Under The Volcano

Imagine you spent last night in your magical bed, the one that transports you to new horizons, vistas changing daily, the bed that follows you around all day and is there to embrace you when exhaustion renders you mute. The bed, a familiar friend in the strangest of places, that refreshes and gives you a chance to start again the next morning, wherever you may be. You get up, you slide the side door open to let your loudly yawning dog out and you see this:

The Granja de Don Álvaro is a working farm (“granja” - gran-hah) and in a country not yet equipped with campgrounds it is what we made do for a place to sleep. We ate dinner after we arrived, ribs beans and burningly spicy pickled onions off the farm while I put down large helpings of kibbles for the inevitable hopeful dogs. Rusty was passing out on his bed in the van.  

Jaime owns the farm and met us on arrival and he gladly gave us permission to spend a free night at his farm. We were after all friends of Marie-Elena and Oscar who lived in Marathon in the Florida Keys…Marie-Elena had been an English student in Layne’s Adult Education classes at Marathon High School and they had become friends. If you tell Layne she must visit your friends next time you’re passing through El Salvador…guess what : that’s exactly what Layne will do. The open air farm to table restaurant: 

Jaime invited us to fill our tank with his delicious well water so we did, and he invited us to breakfast at his mother’s house next morning. Our magic carpet, a 2020 Ram Promaster 3500, 21 feet long gasoline powered and filled with Layne’s interior design built by Custom Coach of DeLand Florida: 

Jaime promised us a traditional Salvadoran breakfast of beans, cheese scrambled eggs and fried plantains washed down with delicious Salvadoran coffee. The conversation however was extraordinary as he laid out for us his view of El Salvador’s recent history, its present state of development and its risky path forward. He was amazingly open and thoughtful about the state of his country. 

I witnessed El Salvador’s civil war in the 1980s and it was thoroughly gruesome and the ending of the fighting by peace treaty left a lot of young men in a psychological mess unable to settle back down. They took to armed lawlessness. They bought politicians and corrupted the democratic process that was budding in the Salvadirvof the 1990s. The country fell into the grip of armed mafias and politicians bought and sold by the utterly ruthless gangs. 

Jaime told us stories of the initiation rights where gang leaders required candidates for membership to murder family members to prove their loyalty. They exacted tributes from everyone, field workers, laborers, bosses and random people they met on the streets. Murder was the order of the day. Everyone stayed home as much as they could and avoided getting caught outside. Like Fernando whom we met at the campground Jaime said this period of lawlessness was worse than the civil war. 

Something happened collectively across the country and a few years ago and at one election the people, cowed in their homes and fearful of the army, police and gangs all in cahoots elected a president who decided to put an end to this state of affairs. What happened next is controversial Jaime said looking anxiously at his 90 year old mother who sat at table with pursed lips and a glint in her eyes. She may be 90 but she looked to be 70 and physically and mentally as sharp as you or I and ready to give battle to her son. 

I was drinking my third cup of coffee enthralled by the story telling feeling like I was having the best breakfast ever. The eggs were pretty good too and the bean puree was delicious on the crusty bread.  

The  new government built a high security prison and empowered judges to send people to jail on the flimsiest of evidence. Membership in a gang presumed you had committed appalling crimes to prove loyalty to the thugs and therefore you were sentenced to a minimum of twenty years in prison for belonging to a gang. The right to a defense was abolished for suspected gang members. The courts have processed tens of thousands suspected gang members on a high speed conveyor belt of this new justice system designed to destroy the gangs. 

Civil rights advocates are up in arms of course and Jaime’s mother says this system goes against any sense of justice that should exist in a democratic society. Undoubtedly there are non gang members caught up in the dragnet. But Jaime and his son Jaime Junior, a law student shrug their shoulders. 

Nowadays the police are trustworthy.  If you have a problem they respond and crime in El Salvador is negligible. You can go where you wish Jaime said to us, no one will harm an American tourist in our country. It would be more trouble to them than it is worth. Indeed police smile and wave us through checkpoints on the highways and when we asked permission to spend the night on the street the officers smiled and said of course. 

The big question in El Salvador is what happens next.  Surrounded by Guatemala struggling with stolen election claims and strikes and protests and Honduras perennially the poorest most run down country in Central America, tiny El Salvador is flourishing. 

Jaime Junior loves the US. He loves the American legal system, he likes our lack of bureaucracy and the simplicity of life in the US. Which may surprise you if you think you are oppressed in the US. He is flying to Los Angeles this weekend to take a concealed weapons course and to learn to use a Glock as hand guns are his passion. In Costa Rica he said it takes months to get an appointment to apply for a drivers license. Here you walk into the DMV, pay the fee and take the test. Just like America! He said beaming. 

Certainly we found border formalities the easiest so far and when I remarked on the quality of the roads (always a preoccupation for an Overlander) he smiled and said to thank American tax payers. 

The question now is will El Salvador, with the steers cleaned up find a democratic path forward? Jaime is aware of the risk of dictatorship but he said given a choice most people choose safety and peace over lawlessness and daily robbery. His mother and he butt heads in the politest of ways as political ideals clash. They had twenty years to find a democratic solution to our problems and none worked Jaime said. For now this is better. 

Naturally Layne had asked if there were showers available and Jaime offered us the use of his mother’s showers! I was squirming with embarrassment but they sure did feel good. 

Back to Rusty snoozing on his bed aboard GANNET2 and then back to the road with lots to think about. 

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/09/12/the-rise-of-nayib-bukele-el-salvadors-authoritarian-president

Also: surrounded as we are by volcanoes I’m going to have another go at the novel whence the title of this post came. As I recall Under The Volcano wasn’t a light read but I think it’s supposed to be good for you. Am alcoholic British Consul living in1938 Mexico and making a mess of things.