Am I Puerto Rican now?
Our family landed in San Juan, Puerto Rico, one rainy evening in April. We were exhausted and bedraggled — having taken the train to Milan the day before, then flying 16 hours via Madrid. We handed our passports to the border guard. He glanced through the pages and casually said, ‘Welcome home.’
We are not Puerto Rican anymore than we are Italian. For us, Puerto Rico is a holiday destination with sunny beaches, tropical fruits, and a language we don’t speak well. Yet because of explorers, colonies, and changing borders, when we landed in San Juan, we were on American soil dating back hundreds of years.
Christopher Columbus landed in Puerto Rico in 1493 and named the island after John the Baptist, San Juan Bautista. The indigenous Taíno called it Borikén, ‘the land of the brave lord.’ It would become a Spanish colony and a military outpost, critical to the Spanish defense of their Caribbean holdings. After exhausting the gold reserves on the island, the Spanish established plantations and mines — importing enslaved Africans to supplement the few surviving Taíno.
In 1898, Spain ceded their Caribbean outpost of 400 years to the United States (along with the Philippines, Cuba, and Guam) and the end of the Spanish-American War. Puerto Ricans became U.S. citizens in 1917, and the island became a Commonwealth in 1952. As a Commonwealth, Puerto Ricans are considered American citizens but with a few asterisks. They can elect officials and field an Olympic team but are not part of the electoral college or required to follow all federal U.S. legislation. Since 1952, Puerto Ricans have voted several times to remain a commonwealth.
From 1950 to 1970, 25% of the island’s population left in the La Gran Migración. Today there are 3.5 million Puerto Ricans on the island, while over 5 million live in the continental United States. Puerto Rico is a borderland. It carries a testament to Spanish colonization and American capitalism. The billboards switch between English and Spanish as quickly as the waitress at the restaurant Latin Burgers — where you can order a bacon cheeseburger with a side of tostinos (fried plantains).
To navigate a borderland, we can obtain specific traits and abilities. Language fluency is critical. It pays to speak both languages to do business well in Puerto Rico. Understanding the culture and a connection with diverse people is also essential. While it may be easier to exist in our communities, interacting only with those who look and think like us — organized interactions with those who are different can inspire more profound understanding. This understanding provides a road map for better business, more effective aid, and building a better future for the island.
We didn’t stay long enough in Puerto Rico to learn much other than the sun is stronger than in Europe, and the iguanas are hard to catch. After bad sunburns and plenty of piña coladas, we flew back to Zurich, landing on a grey, rainy morning. We left the plane, all of us scrambling to put on our ‘emergency’ sweaters as we walked through the airport. My teenage daughter exhaled a heavy sigh of relief and said, ‘it feels so good to be back where I understand the language.’
I wish I could have glimpsed this moment of love for the German language by my daughter five years ago. It would have brightened my hope for future fluency. Yet now, it reminds me that new growth and new learning are possible. It is possible to be comfortable in a space that was once challenging. We live in the border area between cultures and nationalities. We learn to adapt and to grow. And we return home again — where ever we choose that to be.
