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Those who know me, know I can be a bit absent minded at times (to say the least). And it really doesn’t run in the family, but my mom definitely did something that U would be more likely to do.

She thought that the ‘6′ in 6 o’clock departure time one her ticket was actually an 8 ! She showed up at the airport 2 hours early to find that the plane just left! She’s waiting on standby right now, she HAS to make this flight!!! At least she has aging eyes to blame for her mistake. As for me, I usually don’t have an excuse at all!

Yesterday, I tagged along with José while he had some errands to run. We ended up going near the police station, station and afterwards Parque Central de San Juan (yeah, it means Central Park of San Juan).

José had an appointment and I ended up walking around this huge bridge structure which I think they El Parque Lineal de Puerto Rico. At first, I just thought it was a bridge that us next to a forest that people could run on, so I just started walking with the goal of getting to the other side.

Farther down I saw a mother and son looking into the woods at something. I then looked as well and saw this black bird the size of a peigon that had this bright red head. It was making it’s nest in what used to be a styrafoam(sp?) water cooler! I figured it was with a picture on my 8 gig memory card so I leaned over the bridge to frame the shot. Something caught my eye and I jumped back in a startled state. There sat this HUGE lizard in a tree branch litterally 2 feet from my head! I couldn’t belive it!! I started to pay more attention and saw that they were EVERY WHERE!! I was more excited than that little kid and took a bunch of pics of the lizards. It was just weird to see them in a natural setting like that. In addition to the lizards I saw various types of birds and this weird crab like thing that kinda grossed me out!

When I got back, José was still working out and I decided to walk around the other sections of the park. In one particular section there was a group of maybe 10 kids under a tree. One of them looked like he just got off the set of Lord of the Rings. He had the long hair and everything. Then I saw him pick up a shield and I almost lost it. As it turns out, it was a group of LARPers. LARPing stands for Live Action Role Playing and it’s where you dress up in medival attaire and battle with swords and spells. These kids had archers as well! I took a picture not to make fun, but just out of disbelief! To be honest, back in the day I used to play swords with my bros and it kinda looked fun. Bit it’s much easier to point and laugh!!

The next stop we made was to pick up Piquo from his grooming appointment. Piquo is the dog of one of José’s friends. We actually ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the day. His two friends were named Enique and Glori, and they were cool people. They introduced me to their culture, music and ideas on . We also talked about the similarities between Spanish and Portuguese and some how I ended up teaching them two brazilian slang words: piriguete and pirireca. If you don’t know what those mean, it’s probably better that way, hah!

We hung out at the pool fir a while and then went back to Glori’s condo and listened to all this music. It was not only music from Puerto Rico, but music from Argentina, and Spain as well. I wish I remembered the artists names! In the end we threw in Meatloaf in concert but he ended up talking more than signing so he got the boot and Shakira took his spot.

Later one we had some more Puerto Rican food … It was a pork dish, with rice, fried plantanes (I forget the Spanish name) and more mofungo. I could have had another plate just with the rice! It was sooo good!

By the time we got back, it was close to 11 and I was SOOO tired. I think the sun down here messes with me. But at the same time whenever I am in this climate both my skin and my hair seem more healthy. I don’t need to use lotion here and my hair becomes more soft. Maybe it’s all that extra vitamin D that the sun has been giving out I’m generous amounts! Anyway, I know there is MUCH more to Puerto Rico than San Juan, but I feel like I got a good look at the *real* San Juan.

*** More pictures to come! I’ve been typing all theses up from my phone and can’t upload all the pic I took on my Cannon camera.

Hope it didn't say do not enter!

Yesterday I was at “El Morrro”, which translates to to “the hill” in Spanish. It was one of the fortresses the Spainards bult to protect the island from incoming attackers. Obviously, something went wrong because now Puerto Rico is part of the United States.

Having just visited Spain, I could see the the similarities in architecture and construction. It was different to the ones I we saw. In Spain in that “El Morro” is part if a large wall that perimeters the whole northwest tip of old San Juan. It’s pretty impressive and I would recomend visiting El Morro if you ever are in the area.

Anyway, my original plan was to walk along the oustise perimeter of the fort. From the map, it looks like you can do the later but in reality it just stops at some point. There was this sign that I’m assuming said don’t enter but I could read anything! Maybe the battered and illegible condition of the sign *could* have been an inidication of what it used to say but I went ahead and disreguarded it.

It was there where I was reminded of one of the firat Brazilian Films I’ve seen. The film is called “Terra Estrangeira” and I believe it was directed by Walter Salles. There is a scene with this old ship that the two characters were reflecting upon. During the scene a song was playing in the background. In fact, it turned out being somewhat of a theme of the movie. The name of the song is called “Vapor Barato”. There are two versions of the song that I could find, one was by Gal Costa and Zeca Baleiro, and O Rappa did a reaggaish version.

