On my way back from a weekend at the beach, I had decided to make a mid-day detour to San Salvador to run a few errands. Walking down the street of a familiar neighborhood, I saw two classic cars, and I mean cool classic cars, clearly just washed and highly polished, parked a bit down a side street.
I was tired and not exactly running at full speed after a late night at the beach, but decided to investigate. To me, that decision to “investigate,” just slow down, poke around a bit, and see what is going on, is what Peace Corps is all about. Looking back at the 18 months I’ve already logged in El Salvador, a great many of my most treasured memories aren’t from any planned activities; fun, or if not technically fun, at least memorable, comes from spontaneity—at least in Latin America.
So, I delayed my day’s plans and walked down the block to see the 2 cars that had caught my attention—cars that would have caught your attention in the States, just one, and in El Salvador…well, they really caught my attention. Turns out, I stumbled on a “meeting” of the El Salvador American Classic Car Collectors Association. Yeah…I didn’t know that “Association” existed either. Anyways, not just 2, but about 25, clearly very wealthy Salvadoran men were in a small restaurant chit-chatting and back-slapping while on this out-of-the-way, off-the-map San Salvador side street was parked the most amazing collection of cars I’d even seen.
Figuring I had nothing to lose, and knowing being white and American can usually get you into just about any event/club/party in El Salvador, I walked into the restaurant, ordered a beer, and started talking. Fast forward to two hours later, and I was just getting back to the restaurant after being brought for my fourth quick joy ride in one of the many unforgettable automobiles members of this exclusive “club” had shown up with today.
One guy even brought me to his house to see his other two classic cars, which he lamented about, exclaiming, “I wanted to bring all three of my cars to the meeting, but I can only drive one—my wife…I don’t allow her to even dream of driving my babies.” Then he made me a cocktail and asked me if I’d drive one, following him back to the event, so he could at least show off two of his cars. Don’t ask me why a young American who he had met less than an hour earlier, was drinking, struggles mightily to drive standard, and had no driver’s license with him was more trustworthy that his wife…
Regardless, I politely declined, way too scared to get behind the wheel of a car worth about a jillion times more that the couple hundred dollars Peace Corps pays me monthly, and went back to the party with my newfound friend behind the wheel. Only upon deciding the leave the party a few hours later, having happily given up on getting my errands done, did I realize I should snap a few pictures of some of the remaining cars, so following are a few of the better ones:
