Visiting El Salvador Bitcoin years later – Bitcoin Magazine
This is an opinion piece by Rikki, Bitcoin explorer, author and co-host of the “Bitcoin Italia” and “Stupefatti” podcasts.
Everything is ready for a new big adventure.
The bags are packed, the check-in is already done, the cab is waiting for us with the engine running, outside the front door. We are about to cross the ocean again.
Last year we chronicled the adoption of Bitcoin in El Salvador just a few months after the law went into effect. 45 days were spent there without cash or credit cards, living solely on bitcoin. Our goal was to get out of the comfort zone of tourists and bitcoin influencers, the typical Bitcoin beach and the capital San Salvador, and dive into the more remote areas to see if it was really possible to trade and pay with bitcoin on the popular the markets of small suburban villages, meeting residents of the poorest areas to find out what they really thought of Satoshi Nakamoto’s invention.
It was an incredible journey.
We are going back to El Salvador, to see what has changed more than a year after the law was passed. We are going to spend a whole month in El Salvador and try to live there again using only bitcoin. Will it be easier or more difficult than last year?
But this time we will not limit ourselves to that. Our trip will take us to explore Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama and Honduras – all countries where several communities are organizing spontaneously, to try alternative economy experiments with bitcoin. We are happy to discover new horizons and meet new people. We will be backpacking for 11 weeks and we feel privileged.
Our flight takes off on time from Milan Linate Airport. We have 24 hours of travel ahead of us – three stopovers in total, Frankfurt, Toronto and finally San Salvador.
When we arrive at our destination it is 8pm and already pitch black. Passport control goes very quickly and we leave the airport in no time. An intense, humid heat invades us. The arrivals are crowded with people. The atmosphere is festive, typical of Central America.
Our taxi is already waiting for us. We ordered it from Italy. We travel with the windows open and look around. The air is fresh.
We reach our destination, pay (in Bitcoin of course) and jump straight into bed. A long sleep awaits us.
Source: author
Source: author
Despite 24 hours of travel, we wake up at dawn, slapped in the face by jet lag.
For anyone who comes to El Salvador and wants to live on bitcoin, the priority is one and only: connectivity. Bitcoin is the money of the internet and it depends on the internet. Our Italian SIM cards here are dead, useless because roaming is so expensive. My phone company warns me by SMS as soon as we land that the cost to surf will be 2$/Mb. A scam.
Today’s mission is then to get local SIM cards and of course pay for them in bitcoin.
We try to get our bearings on Google Maps using the hotel’s WiFi, download a list of nearby phone shops and head off to explore.
We don’t have to go very far to realize that we have miscalculated very badly: Around us, every shop is closed.
We stop a passer-by to ask for an explanation and he replies, almost teasingly, that today is “el Día de los Muertos” and that it’s a national holiday — we’re sure to find everything closed except for a big mall downstairs in the street.
We realize that this is our only hope and we move on.
When we get to the shopping center it is actually open, but not all the shops inside are. The telephone company is of course closed. We ask around and are told that there is an open pharmacy that also sells SIM cards. It sounds strange, but it’s worth a try. We walk in, and sure enough, the phone company’s logo is prominently displayed on the center counter. We ask if we can pay with bitcoin, but the clerk replies that they only accept cash. Sin.
Meanwhile, we get hungry and notice that several restaurants have the Bitcoin and Strike logos on their windows. We can use the mall’s free WiFi so we pick one and go inside. We inform the waiter that we are looking for food, but can only pay with our bitcoin. He seats us, but we quickly realize that something is wrong because we see the waiter lingering and talking to the restaurant cashier. After several minutes he comes up to us and comfortingly tells us that it is no longer possible to pay with bitcoin. They accepted it for a few months, but then gave up. “Too complicated and too few transactions,” he says. We get up and leave disappointed.
Source: author
Source: author
The next day, the hunt begins again. The shops around us are all finally open and the city is back to the urban chaos we remember so well. We’re walking around blind because our phones are still not connected, so we decide to play it safe and go back to the phone shops we’d already seen the day before.
There are four or five in total, but none of them accept bitcoin. We are surprised; last time we were here it had taken us less than an hour to find SIM cards.
The last merchant is very nice and recommends a large mall, in the center of Colonia Escalon, one of the city’s vital ganglia.
It’s a bit long, but worth a try. We know it’s our best bet because, he said, there are kiosks and stores for every phone operator in El Salvador. It looks promising.
It takes us a little over forty minutes to get there on foot – the day is a bit cloudy and not very hot.
