Vieques, Puerto Rico

Hello once again! So finally, after much ado and a long absence, I am writing once again to update you (and myself, since I sadly have the memory of a goldfish) on my latest adventures abroad. As you probably know, I have now officially embarked on my much-anticipated Latin American odyssey, in which I plan to finally become fluent in Spanish, volunteer a lot, read a lot, become friends with local activists (I know this sounds vague) and generally try to become a better person in order to justify my utter refusal to work and seeming obsession with never staying in one place for too long.
Okay. So, here I am- as I write this, I am on the island of Vieques, off the eastern coast of Puerto Rico. Some of us know Vieques only because for years it was used by the US Navy as an artillery testing site, a practice which has made 2/3 of the island completely uninhabitable due to all the toxic garbage left behind. Apparently, before the Navy came Vieques was home to approximately 30,000 people; within the first 10 years of the ongoing bombing & weapons testing in their backyards, all but 6,000 of these had abandoned ship for quieter, slightly less toxic locales. There was a long, well-coordinated and ultimately successful campaign to put an end to the testing here, but even though the military finally, grudgingly quit shooting up the landscape in 2003, they have flatly refused to come back to clean up any of the thousands of tons of shells, scrap metal or chemical residue they left behind. So, as the banner hung by the tent city next to the highway in San Juan proudly declared, ‘En Vieques, La Lucha Sigue!’ Which means, for those who don't speak Spanish, ‘In Vieques, The Struggle Continues!’ But that, actually, is totally NOT why I'm here. Which, reading this, kind of surprises me in fact... hmm, maybe I should check out what IS up. Okay, but I'm digressing.
So the reason I am here, now, is simply that a certain director of several films well-known to the queer underground posted a free housesit ad on the Queeruption list serve earlier this spring, and a couple of my friends managed to get spots taking care of the house in which I sit at this very moment (I'm typing on a friend's laptop, & will be transmitting stuff from the email cafe in town). My friends Ane, Luke & Antoine have been here for nearly a month already, and this week they got 4 new arrivals in the forms of myself & Eli, who arrived here 3 days ago now, Holly, Luke's good friend from Seattle, and Collette, an amazing and rad kid Ane & I hung out with in Portland.
From where I am sitting, I can see the blue-green ocean on 3 sides & lush green grass and trees everywhere else, interrupted only by the small, uncomplicated concrete shacks that most of the folks here live in. Our shack has one room downstairs that serves as both kitchen & living room, and one room directly above it where everyone sleeps. There is a fabulous balcony with 2 hammocks on the upper level, and a little balcony-sized porch on the lower level with a couple of wicker chairs to hang out in. It's pretty basic but still a lot fancier than some of our neighbors, for whom this is their full-time home and not just a nice little getaway from their multi-million dollar apartment in New York. Not that I'm complaining, but the privelege of being here under these circumstances is definitely not lost on me. That said, lots of the locals are surprisingly friendly and accomodating, going out of their way to give us lifts to or from town or help us find somewhere to eat or buy ice. There are a lot of folks here who spent some time in the mainland US and therefore speak really good English, which definitely makes things easier for me but isn't exactly challenging me to brush up my Spanish skills.
The weather has been gorgeous the last few days- a little TOO hot, if anything, but not as muggy at the moment as when we first arrived. I sort of panicked, actually, when I first set foot out the doors of the air-conditioned airport and the wall of steam that is San Juan's climate hit me like a blast in the face. I thought, ‘OMG, what have I done?! I can't handle this!!!’ Eli, on the other hand, was in heaven & came bounding over to where I was waiting (our flights came in an hour and a half apart), declaring, ‘THIS is why I'm here! I can't believe I was doubting it- I love this weather!!!’ But what can you expect from an Australian who's been stuck in chilly, grey San Francisco for the last year straight? Anyway, we were greeted by a mobile samba band, complete with costumed dancers & dancing creatures of some sort, courtesy of the Puerto Rican Tourism Board. Because we had no idea what we were going to do upon leaving the airport, we retreated back inside to the air conditioning & had a cup of tea while consulting our guidebook, ultimately deciding to spend a night in San Juan before figuring out whether to go straight to Vieques from there. We phoned the cheapest place in the book (it said $35 for a double room) and they did, in fact, have a vacancy, so we booked it, but not at that price. In reality it was $42, but we figured that was still probably the cheapest we were gonna find without some major hassle, so we got in a cab and promptly gave him the wrong directions entirely. After about 20 minutes of fruitless searching for our street, I took charge of the guidebook & maps and discovered that we were in the wrong part of town entirely, and eventually we made it there and got settled in. Luckily our cab driver was super nice, so we gave him a big tip since he wasn't getting paid by the meter but by ‘zone‘, meaning it was a flat fee so he really didn't have to be as accomodating as he was.
