I’m not exag­ger­at­ing when I say the Sea­son starts the day after Thanks­giv­ing (Black Fri­day) and does not end until the day after Three Kings Day on Jan­u­ary 6th.  I have a small post I did about Black Fri­day too.. it’s as crazy here as it is on the main­land.  Here’s a link to it.

The rea­son for the long cel­e­bra­tion stems from the fact that as a pre­dom­i­nantly Span­ish speak­ing Catholic state, the main event was/is Three Kings Day.  It has been cel­e­brated in Puerto Rico since the begin­ning of Span­ish rule.  Chil­dren would leave food for camels (dried grass) in a box, under their beds at night and then wake to find lit­tle gifts the next morn­ing. Christ­mas Day was a day ded­i­cated to the fam­ily, much like Thanks­giv­ing is in the US.  Move for­ward to the late 20th Cen­tury and you see the locals adding in Santa, gift giv­ing and all the other trap­pings of US Chris­t­ian cus­toms as well.

Believe it or not, I saw a cut com­mer­cial tree, head­ing home on the top of a car, the day before Thanks­giv­ing this year.

Oh– Thanks­giv­ing is slowly being adopted by Puerto Ricans too.

We paid a ridicu­lous pre­mium for a can of Borden’s Eggnog ($4) and cran­berry jelly is still hard to find.  Corn­bread stuff­ing mix?  For­get about it!  We paid over a buck a pound for our frozen turkey (at Wal­mart) this year and it was noth­ing special.

Part of what fuels this sea­son is the Christ­mas Bonus man­dated by Puerto Rican labor law.  I won’t get into specifics, but for those that work, it cov­ers all your costs at Christ­mas and then some.  The ‘manda­tory’ bonus is unique to Puerto Rico, I had never heard of such a thing until I came here.  It is pos­si­ble for an employer to ‘op-out’, but not many busi­nesses do that. PR’s Labor Law blows my mind, but I’ll save that for another day.

Off to the Plaza in Coamo

We made our way to the plaza about 30 min­utes after the sun set… 6:30PM I think.  The plaza fea­tured sev­eral arrange­ments of lights.. one was of 3 guys stand­ing around a pig on a spit while play­ing music.  Another fea­tured the infa­mous 3 Kings.  We were there ahead of Christ­mas Mass so I was able to duck in and take a few shots of the church.  It was the first time I was at the plaza when the church was open.

The church is absolutely stunning

It looks like some­thing right out of an 18th Cen­tury his­tory book.  Well, minus a few over head fans.  A per­fect exam­ple of Span­ish Mis­sion style archi­tec­ture.. very well preserved.

On our way out I caught a bride stag­ing pho­tos in front of the Alcal­dia (city hall).  Once I got her per­mis­sion, I snapped this shot before they headed off in a big white limo.

I wish her well.

After the plaza, we headed over to Buenos Aires Street where me First Mate used to live.  It’s only a block off the plaza, but it is made up of mostly res­i­den­tial homes.  It had been blocked off for a big Christ­mas Block Party for the locals.  There was a live band, food ven­dors and ‘other’ enter­tain­ment as well.  Smack in the mid­dle is the local neigh­bor­hood bar.  We were there early… the party really doesn’t get started until after 9PM.

Local par­ties like this are being staged in towns all over PR.

Some­thing else Puerto Ricans are crazy about– Christ­mas lights. Tons of ‘em!  I plan to spend more time next year, shoot­ing just the lights.  San Juan is sup­pose to be most impres­sive this time of year.

The Fire­works of Christmas

By Puerto Rican law, licensed ven­dors are allowed to sell fire­works 2 times a year–  Around the 4th of July and dur­ing the Christ­mas hol­i­days.  I have never seen them for sale, on or near the 4th of July, but they are very pop­u­lar at Christ­mas.  Unfor­tu­nately for me, PR is a ‘Safe and Sane’ state, mean­ing they only sell sparklers and fountains.

The kiddy stuff.

No fire­crack­ers,
No Roman Can­dles, No Sky Rock­ets, No Multi-Shot Cakes, No Aer­ial Shells or Helicopters.

When I dis­cov­ered this lit­tle fact, I almost can­celed my first trip to Puerto Rico.

I did not want to live in a place where the ‘pow­ers that be’ thought they needed to pro­tect me from myself.  Sure, we need rules about the safe use of fire­works, I’m a safety fanatic when it comes to things that can set you on fire or blow off a fin­ger.  I still got all mine.  Back in Alaska, I worked closely with both ven­dors of fire­works and those that shot com­mer­cial shows.

So what do you do when in Puerto Rico? Do like the Romans…

Since I oper­ate from a bud­get, I could not try ‘one of every­thing’ for sale. What’s more, I did rec­og­nize a few things I had tried before.  For­tu­nately, I hap­pen to like foun­tains and have used them in pho­tos in the past.

After some test­ing, this is what I like–  Most bang for the buck goes to the lit­tle ‘Super Coqui’ at $2.50 per.  It lasts a long time and goes through sev­eral effects. The 2nd best foun­tain I tried was the ‘El Yunque Fuente’ at $7 per.  It has a very out­ra­geous fin­ish.  I scored both of these from Walgreens.

The one thing I found dis­a­point­ing was the red box ‘Wolf Pack Thun­der Strings’ being passed off as fire­crack­ers.  They are loud, but they are cer­tainly NOT fire­crack­ers.  It is as close to fire­crack­ers as you are going to get, but they are lit­tle more than ‘crack­ling balls’ on a strip.  They will badly stain con­crete or tile and please, do not toss them near dry grass as they seem to be quite flam­ma­ble.  Part of this haz­ard is due to the fact that they can jump sev­eral feet into the air before going off.  It’s pretty at night, but only safe at a dis­tance.  Real fire­crack­ers would be much safer than these things.

One last point– M-80’s and Cherry Bombs have been banned for many years now and for good rea­son.  Stuff that goes ‘boom’, should be left to folks with experience.

I wish every­one a very Merry Christ­mas and a Happy New Year.

Stay safe and have fun, Roberto

PS– a much larger ver­sion of the church alter shot may be seen on my Face­book Page.. Click here.

 

 

Copy­right © 2009~2012 RobertosPuertoRico.com, All Comm. Rights Reserved, CC3, ShareAlike