San Salvador, El Salvador

Recently, in mid-december, I had the chance to go on a business trip to San Salvador. My group was hired to sell a building there and since I'm fluent in Spanish, I got to accompany my other colleague.

First impressions.....
Not as bad as I thought. They actually have some very nice malls there and some very nice neighborhoods. The only parts I saw, visited, was driven through were: i) area on the way from the airport to the hotel ii) Colonia Escalon; and iii) Santa Elena. Those are two of the more affluent neighborhoods in San Salvador. We might have been through other areas, but we were SOOOO lost. Two gentlemen helping us in the country were nice enough to drive us around everywhere, so there was no real need for us to know where we were!

I wasn't as shocked as my colleague with all of the armed security guards everywhere (and I mean everywhere!). It's something that I'm used to seeing throughout other Latin American countries (e.g., Santo Domingo, D.R.)

Hilton Princess (hotel where we stayed)
Kind of nice, definitely not a Motel 6!
The food was blah, but they had a great "to-go" coffee bar in the main lobby. The sushi was okay as well. Had a very interesting roll "a la Salvadorena". I'm totally making this up, but seriously it was called something close to this. The outside of the roll was wrapped in sweet plantains (platanos!). Who would've thought.

Eating

Galerias Mall Food Court


We didn't go to many places. However, I do have to say that the loaded potatoes at Papalandia in Galerias were horrible! We did not know what we were getting when we ordered them. We received something in a paper plate (picture one of those hot dog things you get at baseball games, but wider) and in the middle was a potato drenched in some liquid. Not the typical american loaded potato! And it was spicy as hell, where we couldn't even finish it.

Hacienda Real
Very very nice place. And the people walking in there were beautiful...lol. The food was awesome, until of course the next day! My steak must have been too raw for my stomach that I must've gotten some form of food poisoning. I was not feeling so great the next day and I was on a plane for most of the day. Not the greatest feeling. Although it tasted really yummy as I was eating it....so I can't say I regret it too much.

Colonia Escalon
Some good, some bad. Driving around at night is like driving around a ghost town. Very dead.
There were some run down areas, and then some nicer areas.

View down Paseo General Escalon

Salvador del Mundo with Centro Financiero Gigante behind

Centro Financiero Gigante

Torre Futura - part of WTC

Edificio Montecristo

World Trade Center

Santa Elena
Loved this neighborhood. This is where all of the millionaires live. They have some very exclusive gated residential communities here. This is also where you can find the U.S. Embassy, which is a compound in and of itself.

On the way to Santa Elena - Former Edificio Fiscalias

Gated Community across from Edificio Avante

Edificio Avante - Beautiful

Main Entrance of Edificio Avante

U.S. Embassy...it was a point, shoot, put camera away!

The rest of the U.S. Embassy - very large complex!

Shown above were pictures of some nice commercial office buildings I took pictures of, as comparable properties to the building we are trying to sell.

What do I find out once I get back to the U.S.? That we were in the murder capital of Latin America! Waoh....