THE NORTH RIDING PROJECT

The dead and pieces of the dead turn up in El Salvador everywhere, every day, as taken for granted as in a nightmare, or a horror movie.  Vultures of course suggest the presence of a body.  A knot of children on the street suggests the presence of a body.  Bodies turn up in the brush of vacant lots, in the garbage thrown down ravines in the richest districts, in public restrooms, in bus stations.  Some are dropped in Lake Ilopango, a few miles east of the city, and wash up near the lakeside cottages and clubs frequented by what remains in San Salvador of the sporting bourgeoisie.

Didion/Salvador