Anyway, while I was in the “restricted” a ship much like the one in the movie sailed by. I know this will sound weird, but it was kinda a surreal moment.

Well, it has been a successul fisrt day here, but of course it wasn’t without it’s hiccups! When I arrived here this morning, I was unsure of where I was going to stay! I blame much of this on my procrastination though.

As I was saying before, I decided to use the Couch Surfing website for this trip. I of course decided to go that route a little more than 2 weeks before the trip, and even after that I didn’t start making “surf” requests until a week and a half before I had to leave. I found one guy who said he could do it, but I never heard back from him.

Litterally, 2 days before the trip, my soon to become new friend Jose said he should be able to host me. I wasn’t 100% sure if he could do it, but after he got out of work he gave me a call. He went out of his way to drive me to the airport where I had my bag stowed in storage and he showed me around Isla Verde and his neighborhood (which I forget the name … Coronado?).

Afterwards, we went to an Argentine place which had a “Criullo” menu as well … which is authentic Puerto Rican food. I had the arroz com pollo criullo style and a side dish which is called mafonga. Mafonga is mashed plantains which can be stuffed with chicken of beef. It was all really good!!

Some of the highlights of the day were sleeping in the airport, taking 2 hours to go 20 miles via public transit, seeing “El Morro” and walking along sidr the massive waves, getting attacked by peigons, dodging peigon crap only to have another of his buddeis to crap on my leg, finding a place to stay for the night, bumping to Reaggeton in Jose’s car, eating authentic puerto rican food. All in all, a food day, but peigons beware for I will have my revenge!!

I wanted to get to old San Juan and I could go by either taxi which would be a 20 minute $20 car ride or I could take my chances with the busses.

Of course I decided to take my chances. So I’m here! Bad news is it took about 2 hours to do finally arrive. The good news is that I got to see parts of San Juan that I wasn’t intending on seeing, and I only spent $1! So if you ever want to see how it is possible to make a 20 minute ordeal span out to 2 hours, travel with me! It’s sort of a skill that I have!

I’m waiting for the bus to go to old San Juan. It’s 20 minutes away from the airport and I’ve been waiting for at least that long. I *could* take a cab, but $20 one way does seem a bit rediculous to me.

It’s almost 80 degrees out here and in the background there are those Christmas oldies are playing in the background. Growing up in New England I’m used to only hearing these songs when it’s freezing outside. It’s hard to even process such songs when I’m staring at this view:

I will have to admit, I do feel a little ignorant about Puerto Rico. I mean I know it somehow became part of the USA throughout the progression of history, but that’s about it!! Usually, I like to research at least a little bit of the country before I arrive and this time I didn’t even do that!!

While I was waiting to get my bags this morning, a woman — who was practically shouting — asked her husband if he had any American money because she wanted to buy a drink from the coke machine. After I heard that, I felt a little less ignorant. Now if I can figiure out what this gibberish language people speak here I’ll be all set!!

A few of my friends have this inside joke about the guys with the dreds that have them wrapped up in those oversized wave caps/apple hats. In Portuguese, they nicknamed them “moronduns” (eu sei que eu acabei de dar uma rata!!). One time while taking the china town bus to NYC, There was a “morondun” on board with us. Before boarding, this particular guy lit up a joint while everyone was in line (yeah, the Chinatown bus can get a little crazy at times). Anyway, my friends spent half the trip making fun of him by taking pictures of this makeshift moronduns they created with a scarf.

I came across one while eating breakfast –which I tried odering in portanhlol (when you try to speak Spanish but mix Portuguese with it) — a picture just to prove that eles existem em Puerto Rico também (they exist in PR too!)

I made it to Puerto Rico! My trip — voyage rather — started at 2 pm EST. I left worked, and insted of driving to the airport and paying for almost 2 weeks of parking, I drove to my friend’s aprtment complex to drop my car off there. From there I walked about a mile to the closest metro stop and made to National airport with time to spare. Everything went relatively smoothly besides the whole baggage checking process but that deserves a post to it’s self!

My plane arrived a bit late, which could have been a problem because I had a connecting flight in Miami but all went well. As it turns out, the Miami leg of the flight was running a little late as well.

I’m here now and am already re-evaluating some of my decisions! Seriously, I’m not sure why I thought getting here @ 1 AM was a good idea without having plans on what to do immediately afterwards!! As far as lodging goes, I think I’m good for tonight … Still awaiting confirmation on that though! But everything will work out in the end … I’m sure of it … I think

So yeah, it’s almost midnight and I’m pretty much not done packing and still have a lot of errands to run.  It’s gonna be a long night!

I’m not too worried about the clothes, but I feel like I’m going to forget something important like the charger for my camera battery or something … it’s times like these where I hate it that I procrastinate!