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It’s been a few years, but from what I’ve seen from the photos post hurricane, nothing much has changed. We visited the Baia Fosforenza, hiked up El Yunque and drove around the entire island. Outside of San Juan, we saw nothing but poverty with pretty bad living conditions. Even a lot of San Juan looked run down. Basically, it didn’t look much like what we’re used to in America. What I was looking for was a reason why Puerto Rico continues to struggle. The people seem to just accept things the way they are. We crossed Puerto Rico off our list of places to have annual meetings, and went back to Hawaii the next year. There is simply a world of difference between the two places despite the similarity of their climates.

I am sorry and embarrassed that you had a lousy experience during your conference here, vette6387, but I happen to work in that business, and every year our company alone handles hundreds of meetings and conventions, with many being repeat business.

I could go on and on about the virtues of living in the Caribbean and in Puerto Rico in particular, but I’ll just repeat my statement: I’ve lived in the states, have traveled around the world, and I wouldn’t live anywhere else. Well, except maybe for Alabama which I consider my second home. I guess like Hawaii, Puerto Rico is one of those places that you either hate or love. You hate it. I love it.

On our government, I’ve already admitted that we have a rotten one, and that is our fault. Our government, from any political party, really is the spoiler. But to change it, you would need to either work your way through the political parties structures (which would mean becoming one of them), a revolution, or the federal government would have to intervene with our finances. It turns out that the latter is actually happening and we’ll see if it works.

I guess there’s no perfect happiness. It’s always the Yin and the Yang with us. But as I say, that’s life in the tropics.