A Day in the Life of Three Salvadoran Towns: An Afternoon in Panchimalco

Some places attract visitors due to their historic significance, some for natural beauty, others for cultural preservation or a dedication to the arts. And some keep you coming back simply for their vibe, a tangible, self-perpetuating positive energy that differentiates them from other places.  Panchimalco is all of the above, but primarily the latter.

We found the little town in the way we often do - we stumbled upon it. Tucked into a deep valley only 30 minutes' drive from our house, it sits just 7 kilometers downhill from popular Planes de Renderos, a ridgetop town with panoramic views and restaurants with big patios to take advantage of those views.  The kind of place where families gather on Saturdays for lunch and fresh air.  Just a few minutes from Planes de Renderos, Panchimalco is also overlooked by a spot often visited by folks just before they settle down to stacks of pupusas: La Puerta del Diablo. With a distinctly ominous history as first a Mayan Pipil sacrificial site, a practice sadly modernized during the Salvadoran civil war as an execution and body dump site, the two rocky peaks of La Puerta del Diablo tower high above the valley and serve as both visual and historic backdrop to the town. 

View of Lake Ilopango from Planes de Renderos

Volcano of San Salvador

Nahuat-speaking man of Pipil heritage met at La Puerta del Diablo

Nov 2020 - This family said this was their first time out of their house since March lockdowns started.  Puerta del Diablo peak. 

High above even the ever-present soaring vultures. 

Even today, as many Salvadoran towns experience, in the hills and hamlets nearby, MS-13 lets its presence be known. 

Lest we forget...

It was just about lunchtime when we pulled into Panchimalco the first time.  We found the main street blocked off by canopies shading rows and rows of tables and a gathering of (mostly) men in red vests.  The crowd and their animated conversation kept us at bay for a bit, but we soon figured out from the initials on caps, vests and banners (FMLN) that we'd come upon a political party assembly and the stump speeches and negotiations we were witnessing were to select the party's candidates in upcoming elections.  Our presence went completely unnoticed given their focus to the task at hand and we easily slipped around the tents and into the heart of downtown.  

Political party gathering

The main street was lined with pastel-colored storefronts, bakeries, a few tiny restaurants, and stands selling home goods and clothing. The town center was marked by a small shady plaza with occupied benches, the Mayor's office (Alcaldia), and the entrance to the market building, full of stalls. And just around the curve, we could see the backside of the imposing colonial church.  Even beyond the political activities, the main and side streets were humming with people just going about their days: selling, buying, gossiping, carrying loads, doing street repairs - the pleasant buzz of day-to-day life. Not the stresful or frenetic activity of a city, just life moving along and minding its own business. I was tempted to order a cone of tamarind sorbet from the guy with the push cart and take a spot on a bench to simply watch it all go by. But instead, we saw the sign indicating an outdoor sculpture garden just off the hillside from the plaza. 

City hall with the rocky peaks of La Puerta del Diablo in the backdrop

Sporting a sign of the times

Never miss an opportunity to be colorful. 

Necessity is the mother of invention.

And the grandmother.

Let me step back and give an excruciatingly brief bit of Panchimalco history, which will explain some of what we saw and felt there.  First, the town is known for maintaining and celebrating its native heritage in a country with surprisingly few remaining pockets of indigenous populations. Originally occupied in pre-Columbian times by the Toltec, it has been considered a place of refuge. An example of this occurred during the 16th century when the indigenous Pipil fled there during the Spanish takeover of the city of San Salvador.  

The Spanish soon caught up and settled the town, building the central church, "Iglesia de la Santa Cruz de Roma" sometime in either the 1600s or early 1700s, depending on which iteration one considers the original as it faced many an earthquake and flood over the centuries.  It's now the oldest colonial structure still standing in El Salvador.  This mixed indigenous and Catholic history is the background for Panchimalco's festival each May, La Feria Cultural de las Flores y Palmas in which the women show off their colorful woven headscarves and the patron saint parade full of flowers and worshippers fill the streets. 

In more modern times, I've read some about the town being a hideout for guerilleros during the Salvadoran Civil War (1979-1992), some remnants of which could account for the current popularity of the leftist FMLN (Farabunco Marti National Liberatin Front) party we saw upon arriving.  

