Tuesday Night:
This has been my #1 concern about living in El Salvador. It's no secret that gangs in El Salvador are growing by the day and the violence continues at an alarming rate. Until now we haven't had a problem since we've lived here and I've always felt blessed by this. We have always been quite cautious about things, not overly exposing ourselves. Well maybe we have gotten too comfortable.
This morning a guy came to our tienda early in the morning asking to speak to Eduardo. He was gone for the day and my MIL told him that. I don't have all the details, but basically he said he needs to speak with Eduardo and he will be back. He said we need to pay him $2000. She said we don't have that kind of money and he said he has seen our car parked outside and we can sell it and give him the money.
Maybe this is why it's almost 3am and I'm still awake. I can't stop thinking. This happened once before to my MIL the winter before we moved here. Long story short, she called the police finally and after a while they found out the men were actually doing everything from Guatemala and they supposedly caught them. I used this information in our I-601 Waiver Packet, but we couldn't get evidence from the police because there wasn't an "official report" filed. Such a crock! And without evidence my word doesn't mean much to the Department of Homeland Security and that means even with threats to our lives, there no real reason my family should move to the US or why we can't live in El Salvador. The politics of our immigration system is infuriating.
So where does that leave us now? I'm not sure. We will have to wait it out and see what happens over the next few days. It's just so frustrating because we hardly ever leave the house as it is. I go to the mercado maybe once every 10 days or so and just to the grocery store every few days. Poor Liliana begs to go out of the house and on walks and screams because I won't take her. But this is why. It's just not safe. That's the reality. The reality is people are watching us ALL the time. Our car is kinda flashy for El Salvador standards and I'm obviously very white skinned. So we stick out like a sore thumb. Eduardo thinks we've gotten too comfortable, but I think we've just gotten too stir crazy. Thank God I can blog!!
