A Yankee In Puerto Rico

Monday, March 10, 2008 @ 8:42 pm by -DS-

En estos días estuve cavando dentro de toda la porquería que se ha registrado en Puertoblogs recientemente y encontré una joya llamada “A Yankee in PR”. Como dice el título el blog se trata de un gringo que se mudó a Puerto Rico para vivir (no se en que carajos estará pensando pero cool). El blog es reciente, solo tiene varios escritos pero es interesante ver su punto de vista de las cosas y la forma en que las cuenta. Se ha ganado un espacio en mi blogroll.

Aquí unas cuantas citas del blog:

 

Now the food sat well with me, but my novia unfortunately, and rather comically, spent most of the next morning - well I probably don’t need to go into detail as to the nature of her ailment. But luckily there are many colmados on Vieques that had just the stuff to cure her ills. My ills were cured by the mixture of beer and coffee that I ingested at various parts of the morning along with freshly baked pan de agua.

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We had a great time and walked up to one of Viejo San Juan’s many plazas where a guy asked us for 75 cents and then offered to sell us weed or coke. After considering his offer for 0 seconds, I lamented, “Q nos pasa Puerto Rico?” which caught the attention of a rather large homeless gentleman who began to explain in rather good English that all Puerto Ricans wanted their independence from the Great Satan and that he was a licensed engineer who was homeless because of the American occupation. I listened quite nicely until he called my friend and I babykillers due to our apparent Gringoness (I didn’t bother to tell him that I live here and teach Puerto Rican children). So after reminding him that he is also an American and therefore as culpable as I in any perceived American faults, I wished him a buen dia and left.

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Topeka is kind of a legend here – a place for cheap home goods that has been around since God knows when. They happen to sell multiple types of dominos, which is the unofficial national sport of the Caribbean. I bought a really nice set with the Puerto Rican flag on the back.

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What I have found here, however, is a focus on a different kind of fashion. For a state that is supposedly suffering a three year recession, they are very concerned about style. Perfumerias seem to be on every corner hawking the latest J.Lo fragrance and über-expensive designer colognes. The Caribbean’s only Macy’s is located in a San Juan mall along with Brooks Brothers, Armani, Gucci, Guess, Hugo Boss, Lacoste and many other stores. If you cannot afford those, there are ten-thousand stores with copies of the latest fashions at a range of prices and qualities. Everyone here seems to gravitate towards their own personal trend, however, I have found a few commonalities to differentiate Boricua style from my former home:

¿Que hacen aquí? Vayan a leerlo coño!