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| From New York to Puerto Rico: Part 1. |
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I write as a Nuyorican born and raised in New York. I write from the personal perspective of a child that never saw the island, eventually visiting the island and then moving there years later to raise a family. I have now lived in Puerto Rico for the past 23 years. I am a proud Nuyorican who loves both islands -- the one steel and stone and the other tropical nature. I'll tell my story in three parts. First as a child learning about this mysterious island called Puerto Rico. Next, actually experiencing the island and finally, moving there. As a child I remember my mother talking about her Isla and childhood - how different it was from mine. She told me she went to school on horseback, which impressed me since Roy Rogers and Bat Masterson were popular at the time. She stimulated my imagination going to public school on horseback, tieing my horse to the front stoop. I imagined these things going to sleep at night after listening to her detailed stories. I would make my way inside the mattress that had a major hole in the middle that kept me warm; I just had to be careful with the steel springs. My mother told me that Puerto Rico was summer all year around. I always enjoyed summer and imagined a New York without winter or worries about keeping warm. I listened to her talk about green pastures and how her dog would go to the river to take a daily dip, something that I never had the chance to see being an urban child. She talked about how they would plant food for harvest, something I read a little about in school with Dick and Jane. The only green life for me in NY was Central Park. I was lucky enough to live across the street from the park on 111th and Fifth.-but that was limited to summer time. I was young and curious and wanted to learn more.One day a family from Catano, Puerto Rico moved into the building. Our family was there to greet them. We acted like bellmen taking them to their apartment and carrying their luggage. I saw two cute girls my age and a new friend, Papo. We got tight; I was seeing his sister, and he was seeing mine. I taught him the way of urban survival, and he told me about his upbringing in Puerto Rico. Papo was three years older, but I held my own and taught him the way of the streets. We would go to Central Park where he had a feast eating mini fruits from the trees. At the time, I thought only monkeys did that. I didn't know that you could actually eat things that grow in that park!!! That was news to me. He had insight into a world that was so different from mine, and I admired him for it. I wanted to learn more about these things. I found that these folks came from a very different place that I could only imagine. They had insight to what a plant was... where I only knew the world of man bending mother earth to his will with steel and concrete, exploiting the wealth of natural resources. This was the world that molded me. One where you took what you wanted and needed in the name of modern progress and trampled and abused others to achieve the means. I thought food was not grown, that it was manufactured inside some factory and put in cans to consume. I was just a kid trying to understand this crazy place that seemed to make more sense to others then myself. I thought the world was like this huge city and that the park was constructed for recreation. My ideas of nature were contrary to the truth… something I would later understand. Papo and I became really good friends because we taught each other two different way of survivals. I taught him the way of the city, being strong and not taking crap. I showed him how to make extra cash selling shopping bags in la Marqueta. We went to Central Park, and he knew about fishing. I used to go and never put a worm on my hook and never caught anything. He pulled the grass to get worms. I remember asking him how he knew they were there. He always had more fish in his can. I told him I was going to take him fishing too - not for fish, but for money. I took him to Lexington Avenue where they had the air ducks for the trains where people dropped money. I took this old big lock I used with a string. I showed him how to take lard out from under cars and put it on the base of the lock to have the coins stick. I taught him the ways of the city, and he taught me the ways of Puerto Rico. I felt good about our friendship. We both had something to offer each other. I got new insight one one day when my brother got caught breaking into the corner stationary store. They had drilled through the bricks, and in the morning, you could see an open cave to the store from the side street. The police held the block gangs in our hallway. The night before, I had found the hidden stash in a drawer. My brother told me to keep it secret, and that I could take whatever I wanted. I had this little derringer I always wanted that Bat Masterson used. When they went to court, they got sent away to a detention house upstate called Lincoln Hall. We had to visit my brother, and it was the very first time I got a glimpse of what was outside the city's borders. The only other place I has been to was the Bronx to visit my cousins. I loved the open space at the detention house and would return to the city with poison ivory because I loved to roll in the green. In PS 109 I would always hunt some caterpillars and get that damn yellow fever. I was always looking for nature without really realizing