Upon checking in to our ‘hotel‘, we were greeted (more like flagged down, I guess, if we're being technical) by an ancient man in a dress shirt and polyester pants. Now here is one time when our Spanish came in handy, cause this man seemingly spoke not a word of English, so it was gratifying to be able to carry out an entire transaction without incident all en Españ ol.
Once we had settled into our room, Eli & I headed out to check out San Juan Viejo, or Old San Juan. It's a tiny area, and it didn't take us too long to figure out where things were. Frustratingly, though, it seemed nearly everything we were actually trying to locate was under construction or no longer existed, despite the fact that our guidebook is only a year old and some of the info we found online. Eventually we managed to jump aboard the free trolley that goes all over town, which was really cute and a nice way to see things. We passed by a charming little town square, and the trolley took several tight, winding turns through the cobblestone streets before bringing us out onto the road that runs alongside the water, which was absolutely beautiful. The turquoise water of the Caribbean stretched out as far as we could see, and it was all made even more scenic by the ruins of the ancient fort that extended up the hill above us, overlooking the sea, and the old above ground cemetery that stands, all in concrete, right against the waters' edge.
After a few moments of scenic views, the driver guided us back to the square and announced that this was the end of the line, so we got out and explored a little more, stopping at the grocery store before retreating back to the room for a much-needed nap. Later that evening we happened upon a Rasta/ ITOL restaurant, which meant vegan nachos & peanut tofu for dinner- something I was pretty grateful for, even if it was just mediocre. After dinner we were ready to hit the town, armed only with a dubious map and the names and addresses of a couple of gay bars in a different part of town. The first place we tried was closed, sadly, as it looked really cute and homey, and a few others we couldn't locate at all, but eventually we came upon a really big club that was pounding techno music & did the most thorough bag check I have ever seen. Upon learning that the cover was $6, though, we decided to check out the free bar up the street first and come back only if the other place sucked. Luckily for us, it didn't. Things were pretty dead when we first showed up, but after a game of pool and a couple conversations the place was fairly crowded, and sometime around midnight the music changed from hip hop to salsa, and a few people were hustling their way around the dancefloor with varying degrees of expertise. After watching this for a while Eli got one of the fags to show me how, and so I got one lesson from a lovely boy named Juan, and then another from his friend, who offered seemingly out of a sense of needing to save the art form from the butchery that Juan was allowing me to make of it. His lesson was much stricter, but I feel like I was actually kind of getting it by the end, so that was a really fun time. Finally we realized it was 2am and we had to get going, since we had arranged to meet our friends on the other side of the island sometime around noon the next day.
Needless to say, we didn't get there at noon, but we did get there eventually, and after a bunch of annoying details I won't bore you with we finally made it over here, by ferry, to Vieques. Ane & Antoine had had to go back to the main island to visit the hospital, since the day before we arrived Ane had broken her arm. It's a pretty nasty break, as the x-ray shows, and will probably require surgery so they were feeling pretty stressed out about it, especially since Ane actually doesn't have insurance. But in the meantime they've got it in a splint, and we're trying to keep her medicated for the pain to the extent we can.
The saddest part is that she can't change her ticket and she can't go in the water, take a shower, or anything else that would basically make one want to be in the tropics, so I have to say she's pretty miserable, though a much better trooper than I would probably be in her shoes. We're trying our best to help her out, though, and I'm determined to find a way for her to do some kind of snorkelling or at least go out on the Biolumenescent Bay with us in the next couple of days.
As far as swimming goes for us, yesterday was actually the first day we actually made it to the beach. I had written this glorious description of the perfect white sand, the warm turquoise water, and the fabulous woman named Sonia who has taken us under her wing like little easter chickies, but it all got erased when the battery on this died and I don't have it in me to retype it all again. Suffice to say, it's beautiful- it really does look just like all the pictures in the ads for the Carribbean, and Colette & I could not stop freaking out about the fact that it was even real. Many hi-fives and much picturesque frolicking in the water was had by all, making us look to anyone else like we were probably being paid to have such a good time by some weird PR company trying to sell vacation packages to Vieques. It was great. Then we learned that there is even a « Gay Parade » this afternoon, so of course we are going to go and see what THAT is all about. Overall I have been really pleasantly surprised by how little hassle I've recieved and our little group has gotten, especially since one of us is a totally freaky looking drag queen and the rest are just freaky looking, at least by Puerto Rico standards. Most folks have been really nice and some even go out of their way to tell us they like our style!
Anyway, there is much more I could write and already this is somewhat out of date, but this blog has gone on way too long so I’m gonna sign off until the next time- I think I’m gonna have my computer shipped to me so I can write more often! Love and hugs to all! Xoxo, Pike.