LOST IN THE MURDER CAPITAL OF THE WORLD (AND OTHER MISADVENTURES IN HONDURAS)

I shifted uncomfortably in the backseat of the van as I watched out the window. The already dark streets of San Pedro Sula had suddenly become much darker. Maybe the streetlights were fewer and further between here or maybe it was the lack of neon lights and brightly lit signs of the big-name chain hotels we were leaving behind.

Whatever the reason, the changing light signalled that inexplicably sudden transition that every city seems to have – that imaginary border which separates the part of town you want to be in, from the part of town you don’t want to be in.

Behind us were well-kept shops, restaurants, and hotels each framed by perfectly manicured greenery and sprawling sidewalks. Ahead, we watched what seemed to be a scene from a movie meant to warn against traveling to unfamiliar countries – young tattooed men with backpacks, baggy pants and a I-don’t-give-a-f&*^ attitude made their way down the street while women adjusted mini skirts and balanced stiletto heels on crumbling curbsides while waiting for their next job.

Mark and I exchanged a quick, silent glance across the dim backseat which said everything that words couldn’t. This night was getting stranger by the minute. And yet, I was absurdly calm for someone who had lost all semblance of control over the situation.

The light turned green.

Our driver locked the doors of the van as we passed through the intersection.

———

“Soooo, apparently San Pedro Sula is the murder capital of the world” I casually mentioned to Mark as I bent over the laptop that was perched on our kitchen counter. “But,” I was quick to interject, “that’s mostly due to local gang violence and tourists are rarely involved. Besides, flying into the city is the only way we can get to the island. We’ll be fine.”

I was getting awfully good at downplaying the risk factor during the trip planning phase of our travels and a pattern was starting to emerge: I’d get my heart set on a trip, spend endless hours spiraling through the depths of Google, prepare my arguments, and then approach Mark with the idea.

In this case, it was 2014 my goal was getting PADI certified on the Honduran island of Utila, a tropical paradise, SCUBA hotspot, and one of the cheapest places on earth to get your Open Water Diver certification all while enjoying sun, sand, and cervezas during downtime. The only hiccup was convincing Mark that flying into a city with one of the worst crime rates on the planet in order to get there was a good idea.

I wasn’t wrong in arguing that we’d likely be fine. San Pedro Sula is Honduras’ second-largest city and a major transport hub for the nation. It was named the “murder capital of the world” in 2013 due to it’s exploding homicide per capita rate. That title that would normally have led me to immediately scratch it off the list of possible travel destinations. But I really had my mind made up about Utila so I did some more digging.

The increase in violence and crime in the city was connected to a complex mix of political unrest, rising unemployment, drug trafficking, and gang activity which had been fueled by the deportation of gang members from the United States. As scary as that all seemed, tourists were rarely involved in the chaos.

At least, as long as they stuck to certain areas of town they weren’t often involved.

While the media’s obsession with the growing crime and homicide rates had negatively impacted tourism in the country, people were still traveling there and finding that they were largely unaffected. I decided that it was worth the risk and justified it further by knowing that:

• We would only stay in the city for two nights – one on either end of the trip – and spend little time exploring San Pedro Sula
• I would do my research on safe areas of the city and what to avoid
• I would pre-arrange hotels and transport to/from the airport and bus station to avoid getting lost; and
• I would make sure we had all the information, phone numbers, locations, booking numbers, and schedules with us to avoid the unexpected

I thought I was being a responsible traveler by over-planning and doing everything in my power to control each detail. But sometimes even endless lists and neatly organized spreadsheets aren’t enough.

Sometimes, shit just happens.

———

Mark and I stood and watched the empty baggage carousel slowly turn. I wondered how it was even possible my bag wasn’t there yet as we had spent nearly an hour making our way through what appeared to be the world’s slowest moving airport customs line.

I could feel the annoyance bubbling up inside me. Losing my backpack would be the perfect end to a marathon day of hopscotch flights that had left me tired, hungry, and just done with traveling.

While we waited, I absent-mindedly flipped through the various pages I had printed out and tucked neatly into my passport holder before we left. I double checked the name, check in date, and location of our hotel for the night.