it. Now I was going outside the city limits for the first time in my life. I was surprised; no congested street and avenues! I wondered, what happened. Where did all the people go? I saw the splitting of mountain for the first time so for the highway could make its path. I saw the forest for the first time. I knew it was too big for anyone to put there. I had such a misunderstanding of what the world was as a child raised in a congested barrio whose only purpose was for others to exploit cheap labor. It would take time for me to understand. Meanwhile, I was looking for meaning in this badly constructed place, I was forced to live in. It was before the civil rights movement, and discrimination and segregation ruled the day. Most ethic groups lived in communities with set boundary lines. I lived between Black Harlem to the West and a dwindling Italian community to the East. We were right in the middle of gangland conflict. Each block had it soldiers to protect their own. We were the Young Lords that later, later turned political in the late 60’s but then was hooked into urban defense and respect that was outright crazy. It originally was called the Chaplains, and my cousin was President, Spanish Ramon. He grew into a big time numbers runner connected with the Colombo family importing drugs into East Harlem. I remember my father saying, "Stay away from your cousins." Something I had no problem with since I was just a kid. My brothers knew a lot more about the streets then I did. They prepared me as if I were a solder before I even hit the streets. I had good training, and the scars my brother left on me, prove it. I was never scared to defend myself since my father would give really serious whipping with the old iron cord used to press clothing. Kids could never match my father's ass kicking. Today my father would be in prison for those things he did to us. He did not know how to love, treat or raise a family. In those days, the cop showed up and could not get involved in family matter, only warn him to stop beating us. That was the law then; we had no way out of it. He finally moved out to a warm apartment downtown, and we stayed uptown in a dump. He only showed up to eat and give discipline - never took us to a park to eat a hot dog. Guess later years, I tired to understand that he came from Puerto Rico in the 30’s and had a hard time being a man of color. But it turned him into a vicious man. When I got to see what was outside the urban jungle, it seemed so pleasing and peaceful. I would break into the stationary store, if it would take me to live where my brother was living in cottages. They went fishing and played football in green open pastures. It was beautiful there. If the authorities thought they were punishing someone, they made a big mistake. I wanted to go live there too. They were no cracked walls, no broken windows. At home I knew when it snowed because I could make snow balls from inside the house! The only other place that had heat was public school. The only thing I remember about school, other than that nasty green soup. That experience could have turned me into a life of crime for life. Only because I wanted to live decently, comfortable as a respectable human being, and could not. I started to become aware of the unbalanced nature of human rights and that is why I listened to my mother's stories about this place called Puerto Rico. It was becoming more important to me. These people seemed to have no color issues; most of our families had members of different shades, and it was to our culture - algo bonito. We had our skirmishes with people who thought white culture was better; my father was among them even as a man of color. I often wonder, damn, they did a number on him. I often played hooky and went to Black Harlem to hang with the super's kids who were Black. They always treated me right, and I could see the plight of their people in their eyes. I felt comfortable and understood them. One day I asked my brother, why was they so loud. He told me the story of their enslavement by white people and that blew my senses away. I through, damn, I too would be loud if I was a former slave and still faced discrimination. Every summer my father would go to Puerto Rico and play it like he was a big-time wheeler dealer in NY. If only they knew the facts. He was a wall washer for a hotel. Yet, they all played that game going back to the island as if they had made it big time. They would go back as if they had hit the damn “sweep stake”!!! The family at the other end loved it. They knew they had some extra cash coming their way for the stay. People were poor and shoeless and needed help and that was very understandable. They did not have clothing or accessories like TVs and transportation. They had no reason to rush. They did not even wear wrist watches. They lived a simple life. I did not see the island until I was 14 years old. Until then Puerto Rico was a special place in my mind that I wondered about. |
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HISTORY MATTERS
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Public Law 600 permits Puerto Ricans to draft a constitution, which Muñoz Marin presents in a 1951 referendum that asks Puerto Ricans to vote yes-or-no. Puerto Ricans overwhelmingly approve it, and it is then submitted to the US Congress. After some modifications, a second referendum is held in 1952, and Puerto Ricans vote for the constitution, which remains in effect today.
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