Puerto Rico: Hopelessness, Esperanza and Everything in Between
From the notebook of Marketplace correspondent Andy Uhler, who just got back from reporting in Puerto Rico.
The Supreme Court heard arguments this week about Puerto Rico’s right to bankruptcy protection. Right now, it doesn’t have that right and SCOTUS is trying to find out why. Nothing about this case seems all that clear.
But my trip to Puerto Rico wasn’t about politics and legal battles. It was about trying to get a feel for what Puerto Ricans — the people actually living on the island — are thinking, feeling and going through.
If you read the first installment of this notebook (I’m talking to all four of you), you’ll remember that I said this was my mission:
I want to understand what it looks like, what is sounds like — even what it smells like. I want to talk with small business owners and local politicians about what they think needs to be done. I want to talk with real Puerto Ricans about what’s actually happening in Puerto Rico.
Lucky for me, Puerto Ricans like to talk. And I was also lucky enough to have a talented photographer, Filipa Rodrigues, travel to the island with me to take pictures and capture video.
I spoke with rich people, poor people and city dwellers in San Juan and Ponce. I also spoke with people in small towns like Vega Alta (where playwright Lin-Manuel Miranda’s family is from). And in every stop, Puerto Ricans were ready to tell me about what they were going through.
Freddy Torres
I stopped into Freddy Torres’ restaurant in Vega Alta to ask how business was going.
I wanted to get a sense of what it was like running a small business in a town that had seen better days. So, I asked Freddy to explain a typical day in his life.
“Mi dia? Comienza a las tres y media de la mañana. Trabajo como 45 minutos de Vega Alta. Y doce horas para Burger King. Y luego vengo para aca para mi negocio.” My day? It starts at about three thirty in the morning. I work about 45 minutes from Vega Alta and then 12 hours at Burger King. And then later, I get here to check on my business.
Freddy says he gets home about 10 p.m. most nights and then the day starts up again at 3:30 a.m. the next morning. I asked him if he hoped things would get better.
“Todo el mundo tiene esperanza. Que no tiene esperanza agota su vida, y se rinde. Todo el mundo tiene esperanza de vida. Todo el mundo tiene sueña.” “Everyone has hope. If you don’t have hope, it brings down your life and you’ve given up. Everyone has hope for their life. And everyone has dreams.”
Pedro Andre Lazo Rivera
I went to the University of Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras, when I heard they were striking because they don’t agree with how the government is using money that is supposed to be dedicated to the university.
Pedro Andre Lazo Rivera is still in high school. He’s president of the student council for the high school attached to the University. He’s 18, but after you listen to him speak, you’d call me a liar.
“A lot of people feel hopeless about the future. They’ve been put into a position where people who have been working their whole lives suddenly cannot retire, people who have been studying their whole lives and looking for work can’t graduate, people who are currently working find themselves paying most of their salaries in state taxes that they know will not be returned to them in services but will be spent in the payment of a debt. So, basically, what a lot of people are seeing right now is that they’re putting a lot of effort in and getting nothing out in exchange for it. A lot of people have just been seeing their dreams, their hopes, their hard work pretty much go to nothing.”
Rolando Zamora and Mary Candal
I drove an hour and a half to have lunch with a family in the south of the island, in Ponce. Rolando Zamora and Mary Candal. They gave me a tour around their neighborhood to show me how much the city had “progressed.” Now, they have shopping centers with a Wal-Mart and Home Depot next to each other. It was cheaper and easier to get the stuff they needed. Then they took me to downtown and pointed out how many buildings were vacant. They took me to the port of Ponce; it’s virtually unused and has been for years because of a political disagreement, if you believe what the locals tell you (and I have no reason not to).
To a person, though, one thing is clear: whatever is happening right now isn’t working. Everyone you talk to in Puerto Rico — politicians, merchants, people who live in slums — agree that something has to change. But the people don’t expect much to happen anytime soon. They all say something has to happen, but there’s little faith, little esperanza, that those in charge will be able to make things better.
For the time being, the government will just have to keep figuring out a way to postpone debt payment deadlines — the next one, almost half a billion dollars, is due May 1. And Puerto Ricans will just keep plugging away and hope something different is on the horizon.