It was a small locally-owned place, just the type I like to support when we travel internationally. Alex, the owner, had been incredibly helpful when I emailed about having a ride arranged from the airport to the hotel and assured me that it would be no problem. I was glad I had set that up and was happy to know that, once I collected my bag, the rest of the night would be easy.

I breathed a sigh of relief as my old, dirty, green backpack tumbled its way down the ramp and onto the carousel. I quickly slung it onto my back and we headed for the arrivals gate.

The door slid open and I immediately spotted a man holding a sign with my name on it. Knowing our ride was there, I felt myself relax as I walked toward him. An exhausting travel day was almost over, and I couldn’t have been more ready to slip into crisp hotel sheets and rest my head on a soft pillow.

But it wouldn’t be that simple.

As we approached the driver, he immediately began waving his cell phone in my face. Through a thick accent, he informed me that there was a problem with the hotel and that Alex needed to talk to me. He dialed the number and pressed the phone to my ear.

I heard a faint voice on the other end of the line, that much harder to understand through the din of the airport. I caught just fragments of what he was saying…

“… a problem with the booking system…”

“…no room available tonight…”

“…arrangements for you to stay at my friend’s place…”

My tired brain was too foggy to understand what was going on but I hesitantly voiced a cautious agreement.

What else could I do? It was nearly midnight in an unfamiliar city. I didn’t have a lot of options.

My intense focus on the phone conversation was suddenly broken when I glanced up and saw the look on Mark’s face. He was staring me down with eyes that said in equal parts: what have you gotten us into now? and are you seeing this?

I suddenly became aware of the scene unfolding around us.

A group of men surrounded us, spouting out rapid-fire Spanish in the direction of our driver. I didn’t have to understand the words to know that they were clearly not happy about something. An American couple in their 50s stood next to Mark, asking him questions that he didn’t know the answers to.

I handed the phone back, attempted to explain the hotel mix up to Mark, and tried to wrap my head around the situation myself. The couple began peppering me with their questions – did you arrange a ride with this driver? do you know him? do you trust him?

After a bit of back and forth, I began to understand the dilemma. The couple, though they were staying at a different hotel, had also arranged a ride ahead of time. This driver was meant to take both us and them to our respective hotels. The problem was that the angry group of men were telling them that our driver was a liar and not to be trusted.

It also became clear that the group of men were cab drivers, waiting at the arrivals gate for fares. A pre-arranged driver for two different couples meant no fare for them. And they were not taking this one sitting down. They were determined to cut out the driver sent by the hotel and have us come with one of them instead.

We had been thrust into a microcosm of the passenger transport industry that was much more cutthroat than anything I had ever experienced before.

While the argument among the drivers continued, the four of us debated over what to do. We realized that we had little choice, especially Mark and I since we didn’t even know where we were spending the night at this point, and decided to stick with our original driver.

The angry mob of cabbies followed us outside the airport and to the van. The four of us got inside and made distracted small talk while the conflict continued to play out in front of us. The headlights of the van lit the scene like a spotlight on a theatre stage, making the whole thing feel like some sort of twisted play – one that I was hoping would turn out to be a comedy and not a Greek tragedy.

Suddenly, the yelling match outside escalated to a whole new level. One man reached out to shove our driver and within seconds, there was mass chaos. The group of men took off their belts and raised them overhead while chasing our driver around the van in circles.

Everything suddenly felt very real, yet entirely unbelievable. The thought crossed my mind that we could very well be about to witness a murder. That fate, luckily, was thwarted as airport security – clad in military-style uniforms and toting rather large machine guns – rushed over to break up the fight.

The arguments continued as each member of the group began to passionately educate the security guards with their version of what was happening. Eventually, the police arrived to take statements, the group began to disperse, and things started to calm down.

After sitting in the van watching the show for what seemed like hours, our driver finally got inside the vehicle. He brushed off the fight like it was no big deal, assured us that things like that happen all the time, put the van into drive and headed off with a smile on his face.

Just another day at the office.