The side of the Mercado Municipal building was painted with a two-story mural featuring Saint Oscar Romero, the archibishop of San Salvador who was assasinated during the civil war in 1980 and canonized in 2018.  The text to the left reads, "Even if the assasin's bullet kills me, I will be resurrected in the people" and given his overwhelming popularity, it seems he has fulfilled his promise.  However, seeing said assasin's bullet painted blue, white and red, my husband and I paused, and began anxiously whispering to each other. "Why are they blaming the French for Romero's assasination? Were the French involved in the civil war? Oh dear - are they blaming the U.S.? But wouldn't that would be red, white and blue? Who are they blaming?" Flushed with a sudden caught-behind-enemy-lines feel, I started considering other nationalities we might pull off, say Canadian or Australian, should we be surrounded by the folks at the political rally. But those fears were never realized and what we wouldn't learn until days later is that the colors being blamed in this mural for Romero's death represented the flag of ARENA, the right wing political party and opposition to FMLN, not the French and not the U.S. 

Phew. 

Political message not so hidden. 

Politics aside, Panchimalco's dedication to preserving its heritage is seen today in the town's advocacy for arts.  By this, I don't mean they have one or two nice galleries to visit, but I mean a whole-town support for the value of the arts. 

Which brings me back to us finding the sculpture garden...

Set down off the central plaza under a shading canopy of trees, the sculpture garden with its murals depicting the town's history, pathways curving through the sculpture installations and the gentle splash of a small waterfall provided refuge from the day's busy-ness.  A secluded spot for romance, too, it seems, as evidenced by a few couples nestled together on benches and a sign warning people not to engage in amoral behavior in the park.  At the back of the park we found a small cafe with a wide balcony overlooking the mountains and rooftops and stopped for a lemonade and a bite. 

Revisionist history of indigenous warrior?

History of the country in relief mural. 

The large tree to the left is still standing and is as impressive a structure as the church itself. 

Sculptural sense of humor.

Cafe balcony off the sculpture garden.  I recommend the pollo encebollado. 

Leaving the cafe and scultpure garden, we walked back up to the main street and continued down a few blocks to the church. Finding it unfortunately locked up, I stuck my head into a tiny bar/cafe next door where two men were seated with a pot of coffee and conversation between them. I asked if they knew when the church might be open to visit.  Perhaps it was the novelty of talking to foreigners or perhaps just the coffee, but 20 minutes and centuries of condensed colonial history later, we parted company on the sidewalk with promises to continue the conversation another time.  

Funky cafe with chatty and informative owner on the left. 

Although we were out of luck that day, in later trips to Panchilmalco we have been able to explore the church and take in the delicately carved wooden ceiling beams, the meter-thick walls, and despite the soaring ceiling and unobstructed, airy interior the building has kept its musty smell - like finding a wooden trunk in the attic that hasn't been opened for decades. 

Iglesia de la Santa Cruz de Roma

Directly across from the church, set down off the street level, is La Casa del Artista with its banner boasting the municipality's connection with Xi'an, China.  Local press reported the town mayor's desire to establish a sister-city relationship with the Chinese city famous for its terracotta warriors given their shared dedication to preserving their cultural patrimony.  We found a group of teens in modern t-shirts and jeans practicing traditional dances in a small plaza surrounded by walls of murals, their bright colors blurred by the encroaching moss. 

Headed back through town, we came upon the Casa de la Cultura. With it's tie-dyed exterior paint job, it's impossible to miss. It houses a gallery of local art, a small museum of dusty artifacts and historic photographs of artisans alongside the current day artisans themselves, weaving vividly-striped cloth on looms in a large interior courtyard.  We bought some woven face masks from an elderly weaver which were just as colorful and musty as the Casa itself.  

Woman waiting outside the Casa de la Cultura.

Artifact on display at the Casa de la Cultura. 

And finally, if all this weren't enough, directly across from the Casa de la Cultura on the high side of the road we made one final stop at the Fundacion Miguel Angel Ramirez, an art institute and gallery occupying an equisitely renovated old stucco house. The property expands up the hillside in a series of patios, gardens with water features, decks, lookout perches and hidden rooms- each area dedicated to a different art medium.  We arrived as a group of local kids was finishing their day-long art class, gathering their pencils and sketchbooks and tidying up their little stools and benches.  The director stopped to chat with us and give us a tour, explaining the foundation's purpose: an apolitical, non-religious NGO dedicated to promoting and recognizing the potential in young people through art and culture. Their slogan is "Colors for Humanity," which after multiple afternoons spent in Panchimalco, I believe doesn't stop at the foundation's doors, but is embraced throughout the entire town.  

