Going Native

The days are ticking down! We're trying to squeeze every last morsel of fun out of this place, twisting Puerto Rico like a boa constrictor of appreciation. And it's been largely successful.

I bought a paper this morning, and in it read a number of fascinating things. Such as the fact that Puerto Rico is doing enormously well at the Pan Am games in Rio de Janeiro, garnering the same number of medals as much larger places, like Chile and Ecuador. And that the electric power currently cooling me comes from a nuclear power plant, built thanks to the expertise of a Puerto Rican who got his doctorate in such things in the US and came back to design and build the reactor. (He died recently and had a helicopter drop flowers over his funeral.) I also learned that the government, trying to help out PR's dairy industry, is placing tarriffs on the milk that is sold in vacuum-sealed boxes, since that milk is cheaper - because it's imported from countries where people work for nothing. Of course, the poor and the elderly are the principal consumers of this milk, so it's going to hit them harder than anyone. And I also learned that today is the anniversary of the signing of Puerto Rico's constitution.

What I didn't see, because it wasn't there, was the subtitle of the article about the anniversary of the constitution. It would have read thus: "EVERYTHING CLOSED". But, again, because that wasn't there, we sauntered out to the market where Janneke found the best fruit smoothies in Puerto Rico for the kids' mid-morning snack.

The place is gorgeous, in a very character-ridden (in a strictly good way) neighborhood about a ten-to-fifteen-minute walk from our house. That walk is kind of excruciating in the heat we're seeing here, so it was particularly disheartening to arrive and find the lovely old place shuttered in celebration of the constitution. We prowled the neighborhood briefly, looking for another option, but in the end decided to just bolt to Ashford Avenue, six blocks away or so, and buy the kids ice cream at Walgreen's. Bold of us, I know.

They held up incredibly well on the walk, and were rewarded by a fudgecicle apiece, which they consumed in the nearby park where we'd not played hacky-sack yesterday. We settled in for some more not-playing-hacky-sack, and then wandered home for lunch. Thereafter things unfolded like yesterday: Tess out to walk and to nap, Quinn and I to the beach.

An ice cream salesman (and again, this isn't really a dairy-product-laden ice cream; it's more a thick fruit-ice-sugar whip) made his way up the beach, and Quinn and I bought one coconut-flavored and one parcha. We ate them and then swam a while; Quinn was into making a castle for a little while, but went back to the water. I stayed behind, though, headache-depleted, and pondered what sort of cooler castle I could make. Forcing myself to remember to look up every 30 seconds or so, so I could see whether Quinn's T-shirted torso was still bobbing around, I set about constructing a rough replica of a Maya temple. See for yourself whether you think it was successful - it inspired varying reactions from passers by, as you'll see in the pictures.

Not long after, I picked up a bag that went floating by and filled it with other trash, then walked the lot up the hill to the garbage can. On my way down, I saw the same ice cream salesman (who was doing very well today, what with all the constitution-day revelers) trying to drag his two-flavor cart up the steep rise to the street, and making little headway. I sprang into action.

Materializing as if out of nowhere behind his cart, I warned him with a "Jefe, le doy empujando" (Hey Chief, I'll give you a push), and then applied just enough force to the back of the cart to help, but not so much as to intimidate or frighten him. And the two of us got the cart up the rise in short order. I was surprised, though, at how quickly we stopped once we reached the top - he practically jumped out from in front of the cart, as if afraid I'd run him down. Had I applied too much force after all - more than any normal man could possibly possess? Was my secret revealed...? He opened up his cart and said to me, "Se ha ganado un helado de parcha." (You've earned yourself a parcha ice cream.) I laughed, and protested meekly, but then stood waiting while he prepared it, and giggled my way back to where Quinn was swimming, happily scooping it in. Great stuff.

Soon thereafter, I heard a cry for help, and looked up to see a parasurfer motioning toward me. I disappeared in a cloud of smoke, then reappeared behind him; he explained that his parachute, floating some 100 feet above us, would need to be held down once he guided it into the sand. Could I do that for him...?

I did, needless to say. (Those sails turn out to be inflatable. Didn't know that.) He thanked me and went on his merry way. I swear, I don't know how that beach could have gotten by without me. What they've done without me on the previous 49 Constitution Days, is what I want to know.

Janneke and Tess showed up not long after, and the rest of the afternoon was spent in the pounding surf or on the sunny beach. Enjoyment galore.

As we were preparing to go home, we sprung it on Quinn that we would be eating at Bebo's again tonight, and he nearly popped with joy. He absolutely loves that place, though he has the same thing every time. It was good, but I have to say I'm getting a little tired of comida criolla. It starts to feel like it's all the same after a while. Really, really good, but I need to spread it out more. Have some Chinese in between, maybe.

Janneke has practically gone native, by the way. It's like in that Ray Bradbury book where the colonists on Mars slowly turn into the Martians. She's picking up all kinds of Puerto Ricanisms in her Spanish, she's completely changed color, and right now she's out in the living room - the non-air-conditioned living room! - watching TV. We may wind up staying here forever.

We have kicked around the idea of somehow finding a way to be here more long-term, but for now it isn't really feasible. A vacation spread would be nice, somewhere out in the country a bit, but we have that in Wisconsin. And when we do travel, there are so many new places we'll want to see - I can't see our vacations always being in one place, just because we own a place there and feel obligated to make use of it. Still, I fantasize sometimes about having a few acres out near Manati. It's just bloody gorgeous over there. And affordable, from what I understand.

Observations: Puerto Rican men, unlike other Latin American men with whom we've had experience, do not leer at women. We've heard no piropos since we came, directed toward anyone, and by and large the respect level for women seems, in everyday street interactions, to be set just where we're used to. That's definitly been easy.

A sign for a dry cleaning service had "Dry Cleaning" and "Laundry" in English, but then had "Sastreria" (taloring) and "Zapateria" (cobbler) in Spanish. Same sign, same business. I'm still wondering what the deal is there. Janneke suggested that the latter two businesses aren't typically patronized by gringos, and that well may be. But I think that every laundry sign I've seen has been in English - it may also be that the Puerto Rican words for "laundry" and "dry cleaning" are "laundry" and "dry cleaning".

Tomorrow: A last hurrah in Old San Juan, and swimming at the Escambron beach, where there will be decent snorkeling.

Pictures!




The vegetable market - Note the closed shutters.



The place is gorgeous - we're going back Saturday.



A mural underneath Highway 26 celebrating the
native ball game. We passed under 26 in two
spots today, and both underpasses were clean
and smelled not at all of urine. If they were
in Ecaudor, they would be the only two such
spots in the country.



"El jibaro" is the quintessential semi-mythic Puerto Rican country
bumpkin / sage / salt of the earth. You see him everywhere.




Big crowd on Constitution Day. They didn't really
want to go to the beach; they kind of had to.
(It's in the Constitution.)



My pyramid. Funny fact: It turns out to be illegal to
cut the beating heart out of a pigeon, no matter
where you do it. Pyramids are not exempted, apparently.
Weird.




Quinn saw the waves damaging the pyramid and tried
to build a wall to save it.



Tess sees the pyramid and recruits people to
help her destroy it.