Yesterday I spent the whole day looking at pictures and info about the place I left behind when I moved to Puerto Rico: La Romana, Dominican Republic.

I was practically dragged outta there when my family decided that the country was slowly sinking into third world territory. Maybe it already was, I can’t quite remember a lot of details. (Click on the thumbnails for bigger pics)

A view of the town hall, now with a horrible yellow color. When I lived there it was brown or beige. The building on it’s left (not pictured) was the Colegio Episcopal, where I studied.

La Romana is a small town. Everybody knew each other or someone related to you. And my father specifically was a notorious figure in town. There wasn’t a single day where we’d go out and he’d be greeted by at least 15 people while on the street.

I studied in El Colegio Episcopal Todos Los Santos until sixth grade. It was a small school, but the courtyard was huge. Lots of territory for hyperactive little devils like us to run around and get filthy. It was fun as hell. It has a huge church, with a gigantic, hideous wooden Christ in it’s center, which looked more ominous than savior-like . I used to kid with younger children and tell them that the statue was really Satan. Many of them cried and refused to enter the church afterwards.

The Church of Santa Rosa, which was the usual church you see in the center of every small christian town on earth. It’s located to the right of the town hall. It’s shown here without all the kiosks and sweaty haitian ladies selling all kinds of shit.

When I left, I didn’t tell any of my friends or classmates that I was moving out of the country, I didn’t even keep any of their phone numbers or addresses. I didn’t even have a farewell party like some other idiots who fled the country in mid-semester. I lost complete contact with everyone from that time in my life and I regret it every fucking day. But hey, I was only 9 years old. I probably didn’t give a fuck about anything and had the crazy idea that I’d be there every summer, as if nothing ever happened. In fact, the idea of coming to a brand new country was something I fantasized about, I even had a countdown scribbled on my desk when I was traveling to the island for the very first time. Puerto Rico was described to me as a magical place full of opportunity, lavish banquets of neverending food, inexpensive things, and best of all, no power or water outtages whatsoever! and if the lights went out, it was only for 15-20 minutes!!! Could this even be real?!

Hardly. The first time I arrived to PR my dad still hadn’t accomodated himself properly (which is preposterous, since he’d been traveling to study and work in PR for over a decade), so I was greeted by a frat boy’s studio with 1 room and bathroom, a kitchen/living room and a 5 foot refrigerator. But I was young. I didn’t mind that I didn’t know anybody and had to spend whole days watching local TV (no cable) while my dad slaved at the hospital and we couldn’t even go out to buy gum. All that matters is that we’re in Puerto Rico! land of opportunity!…

La Romana’s obelisk, proof that the Illuminati reaches the most unthinkable spots on the planet. Hehe not really. When I lived there it was just bone white, now it looks like the United Colors of Benneton vomited all over it.

Of course my enthusiasm only lasted for a few weeks. I soon noticed that living here with no friends or family to visit was the most disheartening thing in the universe. Sure I could do things I couldn’t do back on the DR (like waking up and having chocolate chip ice cream for breakfast), but I was a bored kid. The only thing that kept me going was watching the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon on the afternoons, making mix tapes (hey, it was the 80’s) and waiting for my dad to arrive so he’d take us out somewhere. To the supermarket. To one of his friend’s house. ANYWHERE. I just wanted to see more of the island that caused so many people to risk their lives in the unruly seas on a daily basis.

Instead dad took us out to places that only HE cared about. He took us to many of his friends’ houses, where he spent HOURS drinking and talking shit with unknown people while I sat in a corner with my brother drinking soda and wishing to be on the streets of DR playing “el loco”, “el topao”, “el econdío” or “la pata ‘e jarro”. We also went to cheap department stores (anyone remember Woolworth’s, Seedmans or New York Department Stores? I do), we went to dirty hardware stores, the supermarket at the corner… Good lord. Is this what it’s all about?

This intersection I remember quite well. It’s right besides the remnants of La Rotonda, an ancient bar/nightclub where back in the day the local “chopas”, “grillos” and “cueros” hung out with all sorts of heavily drinking men. Ahhhh, memories.

I returned to DR, unaware of the shitty time I had, since sitting on the window seat of a plane was the biggest pleasure i could think of at the moment and made me forget all the boring shit. Besides, I also wanted to brag to my classmates about where I’d been. I sure wasn’t gonna tell them that my trip sucked 80% of the time…

Eventually I returned to Puerto Rico about 2 more times, until we established ourselves permanently. My half sister, who had the same boring experience as me (being the eldest, she lived in PR for a few months before all of us), couldn’t bear the thought of moving here forever, so she stayed in DR with her boyfriend and her other family, and was villified by my father for being a “backstabbing whore”. But that’s a whole ‘nother story…

A pic of the Church of San Pablo. This pic floored me because I lived very close to it and even became one of it’s altar boys for a few months. (no, I wasn’t touched improperly by any priests, even though I would have enjoyed it more than I care to admit )

It is a very fucked up coincidence that as I was going through all these memories yesterday, I arrived at my house to find out that THE LIGHTS HAD GONE OUT IN MOST OF MY AREA. 3 or 4 whole sections of Bayamón had a major power outtage because of a huge electrical breakdown. This is truly the most ironic shit that’s happened to me in weeks. I was remembering all day those gas lamp nights I spent every night while living in DR, and now it was happening all over again. The Electrical company said that the damage was serious, so they didn’t have an exact time for it’s reparation.

The power arrived today, at 12 p.m.

Over 15 hours without power!!!! That right there is the Queen Mother of all Flashbacks. What would have made it even more fucked up was if the water had also gone out, but luckily, we had water all night long. What we lacked however, was a breeze. The summer is just about starting. The house had accumulated all that sunlight over the day and releasing it overnight. How do you think we felt with no fans, no breeze, NOTHING to cool ourselves while this nightmare haunted me again?

I felt right back in La Romana.

Dad refused to turn on a gas lamp (very similar to the ones used back at the DR) because it expels a horrible amount of heat, making out situation even more miserable. Instead, and after I threatened to call my “friend” (ha!) and go sleep at his house, my dad got some sort of battery thingy and connected a fan to it, which resolved the heat problem to a point. I couldn’t bear rolling around the bed with no sleep and nothing to do, so I popped a Panadol PM and knocked myself out.
I had such a miserable night (and I felt so shitty because of sinus issues) that I called in sick. There’s no way in hell I would endure a whole day of work after going through that. And to think that in DR, this would be a totally common experience. 12 hr. blackouts are as expected as night and day.

Yes, I miss my country. I miss my people and their funky accent. I miss having “mangú con salami frito” for dinner. I miss playing in the streets with all my neighbors in utter darkness because the lights went out. I miss my school and the people I knew there. I miss how carefree I used to live with no worries or responsibilities at all. But I sure as hell couldn’t bear to live like that once again.

I also wonder, since Dominican Republic is a much more intolerant and narrowminded environment than PR, If I had stayed there, would I have turned out gay anyway? or would I meet women and date them but still have the burning hidden desire for cock? Very probably. Appearances are everything over there, and in such a macho-driven environment I wasn’t gonna “tarnish” my reputation by turning out a “faggot”…

At least not in public.

[Photos courtesy of THIS GUY. I don't know who he is but I thank him profusely for taking pics ot the REAL La Romana and not those squeaky clean photoshopped hotel brochure pics you see on commercial websites]

Tags: Republica Dominicana, La Romana

Posted in Family, Reveries |

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