Arbors framing the view from one of many patios and balconies at Fundacion Miguel Angel Ramirez.

Wrapping up the day's class. 

We've now visited this little town tucked into a valley many times and I have yet to change my mind about it. There are places that just have a good vibe: welcome, warm, bright, and positive despite the violence of their past or even their present. It's evident that Panchimalco hasn't let its daisy be stepped on and continues to bloom with each generation. 

Next: A Day in the Life of Three Salvadoran Towns: Nightfall in Suchitoto

A Day in the Life of Three Salvadoran Towns: Morning in Ataco

Dawn breaks by 6:00 a.m. year-round here at 13 degrees north latitude, just about the time I'm getting up for work.  It's rung in with a cacaphony of birdsong as the roosters are already a few hours into their work day, the zanates squawk and shriek amongst each other, and the passing loros catch up on the news while commuting from their nests to the trees where they spend their days. The loros, officially called pericos verdes, make me smile, and not just because their name sounds like "green beans" in French, but because they're just such noisy little busybodies as they cruise overhead with their life-partners. This isn't only the dawn soundtrack, but one that plays on an endless loop for all daylight hours in El Salvador. 

Today I'm not getting up to head to the office; instead, I swing my camera over my shoulder, pull on my tennies and slip out of the hotel room as quietly as I can to not wake my husband, locking the door behind me with the old-fashioned iron key.  I pause before stepping off the curb to pick a direction, hopefully somewhere lit by the rising sun, and turn left to the east. 

Country alarm clock

I can smell what I've come to call the scent of El Salvador: the combination of thick corn tortillas being slapped together by hand and the smoke from the charcoal fire over which they're grilled.  Already a steady stream of people are walking away from the center of town towards a bus stop just out of sight.  They're equal numbers of women as men, many are carrying large, flat baskets - the tools of the coffee pickers' trade - and no doubt they're headed to one of the many coffee plantations these towns on the steep volcanic slopes are known for.  Specifically, I'm in Concepcion de Ataco (called simply "Ataco") for a few days to see the coffee estates, the art and handicrafts and simply to be up at a bit of altitude (4,068 feet) for fresh air, pine trees and quiet.  

Quiet except for the dang roosters, that is. 

As the parade of coffee pickers and other workers hustle to grab a spot on a bus or the back of a pick-up, there is also a flow of kids in school uniforms making their way to class in the opposite direction.  Those old enough walk in groups, jostling and joking with each other on the way to class, while the little ones are hand-held by a parent or older sibling. 

Early sun lights up the faces of Ataco

Starting the morning wash

Dogs trot by, sniffing out greasy spots on the sidewalk for a bit of something tasty from last night's garbage, or find sunny spots to warm their bones in the still-coolness of the morning. 

Dogs and laundry warm up in the first rays of the day. 

Finishing my rounds, I turn back over the cobbled street to our little hotel and find my husband and our visiting friend already up and sipping coffee in the interior courtyard, ready to start the day themselves.

Ataco is a gem of a town, but I'd be lying to call it a hidden gem.  A popular stop along the tourist route "Ruta de las Flores" that winds up into coffee-plantation mountains in El Salvador's far western edge, Ataco also attracts visitors for its art, indigo-dyed clothing and typically colorful Salvadoran murals.  Our first day in Ataco was spent popping into one doorway or another, watching artists and craftspeople at work or just wading through touristy souvenir shops.  

Volcanic panarama on the Ruta de las Flores

Typical mural style that often features three cats.  Won't find me complaining. 

After breakfast, we take a short drive to the El Carmen Estate, a coffee plantation just a minute from the center of Ataco. We've arranged a tour of the estate and the coffee processing factory, including lunch and a tasting.  The family estate, known as La Casona, is over 100 years old and has been perserved as it always was with thick adobe walls hanging original art, (now antique) furniture, high ceilings, original tiles on the floors and arched windows that look into gardens and cool interior patios.  While I was charmed by our tiny, cozy hotel - next time I won't be able to resist packing a long, cotton nightdress and staying here in the 1920s instead. 

Bedroom at La Casona, El Carmen Estate. 

Many a cigar was puffed here over the decades.

Coffee pots or tea pots?

