Horacio Castellanos Moya - Revulsion - Thomas Bernhard in San Salvador

Warning: Edgardo Vega, the central character of this report, exists. He lives in Montreal under another name, an Anglo-Saxon name that’s not Thomas Bernhard. He surely relayed his opinions more emphatically and with more carnage than this text contains. I’ve softened perspectives that may have offended certain readers.

GLAD YOU COULD COME, Moya, I had my doubts that you would come, so many people in this city don’t like this place, so many people don’t like this place at all, Moya, which is why I wasn’t sure you’d come, said Vega. I love coming here toward the end of the afternoon, sitting out here on the patio, sipping a couple of whiskeys, listening to the music I ask Tolín to put on, said Vega, I don’t sit at the bar over there inside, it’s hot at the bar, very hot over there inside, the patio’s better, with a drink and the jazz Tolín puts on. It’s the only place where I feel at peace in this country, the only decent place, the other bars are filthy, abominable, filled with guys who drink beer till they burst, I can’t understand it, Moya, I can’t understand how they so eagerly drink such nasty beer intended for animals, said Vega, it’s only good for inducing diarrhea, what they drink here, and what’s worse is they’re proud to drink this nasty beer, they’re capable of killing you if you tell them the beer they drink is nasty putrid water, but it’s not beer, Moya, nowhere in the world would this seriously be considered beer, you know it as well as I do, it’s a revolting liquid, but still they drink it with ignorant passion, said Vega, they are so passionate about their ignorance, Moya, they drink this nastiness with pride, even with a sort of national pride, they’re proud thinking that they drink the best beer in the world, they think El Salvador’s Pilsener is the best beer in the world, not swill only good for inducing diarrhea as any healthy person would think, instead they say it’s the best beer in the world, this is the primary and principal characteristic of ignorance, to consider your very own swamp water the best beer in the world, if you call it anything other than that, if you deride their swamp water, their nasty diarrhea-inducing swill, they’re capable of killing you, said Vega. I like this place, Moya, it’s nothing like those nasty bars where they sell that nasty beer they drink with such passion, this place has its own personality, it’s decorated with some taste, although it’s called La Lumbre, and it’s horrific at night, it’s unbearable with the racket of rock groups, the noise of rock groups, which is perversely annoying to all those in earshot thanks to rock groups. But at this time of day I like this bar, Moya, it’s the only place where I can come, where no one bothers me, where no one hassles me, said Vega. That’s why I invited you here, Moya, La Lumbre is the only place in San Salvador where I can drink and do nothing else for a couple of hours, between five and seven in the evening, for only a couple of hours, after seven this place becomes unbearable, it’s the most unbearable place in existence thanks to rock groups, it’s as unbearable as those bars filled with guys proudly drinking their nasty beer, said Vega, but now we can talk in peace, between five and seven no one will bother us. I’ve come to this place every evening since last week, Moya, I’ve come to La Lumbre every evening since I discovered it, between five and seven, which is why I decided to meet you here, I have to chat with you before I leave, I have to tell you what I think about all this nastiness, there’s no one else I can relate my impressions to, the horrible thoughts I’ve had here, said Vega. Since I saw you at my mother’s wake, I said to myself, Moya is the only person I am going to talk to, no other friends from school showed up at the funeral, no one else thought of me, none of the people who call themselves my friends showed up when my old mother died, only you, Moya, but maybe it’s for the best, because none of my school friends were really my friends, none of them I saw after school ended, it’s better that they didn’t show up, better that none of my old companions showed up at my mother’s wake, except you, Moya, because I hate wakes, I hate to receive condolences, I don’t know what to say, it bothers me when these strangers come up to hug you and act like intimate acquaintances only because your mother has died, it’d be better if they didn’t show up. I hate to have to be nice to people I don’t know, and the majority of people who give you sympathy, the majority who help at the wake, are people you don’t know, you’ll never see them again in your life, Moya, but you have to put on a good face, a contrite and grateful face, a face that’s truly grateful for these complete strangers who have come to your mother’s wake to extend their condolences, as though in times like these what you most need is to be kind to strangers, said Vega. And when you arrived, I thought what a good guy Moya is, and it’s even better that he left so quickly, good old Moya, he left so promptly, I thought, I don’t have to deal with any old school friends, said Vega, I don’t have to be kind to anyone, because hardly anyone attended my mother’s wake, except my brother Ivo and his family, a dozen acquaintances of my mother and my brother, and me, the oldest son, who had to come as quickly as he could from Montreal, who’d hoped to never return to this filthy city, said Vega. Our ex-friends from school have turned out for the worst, Moya, they’re truly revolting; what luck I didn’t run into any of them, except for you, of course, we have nothing in common with them, there isn’t a thing that unites me with one of them. We’re the exception. No one can maintain their lucidity after having studied eleven years with the Marist Brothers, no one can become the least bit thoughtful after enduring an education at the hands of the Marist Brothers, to have studied with the Marist Brothers is the worst thing that’s happened to me in my life, Moya, to have studied under the orders of those fat homosexuals has been my worst shame, there is nothing as stupid as having graduated from the Liceo Salvadoreño, the Marist Brothers’ private school in San Salvador, the best and most prestigious Marist Brother school in El Salvador, there’s nothing as degrading as studying with the Marists who molded our spirits for some eleven years. That doesn’t seem so long, Moya? Eleven years listening to idiocies, obeying idiocies, swallowing idiocies, repeating idiocies, said Vega. Eleven years responding yes, brother Pedro; yes, brother Beto; yes, brother Heliodoro, at the most revolting school for submission of the spirit, that’s what we were in, Moya, which is why I don’t care if any of those characters who were our friends there came to my mother’s wake, they underwent eleven years of spiritual domestication, eleven years of spiritual misery they wouldn’t want to remember, eleven years of spiritual castration, whoever would have showed up would have served only to remind me of the worst years of my life, said Vega. But I just ordered a drink, as you can tell by my rant I haven’t settled down, drink a whisky with me, let’s call Tolín, the bartender, the disc jockey, the jack of all trades at this hour, he’s a good guy, someone I’m grateful to for minimally easing my stay in this horrible country. It makes me happy to chat with you, Moya, although you’ve also studied at the Liceo like me, although you have the same uncleanliness of soul that the Marist Brothers instilled in me during those eleven years, I’m glad to have run into you, an ex-Marist student, who hasn’t participated in the general cretinism, in this we’re similar, Moya, you’re the same as me, said Vega.