A few weeks ago a friend of mine got married. The civil wedding was held here in Guatemala, but the religious ceramony was held in El Salvador because his wife is from there. The drive from Guatemala City to San Salvador is about five hours give or take. The beautiful scenery makes the drive pretty easy. On the way back from the wedding the previous day I was in a hurry to get home so my led foot took charge. Not really paying attention to the speed limit signs that were posted I asked one of my friends that was with me what the speed limit was, “90 kilometers an hour” he replied, as I continued my speed of 140 km. Not shortly after though, there was a bend in the road where I decreased my speed from 140 km to 125 km. Sure enough right around the corner the el salvador police set up a speed trap waiting for people like me.

Considering I have never seen or heard of anyone being pulled over for speeding with a radar gun in Guatemala I was almost sure it was the same in El Salvador until now. As I came closer to the officer he sluggishly waves his arm from top to bottom. I couldn’t understand if his hand signal was telling me to slow down or stop completely. I asked Martha if I should stop, but nobody in the car seemed to have the answer, so I stopped just in case. The police office took his time walking up to my car. He was definitly in no hurry. As he was walking up I asked Martha if I should just pay him off, but she had no advice toward the matter and she said “we are in El salvador, not Guatemala, I am not sure if you can pay off the police here.” With that said, the office finally arrived to my window, displaying his radar gun at which I was going 125km. I told the officer that I was sorry and hadn’t seen any signs displaying the speed limit, trying to appear ignorant. He then asked for my license and registration which I kindly gave him. The officer looked at my Ohio drivers license and said, that he was going to have to confiscate it. He then said that he was going to give me a ticket which could be payed in the municiple court house the following day. That was not good news at all. The officer then walked around the back of my car, looking as if he was writing down my license plate number, and returned to the driver side window again. I asked if I could speak to him for a second as he didn’t seen interested in talking to me infront of the other passengers, he asked me to get out of the car and he walked away again. I asked my friend in the car how much money he had. I had no dollars which is the el salvador currency and he had $40. I asked him to lend me $10. I then got out of the car and walked over to the officer. I told him that we were on our way from a wedding back to Guatemala, and we couldn’t stay there for the night. I then told him that it was my only form of identification and I needed it to travel very soon. He asked where I was from and where the others in the car were from. It was kind of ironic, me, being the only american, speaking to this officer in spanish while the two guatemalans were waiting in the car. The officer then suggested that he keep one of the documents of the other passengers of the car if he were not going to retain mine. I then asked him how much the fine was, and kindly asked if he could pay the fine for me to avoid me the trouble of returning. He then said that the town’s people get the wrong idea if that happens and that it would look bad. After talking to him for awhile, he said he was going to give me a hand. Seeing that he hadn’t written down anything in his notebook it was most likely he was just looking for money. I then pulled out the $10 that my friend gave me in the car and said.. “Look, officer, I don’t want to offend you but this is all I have.”, that way $10 didn’t look like an insult when I gave it to him. I placed it in my passport and handed it over, not like anyone was going to see me bribing the police anyways. I then took my things and walked back to my car, put my seat belt on, and drove away. Martha and Neto were curious what happened, as they were certain we would have to find a hotel for the night.

I learned this technique after living in Mexico for a year. Although now I would not recommend it. The United States are putting alot of pressure on Mexico to enforce the laws which only makes the bribes alot more pricey.