We chose a Monday to visit El Carmen Estate and were rewarded by being the only three on the tour.  It started not in the steep, shady hillsides where the bushes grow, but later when the beans arrive at the plantation to be processed in what seemed to me a factory of Rube Goldberg complexity.  I continually asked myself, my friend, my husband and likely a few too many times, the guide, "But how'd they figure out to do THAT step, too?" as he explained the sorting, roasting, and washing, then showed us the machinery that shook off this bit but left on that bit. Geez oh Pete! As a life-long tea drinker (pick leaves, dry leaves, add hot water, enjoy), it amazed me that they persisted to perfect the process.  But they did.... and still do.  From the drying patios, to the bean sorting conveyor belts, to the guys stacking the 100 lb sacks in the warehouse, the amount of physical labor, not to mention painstaking record keeping to track and monitor the batches, just to create a tasty morning beverage was astounding.  And the gut punch for me - these workers are making $1 per hour.  Yup, $45 weekly salary for 5.5 work days.  

Coffee drying patios separated by variety, process and producer. 

More like Superman.

Oh yeah, that ramp is totally up to code. And as the stack grows, so does the angle of the ramp. 

The sorting belt. 

End result. 

The tour ended with sampling of the varieties, from "honey" to "bourbon" and "gourmet," but we only got to see a bag of the super-flowery "geisha" - too rare a variety for the day tour, it seems. Finally we sat down to a roasted chicken lunch on the patio accompanied by yet more roosters and a flock of guinea fowl. 

By now the afternoon was upon us and it was time to move down the road.  A gorgeous morning in Ataco, just one part of a day in the life of a Salvadoran town. 

Next: Afternoon in Panchimalco

Tour extension: We'll be here for a while

 Yesterday I did something that surprised me; I deleted the Excel sheet from my computer that I'd saved a few months back containing the projected job vacancies for the upcoming summer bidding season.  Starting last year, I began poring over this list, color-coding the assignments by preference, adding notes about the jobs, daydreaming about the locations and trying to imagine which one would eventually be mine.  It's one of my favorite things to do, second only to Zillow house hunting. Hey, there's no harm in seeing what a little farm house on 10 acres in Eastern Oregon costs these days.  Or maybe a 6th floor condo with bay view in Bellingham.  Or three years in Istanbul, Minsk or Addis Ababa.  In each activity, I'm imaginging my new life, the people I'll meet, the stories I'll hear, the landscape I'll soak in, and I find all that absolutely irresistable.  Which is why deleting my list of possible posts to bid on was completely out of character. 

I did it because my husband and I got some news while on our vacation back to the U.S. these past few weeks.  For the first time since the pandemic iron curtain dropped on us all, we got on a plane and spent two weeks in another world.  At least that's what the U.S. felt like after being in El Salvador for 20 months.  I sound like the mother of a toddler counting time like that, but like a toddler's parent - I want credit for all the time served.  Now that sounds harsh against Central America's "Pulgarcito" (little thumb), and that's unfortunate because living in El Salvador is by no means a punishment. It just felt really good to touch base with the familiar, to hug family and friends, share favorite meals over dinner and have the names of places we used to know come back to life. ("Why don't we meet up at Picnic Point? We can stop by the Fred Meyer just off 196th on the way there and pick up some lunch from the deli counter.") Not to mention the awesome yogurt selection and excellent Vietnamese food.  

I should get back to the news.

I deleted my projected vacancies list because I won't be bidding this summer. While on vacation, we got  the word that our tour in San Salvador had been extended by 13 months.  Yup - the family train will now stay in this station for four years plus one month.  This wasn't something unexpected or unwanted, but rather something we requested.  At certain posts, usually those with higher hardship pay, including El Salvador, employees can request a one year tour extension.  The Department doesn't always approve these requests, and as with the assignment process in general, we're often left picturing our fate at the end of one of these wooden sticks.

A rare view of the Consular Affairs assignments war room

I submitted my extension request back in March, and when we left on vacation in the final days of April without having received the Department's response, I was starting to get a bit nervous.  In fact, I'd started refreshing my projected vacancies list more frequently.  But now that it's official, we're back to buying green bananas and multi-packs of canned mushrooms.  I even bought some very pink shorts and dust covers for all my suits as this tropical life will continue until September 2023. 

After only a year here, when I began pestering my husband about how he'd feel spending a year learning Albanian - no doubt I saw a shiny assignment on the projected vacancies list, I'm so incorrigible - he responded, "Why don't we just extend HERE?"