———

We dropped off the Americans at the bright, shiny Hilton where they exited the van with a sigh of relief and wished us luck. We drove off into the night and now there we were: sitting at that dark intersection awaiting our fate.

The fight at the airport had distracted me from the fact that I had no idea where we were being taken, but looking ahead at what we were driving into made it all come rushing back.

Let’s recap:

• It was well past midnight in the murder capital of the world.
• We had lost our hotel room for the night and had no idea where we were going.
• We nearly witnessed a beating happen – not in some dark alley or outside a bar, but directly in front of the international airport among a group of professional drivers.
• We had been in the country for less than four hours and had already been in a situation where armed guards and police were involved.
• And now we were driving into one of the roughest-looking areas of a city I’d ever been in.

In my real life, losing control of a situation to that level would have caused some major anxiety. I’ve been known to lose my shit over burnt toast. I don’t do well with curveballs being thrown my way.

And yet, there I was, sitting in a van, watching the shady side of San Pedro Sula pass by the windows, putting my fate into the hands of a guy I had just watched nearly get beaten to death by belt-wielding cab drivers, and I was … totally calm. I had complete faith that things would turn out fine.

Perhaps it was a defense mechanism. Perhaps I was in so far over my head that my mind wouldn’t even let me acknowledge the fact that this is how stories of missing tourists start.

Or maybe this is part of the appeal of travel. Those moments when you’re so far out of your comfort zone that you meet parts of yourself that you never even knew existed. Those times when you’re forced to give yourself over completely to fate and let what will happen, happen – all while witnessing yourself deal with shit that just isn’t part of your normal daily routine. Usually you surprise yourself. Or at least that’s what often happens for me.

As we drove through the streets, the number of turns and seemingly directionless route the driver was taking had me wondering, yet again, just what the hell was going on. He had dropped off the Americans with no issue. Surely he would do the same for us. Right?

I let go and just took in the scene. Although there were a million questions running through my mind, I was fully present in the moment – another thing I suck at in my regular life.

As we slowed for a stop sign, I spotted a group of men dressed in elaborate mariachi costumes leaning up against a fence. They chatted and laughed as smoke slowly curled up from the end of their lit cigarettes, each of them in various states of relaxation. They had likely just finished a gig. Maybe they were waiting for a ride. Maybe just taking a break. I thought about how that scene would have made an amazing picture.

Really, Laura? You could very well be kidnapped right now and you’re thinking about photography composition?

But it was a glance into a world I never would have seen had things not gone as they had that night. If my backpack had been the first on the carousel, if there was no angry mob or waiting for the police at the airport, if we had decided to get out at the Hilton to try and get a room there for the night instead – if any of those things happened differently, I would have missed a moment that I found, for whatever reason, incredibly captivating and strangely comforting.

After a wrong stop at a dark, unmarked building added another red flag to a seemingly never-ending night of strange events (and nearly sent Mark tumbling over the edge of his patience), it turned out our driver didn’t exactly know where he was going. But after making a quick phone call and laughing at himself, our ever-enthusiastic and perpetually positive chauffer pulled up at Villa del Sol, a small hotel that apparently was our destination.  

Once we were settled into our room, I stuck to my usual rituals and sent off a quick email to my mom letting her know we had arrived safely. I gave her the name of the new hotel, saying there was a “bit of a mix up” and that we had ended up at a different place than planned for the night.

I left out the details of the fight, the police, and being temporarily lost on the wrong side of the murder capital of the world. That’s a story your mother doesn’t want to hear until after you’ve returned home.

Of course, the fact that we weren’t actually kidnapped, didn’t witness a murder, and ended up with a safe place to stay makes it much easier to romanticize that first night in Honduras. To see it as a memorable misadventure rather than a legitimately dangerous situation that could have ended very differently.

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Our time in Honduras ended up being one of my (and Mark’s) most favourite trips. We got our PADI certification, spent time relaxing on the beach, kayaked through mangroves, and hiked along the Rio Cangrejal. But that first night wasn’t our only misadventure – read more about how we accidentally broke into a grocery store.

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