At the election Party
Election Party
Rally for the red party
Me & Mandi
Calderon Vs. Juanma
Mandi, Mariela, Me
POW!
So for Halloween Mandi and I decided to be Puerto Rican boxers. Boxing is really big down here so we thought it would be fun. I dressed up as Ivan Calderon and she was some guy names Juanma. The reason the back of my robe says, "Iron Boy" is because that is the nickname of Calderon. It was great because everyone here knows who these people are so they thought it was great that these two American girls dressed up like them. We started the night out at our house. We wanted to pass out candy to the trick-or-treaters, but we did not have anyone really. We only had the boy next door, a student from school, and two other little girls. After that we went over to Casa Benny, where the boys live. We played some fun drinking games. We keep saying that we want to have an American drinking games night here so we can teach our PR friends how we do it. Haha. We did make our friends Frances and Mariela shot gun a beer. They thought we were crazy of course. After that we went out to our favorite spot here in Guayama, Soul's. I was happy to see that a lot of people were dressed up in costumes. I was not sure what to expect. There was also a reggae band playing that was awesome. It was a fun night and I was recovering all the next day!
Now to election day. Well first let's rewind about three months to when I got here. When I got to PR and stayed a couple of nights in my house, I noticed how these trucks with huge ten foot speakers in the back would drive through my neighborhood and anywhere else you went. I thought it was the funniest thing ever. I asked someone what those things were and what was their purpose. I was told that those trucks are used as advertisements and also as a campaign tool for the election. Well let me just say that you have never seen any group of people get into politics more that Puerto Ricans. For the past three months this is all you hear about. What the people do is called caravan. It is basically the came thing as a parade. These parades are miles of cars and trucks following each other around town with flags of the person they want to vote for. It is crazy. There are people hanging out of the windows of cars, people piled into the back of trucks, loud music, and a lot of drinking beer. Yes, drinking beer while driving. It is a pretty popular thing here as well. It does not seem like anyone is too worried about getting a DUI since I see people all the time going up to the bar to grab a drink to go. A little bit scary too. The most annoying thing about these parades is that you get stuck behind them if you are not so lucky. Okay, so now to the night before elections. Because the election is so big down here, we do not have school on election day. For one I am sure no one would show up since voting is an all day thing and one big party. If you ask a PR person what they are doing on Election Day, they say, "voting." And we say, "All day?" And they reply, "Yes." It takes all day because after they vote the caravan all day and then have parties. So since we did not have school Tuesday, on Monday night we decided to go caravaning. It was Mandi, the Mudd's, and Me. The two popular parties here have the colors of red and blue. We did not know which party we would find so we all brought a red shirt and a blue shirt. We started driving and found a caravan in the plaza of Guayama, which ended in the plaza and led to a huge rally. People had tiki torches, flags, signs, and of course there were those trucks with those speakers. The party we found was the red party, so of course we put our red shirts on and fit right in. It was hillarious. The man who was running for mayor of our town was there speaking. Then they had other people get up and speak about him. People we cheering, singing, and having a good ol' time. It was fun for us to see something like this because we would never see this in the U.S. I think the PR people appreciated us Americans taking part as well. We got a lot of compliments and smiles. We stick out like a sore thumb; especially, Mandi and the Mudd's with their blonde hair and blue eyes. On election day we cannot vote here so we celebrated by going to the beach! It was a beautiful day too. Barbara bought herself and I a banana colada, and named it a "Barack colada." Later that night we were invited to an election party. These people really know how to party here. I think they have a party for everything, which is fine with me. There was a lot of drinking and food. Good times. I was thinking, "Don't these people have to work in the morning??" They do but it is an exciting day for them, as it was for us Americans too. I could tell that everyone was up late celebrating because all of my students were extremely tired on Wednesday. It was a great experience to witness. It was even more exciting to wake up and see that Barack Obama Had won President of the United States!!!! I was so excited! I showed all of my classes his speech. It was so awesome! And I must say that I really do love the PR way of getting into the elections. I believe they have over a 90% voter turnout here! Wow! Even if I have to wake up to the sound of "Buenos Dias Puerto Rico" at 5 a.m, I still appreciate their dedication.
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