This caused an immediate reaction in me, something like this:

As much as I was cheering for El Salvador and our life and work here, the notion FOUR years in one place, ONE place, got me real itchy under the collar. 

But he was right.  

Here's the math behind why this is the right decision, and perhaps this can serve as bidding advice to anyone wanting it.  First, given the worldwide cessation of routine visa and passport services due to the pandemic (the fancy way of saying just about all fee-producing services stopped for a long time), Consular Affairs is in dire budgetary straits.  In cable after cable and bi-weekly broadcasts from HQ, we Consular employees have learned about the belt-tightening, which now has us looking like this:

One of the ribs they removed was the hiring of any new family members into consular sections.  Considering my husband has six years' experience in consular work, and none in other embassy sections and is of a "semi-retirement" age, both of which could make his finding a job at a new post more difficult.  He has a good job now where he likes his colleagues, knows what he's doing, uses his Spanish every day, and has interesting dinner table stories to share (that part is for me).  

We live in a country we like, with pleasant weather, beaches and mountains in easy reach, set in an interesting region to explore, in a U.S. time zone for keeping up with family, and only a short flight to Houston, Miami or Atlanta.  Naturally none of our family live in those cities, but it's an easy enough connection to get where they do.  We like our house and live minutes from work and most importantly, the cats love their life here, especially in the garden my husband has whipped into shape.  

Bridget blending into her new habitat

Seamus displays his response to our extension via interpretive dance

I have my own reasons to stay here, too.  First, I find my work endlessly fascinating and have a team of five local staff and three family member employees whom I adore.  I know that as a supervisor I'm not supposed to say that, but instead I should highlight their professionalism, the skill with which they complete their work, blah blah, but really - I truly enjoy each one of them and am incredibly proud about what we collectively accomplish every day.  Plus we have a good few laughs along the way, which is like gold in my book.  

Finally, I get along very well with my new supervisor and the rest of our consular management team, and one of my favorite A-100 classmates will soon be joining us. 

Yes, I know what you're thinking: I've just cursed the rest of our tour by saying all the above.  It occurred to me, too.  But I counter that unpleasant feeling by remembering that if we were to reshuffle the deck this summer by bidding, there is absolutely no guarantee that we'd end up with anything resembling what we have now.  Sure, it is technically possible we'd be assigned to Vancouver or another dream post, but it's far more likely we'd end up in distinctly NOT Vancouver.  I won't name places where we'd, errrr, really rather not go, because I truly believe in the pricinple of one man's trash is another man's treasure. So just trust me that there are places where I would rather take a year of leave without pay versus move there. 

It won't be fun writing four EERs on the same subject matter no matter how interesting it is (see last post regarding my thoughts on our annual employee evaluations). This could also reduce my chances of promotion, but no decision comes drawback-free and these are the ones I've accepted. I'll just complain about them later.

One final thing about tour extensions: they come with mandatory 20 working days of home leave in the U.S. mid-tour.  This is why the extension was not for one year, but for 13 months. We're not allowed to be abroad for more than 42 months without home leave, and this extension brings us to 49 months overseas.  Generally, home leave is the most delicious thing on earth, comprised of one full month (at least!) of paid vacation between tours, to re-Americanize ourselves, free from the burden of thinking about work piling up that so often comes with regular vacations, no work phone to check/not check/check anyway, and not yet saddled with the pressure of language training. 

Regular home leave 

But mid-tour home leave is slightly (sarcasm font) less tantalizing in that we WILL have work piling up in our absence. We WILL be burdening our coworkers who have to cover for us. Cats are NOT enthusiastic travelers nor are lawns and gardens self-caring, so we'll have to arrange for lengthy cat and home care.  Plus, as the employee, I will be in paid home leave status, but this is not afforded to family member employees. Therefore if my husband accompanies me (we're not yet sure if he must), he'll have to either take leave without pay or use up all his vacation time, or likely both.  And let's not forget that one month is a LONG time to couch surf, no matter how much we love our family, so we need to plan to spend at least a month's income on food, lodging and transportation.  Sounding less delicious now, eh?

Mid-tour homeless leave

So that's where things are now and where they'll be for a while.  Family and friends who get my homemade calendars for Christmas featuring our current country are now slumping their shoulders imagining three more years of beach and volcano pictures. I hear you, and I'll work on that.  But it's nice to know we're settled for a while longer, and the hugs from the local staff upon hearing the news were pretty cool, too.  It'll be all right.