa and cumbia beats. They served pavo indio (turkey with typical Salvadoran gravy). As midnight approached the sound of fireworks grew throughout the city. We lit some here. On December 25 it's common to go to the beach. We went to a friend's beach house in Costa Azul, very close to the El Salvador-Guatemala border.
El Salvador is a beautiful country that is still emerging from its disastrous 15-year civil war. One of the historically interesting spots we visited was the FMLN civil war museum in Perquin, Morazán (seen above). It is located at a former guerrilla camp and ex-guerrillas lead the tours of the museum and the grounds. There are several U.S.-made 500lb. bomb shells - ones that U.S.-supplied Salvadoran air force dropped on the camp during the 1980s. The guerrillas preserved a larger crater made by one of the bombs.
We also visited what's left of the town of El Mozote. On December 11, 1981, the Atlacatl battalion of the Salvadoran army entered the town, rounded up it's roughly 900 inhabitants and slaughtered them - men, women, children and all. The town is a 20-minute drive from the main road to Perquin. It’s a rocky dirt path that can only be maneuvered with a 4x4. The town church has been rebuilt along with a monument (seen above) to the murdered townspeople. The docent who guided us through the memorial lived in El Mozote, but then by a stroke of fate moved to Perquin two months before the massacre. He remembers seeing and hearing military vehicles on the road to Perquin when the massacre occurred.
The ruins at Tikal, Guatemala were amazing. The pics speak for themselves. I asked our guide about Mel Gibson's Mayan epic Apocalypto and he shook his head in disgust. Yeah, I'm not much of a Gibson fan either.
Supposedly the above view (from atop a 10-story temple) was used in one of the Star Wars films.
And that's all for now.
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