affordable flight routes from DC area?
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
| Neither El Salvador nor Guatemala are safe OP. There are military officers with machine guns at supermarkets in Guatemala |
Anonymous
The official language of Belize is English, however over 60% of the population speaks Spanish. |
Anonymous
El Salvador has the 2nd lowest homicide rate in all of the Americas (Canada is lowest). DC had 67 homicides in 2023 with a population of 670k people. El Salvador had 154 homicides with 10x the population (6.3 million). https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/el-salvador-says-murders-fell-70-2023-it-cracked-down-gangs-2024-01-03/ Flights are also really cheap to El Salvador on Avianca, and they fly 3-4x a day direct from Dulles. |
Anonymous
So you ran around speaking Spanish to people who also spoke English? You didn’t need to go to Belize to do that! |
Did we need Spanish, no? Did my kids have a ball speaking Spanish to hotel staff, cab drivers, tour guides, absolutely. And, there were absolutely situations where it was very useful and more than that there were situations where they had a very different experience because they were communicating in others' native language. Additionally, Mexico City certainly doesn't require Spanish and we wanted to go there. We just can't afford to anymore.
Anonymous
Oh boy chicken little. |
Anonymous
Yes, mainly Salvadoran immigrants just like here. It’s a former British colony, part of the Commonwealth, and squarely an English speaking country. Running around speaking Spanish to migrants there would be majorly cringe. |
Anonymous
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Belize "Approximately 52.9% of Belizeans self-identify as Mestizo, Latino or Hispanic. Spanish is spoken as a native tongue by about 52.9% of the population" |
Anonymous
It's Guatemalans there, because that's who they share their border with, and it's a big issue for them. But yes it's pretty cringe. |
Anonymous
| Guatemala is amazing. Stay in Antigua and if you have time also somewhere on Lake Atitlan |
Anonymous
I don't know about you, but even my young kids aren't sprinting up and down hotel lobbies accosting people with their language skills (what people do you know that spend all this time running around on vacations?). What can I tell you? They spoke a lot of Spanish on this trip. There was more than one time when it was very helpful. They had fun. They want to go someplace where they'll need it more. You can continue to be aggrieved but you've now received all the attention you'll get! (You get what you get, and you don't get upset.) |
Anonymous
Read the news about El Salvador. Crime is way down. We saw people doing things we would never do in DC - like leaving their purse at the table at a restaurant and walking away! To be clear Salvadorans were doing that! And anyone in tourism you talk to for a minute will boast about how safe it is now, how Bukele has cleaned things up, etc. |
Anonymous
I live in Belize, on Ambergris Caye, where at least 50% of the residents are Spanish native speakers. They all regularly speak Spanish to each other and people who can speak Spanish speak it to them. My husband breaks out his incredibly bad Spanish pretty often because we own a business and he has to deal with a variety of people who don’t speak English. I met several people who speak no English at all and have public-facing jobs (mostly running burrito stands and the like). I don’t think it would necessarily be my choice to do tons of practicing of Spanish, but it’s definitely not unacceptable to speak Spanish to the Spanish speakers. Perfectly acceptable. And Belize might be a nice compromise so that Spanish can be practiced yet you can still get around easily in English when necessary. |