We walk through the mall entrance into a large lobby and our faces light up. There must be at least a dozen phone booths. We begin to ask. We don’t care about the prices or phone plans, all we need is connectivity. Unfortunately, however, no one wants our bitcoin.
We go up and then up again. There are dozens of small stalls selling phone chargers, cheap smartphones, accessories and electronics. But no dice. When we say we can only pay with bitcoin, they look at us with amazement. They are very polite and almost all apologize. But they react as if the very word “bitcoin” is something belonging to a distant memory. Like it’s something they haven’t heard about in a very long time.
On the top floor, however, are the companies’ actual stores. Large showrooms are lit up and packed with employees. This is it, we think.
We start with Claro, the telephone giant here in Central America, but their response is that they can sell us top-ups in bitcoin, but they cannot do new activations. Company policy is apparently to blame. We then try the large Tigo store, by Movistar, but get nothing.
Our last resort is called Digicel and we feel like we’re going to pass out when we see the Bitcoin logo hanging on the cash register. We immediately ask if we can use it to buy three SIM cards. The salesperson is surprised, asks her superior – and the answer is affirmative.
Apparently this is not an easy thing. The clerks talk to each other for at least fifteen minutes to find the device on which the Chivo wallet is installed and remember the password to activate the app. Not many Bitcoin transactions are seen here either, apparently. But they eventually manage to generate a Lightning QR code and the transaction goes through.
We did it: we are connected.
Source: author
Source: author
Compared to last year, we arrived in El Salvador a month earlier. It seems like a small thing, but it makes a big difference. We are on our way to the rainy season. This means that the weather is capricious to say the least. The mornings are generally warm and sunny. But often in the afternoon, within a few minutes, the sky is covered with clouds and it starts to rain. Rain at these latitudes and in this season is somewhat difficult to describe. It must be seen. An abnormal amount of water is dumped on the ground, all at once. The universal deluge. An apotheosis. Then, a few hours later, with the same speed, alertness returns, as if nothing had happened.
Because of this, we have to seek shelter and spend several hours indoors. We take the opportunity to get some work done. We plan the rest of the trip and try to rent a car, and of course pay for it with our bitcoin. We are used to this routine now. It takes a little patience and a few dozen phone calls. None of the major car rental companies accept bitcoin, but small local businesses often do. Best to call them directly and forget Avis, Budget and others.
Source: author
Source: author
Word has gotten out that we’re back in town and lots of local Bitcoiner friends are asking us out. Many of them want to talk to us about how today El Salvador is back to being relatively safe, after the great fear caused by the resurgence of gang clashes that began at the end of March. These were terrible months that really made people fear the worst. It all started when the rivalry between criminal gangs flared up again and within a couple of days there were close to 100 murders. A flood of blood.
Although the victims were the majority pandilleros, as they call them here, the government could hardly sit still, and they reacted with an iron fist, declaring martial law, deploying the police and army and organizing a series of special operations. The months that followed were, we are told, really difficult. Travel was restricted to home areas, there was a curfew and cities were deserted at night. There were checkpoints on suburban roads and major city roads. It took more than 55,000 arrests to bring the situation under control. 55,000, in a country of just over six million people.
It is difficult for us “Westerners” to immerse ourselves in such a reality. It is something unthinkable.
Of course, criticism has also flowed to the government of El Salvador. Many international humanitarian associations condemn a systematic violation of human rights in prisons. There is talk of torture, arbitrary imprisonment and summary trials.
Today, the country is still under a state of emergency. The special laws have not yet been withdrawn. There are still ongoing police operations, we are told, especially in the more peripheral areas of the nation. All mobile communications are intercepted, including ours, and the police can at any time close off entire areas without warning, introduce curfews, set up checkpoints and make arrests.
But today the situation is quiet and we can observe on our own.
It is really difficult for us to judge and we are at a loss when it comes to making a decision. On the one hand, we firmly believe that brutality is never justified. But we also cannot deny that we are happy to see the faces of our friends finally become calm and relaxed, while enjoying the rain.
Next week we will leave the capital to gather evidence of Bitcoin adoption in less populated areas of the country. We do this for our new project, Bitcoin Explorers, which aims to chronicle the impact of this technology everywhere in the world, especially in emerging markets. On our Youtube channel you can see the travelogue from this first week with only Bitcoin spent in El Salvador. If you would like to get in touch with us directly, Twitter or Instagram are our preferred social media channels.
Source: author
Source: author
This is a guest post by Rikki. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.
