Politics of the Caribbean

Election excitement is in the air!!! Yes, the buzz of the upcoming election is definitely electric down here in Puerto Rico. I haven't exactly been caught up in the fever yet though, and must declare that at this point I am still undecided. But I can tell you who I am definitely not voting for: Berty! Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the incumbent mayor of Aguada right now and his stupid campaign van has annoyed me quite a bit so far. Following the general guideline of music or noise coming from cars in Puerto Rico, this van is also annoying. I guess I should be happy that it's not blasting Reggaeton like 98% of the other cars driving around.

NOTE: if you are not familiar with Reggaeton, it is sort of like a Spanish HipHop, that has the distinctive characteristic of always using the EXACT same beat in every song. Feel free to download or listen to about 10 seconds of any song by Daddy Yankee or Don Omar, or remember that song Gasolina or "Are you Ready??".. well yeah, when you've heard 10 seconds of that, just imagine that exact same song being played for hours on end.

But back to Berty, he and a bunch of other candidates running for Alcalde (mayor) or Senador (if you need a translation for that you're too dumb to be reading my blog so please just log onto PerezHilton.com right now) have these cars, trucks, and vans that drive around, sometimes with big pictures of the electoral hopefuls and usually some Salsa type of music playing with songs that are customized to the candidate. Saying crap like "4 more years", "___ brings progress!" or sometimes just "___ is gonna win, ___ is gonna win".. Now, I haven't seen cars driving around with huge speakers on top of them since the Blues Brothers movie when they are announcing their big final concert at the Palace Ballroom, but these speakers are really loud and clear and you can hear them from a ways away. Just check out the incredible volume my tiny little camera picked up from the van in the video above!

In other non-political news I am very happy to report that I have been able to get back into the water. On Tuesday, I purchased a bodyboard at SurfTown in Rincon, a Custom-X 40" board along with some fins and some sockfins with tethers that help ensure that your fins still stay attached to your leg if one of them gets pulled off by a big wave. I tried out the gear later that afternoon and was pleasantly surprised at how much fun it was to be back in the water and catching waves. I didn't have to do any overhead paddling - the main source of my shoulder aggravation. And the waves weren't too big so I didn't have to duckdive (submerge under oncoming waves). On Wednesday, the waves did get a bit bigger so it was little more challenging and my legs were a bit sore after that session. And again today I went out for a leisurely session. While I am new at bodyboarding, one of the things I do like about it is the fact that I am lot more fearless in catching waves. I guess psychologically you don't fear the spill as much when you're already lying down as opposed to standing up where you feel more vulnerable. I do still need to work a lot on my technique though, specifically digging my rail into the wave to traverse down the line on it. With a surfboard, it seemed easier since I was accustomed to it, and since the fins underneath the board help you move down the wave more... bodyboard has no fins underneath it so you really have to lean with your body to stick the side of the board into the open face of the wave... enough waveriding mechanics, yawn.. let's look at some pictures!


Wednesday Feb 13th was a solid day at Domes beach in Rincon, waves were a good 2-3 feet overhead.


And when a macking wave like this one pushes through, a mad scramble ensues as half the people try and jockey to try and catch it while the other half just try to get the hell out of the way!!!


Somebody call Hans Blix and tell him to head down to Puerto Rico ASAP as this is some hard evidence on new weapons of mass destruction being kept here.. namely my new bodyboard and fins!!!!


And oh yeah had to put in another picture of the sunset.. at least this time with some surfing!