28–29 September 2026 · San Salvador, El Salvador
On the 28th I took a city tour of San Salvador with EC Tours. The stop that stuck was the new National Library, BINAES, and I am relaying what the guide told me, so treat the details as his.
The library was donated by China, and a new national stadium, also Chinese-funded, is going up nearby. Each floor of the library has its own theme. One floor is technology, with free computers and gaming stations, and the rule, as I was told it, is that kids have to read for at least forty minutes before they are allowed on them. I thought that was a very good rule. Another floor is comics and the staples: Harry Potter and the like. The building is reportedly modelled on a library in China.
The guide put it in a bigger frame. El Salvador switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China in 2018, and the gifts that followed are landmark public works. The library, the new stadium, the rebuilt pier at La Libertad on the Surf City coast and a water-treatment plant on Lake Ilopango were all funded by China, according to him. I had photographed that pier on my second day in the country. Walking through the library, you can see the diplomacy in poured concrete.
I have no view on the politics. I do have one on the forty minutes.
The next evening was my last in the city and my last in El Salvador. I went to Casa 43, a bistro in San Benito: whitewashed brick arches, green gingham tables, a garden patio under string lights. I told the server I was hungry and to surprise me.
He did. Steak and grilled prawns with garlic-parsley butter and shoestring potatoes, baby potatoes in a spicy cream sauce, and a neat whiskey. It was worth every cent.
The 06:00 bus to Guatemala City left the next morning.
Ledger: one last supper, one neat whiskey, worth every cent.