Puerto Rico? (houses, college, camps)

[nenushka]

take care all and if one decides to come to PR becareful ! take precautions

[Boston14]

Originally Posted by leavingcali

Okay...in December I will turn 30 and hopefully, I will also be graduating with my MA. I did a big 30th birthday bash almost 3 years ago for my husband, and now it is my turn. I want tropical, beautiful, beachy wonderland. I want fun places to eat and drink, some partying, but not party central. I want some tourism, but not overly touristy like Los Cabos (Mexico) etc. My mom suggested Puerto Rico today. What do you think? Which areas in Puerto Rico would be best? I like to snorkel, eat, walk around, eat, drink, did I mention eat? I don't believe I have ever visited the Carribean Ocean, so I want to be somewhere in Puerto Rico that is on the Carribean side (I believe it is surrounded by the Atlantic and Carribean, right?).

What are your suggestions?

Many thanks!!

You should go to San Juan the capital that city is great!

[Ounce]

Old San Juan which is on an islet is very nice. The Greater San Juan metro area is nothing to write about.

[anakincsg1]

wow, people talk about discrimination in PR as if there is the only place were you can find it. Go to Nebraska, or Utah and speak with an accent to see how you will feel,or go to England , Germany or France, you will find more of the same..... it doesn't matter were in the globe, you will find that and it is very unfortunate. No place on earth is a perfect place. I feel sad when people try to generalized..... It doesn't matter were you live, there is good people that works very hard, takes care of their family and needs, and be productive members of society, however there are others that would do whatever it takes to have it easy. I know many people in PR and quiet honestly they don't fit with the description that I have seen here. I know not only PR natives but other heritages and background and they are delighted to be living in San Juan, Ponce, Dorado, Manati and Guaynabo. I have also visited these areas and lived.. do to my job in downtown San Juan (Hato Rey) for quiet some time and I felt as comfortable as I have been in any other city that I have lived such as Miami, Chicago, London and LA. In every big city you will find traffic, different driving patterns and such. Probably I am a bit considerate about San Juan because there was were I met and married my wife. My Spanish is a bit better now and every time I visit I don't even have to use it.... People are friendly and such...... anyways every personal experience is different I guess. I specially enjoy Old San Juan... it reminds me of Europe after all is the oldest city in the USA.

[davsot]

Originally Posted by anakincsg1

wow, people talk about discrimination in PR as if there is the only place were you can find it. Go to Nebraska, or Utah and speak with an accent to see how you will feel,or go to England , Germany or France, you will find more of the same..... it doesn't matter were in the globe, you will find that and it is very unfortunate. No place on earth is a perfect place. I feel sad when people try to generalized..... It doesn't matter were you live, there is good people that works very hard, takes care of their family and needs, and be productive members of society, however there are others that would do whatever it takes to have it easy. I know many people in PR and quiet honestly they don't fit with the description that I have seen here. I know not only PR natives but other heritages and background and they are delighted to be living in San Juan, Ponce, Dorado, Manati and Guaynabo. I have also visited these areas and lived.. do to my job in downtown San Juan (Hato Rey) for quiet some time and I felt as comfortable as I have been in any other city that I have lived such as Miami, Chicago, London and LA. In every big city you will find traffic, different driving patterns and such. Probably I am a bit considerate about San Juan because there was were I met and married my wife. My Spanish is a bit better now and every time I visit I don't even have to use it.... People are friendly and such...... anyways every personal experience is different I guess. I specially enjoy Old San Juan... it reminds me of Europe after all is the oldest city in the USA.

Have you been to Ponce? It's amazing! It reminds me of Europe.

[motormaker]

Ponce is pretty neat in the area around the fire station and plaza.

[blue11]

If anyone is going to Puerto Rico, you HAVE to visit Culebra. I lived in Puerto Rico for over 25 years and never went there until recently. TOTALLY REGRET NOT GOING BEFORE!
www.islaculebra.com/

[vcabrera29palms]

I am from Puerto Rico, I lived on the island up to the age of 21 which at that time I married my High Scool sweetheart and left the island for good. Like most that have posted their comments I agree that it is not what most see on the "Suenas que estas in Puerto Rico" Commercial. Because I was able to speak English I was bullied every day of my life from elementary school and through Junior high school. I was beat up and even ended in the ER. At school it was not uncommon to have the police drive through the yard and have a huge drug bust. It was common for the teens to have sex on stairways at the school, under bleachers at the baseball park and behind the buildings in town. It is not strange to the local people to have crack heads, so waisted that they stand in the middle of the streets just acting crazy. The amount of vulgar language you hear on a everyday basis on the street is undeniably unacceptable.
You are all right, when you say the police does not care I had a relative become an officer only to be bullied out of the department for doing his job and not looking away. It is a big joke, you see people riding in new cars with rims and stereo systems to get their groceries with food stamps and live in the low income housing with all the flat screens and jewelry like Mr. T. The religious people are just as bad as the fanatic political people, they try to outcast all that are not part of their church and rely solely on the word of whom is preaching, but live their lives in utter disregards to the fellow man if they don't attend their church. They preach to no avail and if you try to have a reasonable educated discussion such as birth control, you are black listed as a devil worshiping person. Their ignorance and non tolerance is ridiculous.
The government is so corrupted that no one sees that the choices don't even matter anymore. No one pays any taxes because they mostly live off of the system or work off the books.
I used to love the Puerto Rico where being productive, hard working and proud of your heritage was important, where culture was to be cherished and passed down through the generations. I don't love the current Puerto Rico and I believe that it will get worse before it gets better.
I even tried living in Puerto Rico for the time my husband was deployed to Iraq, I even placed my children in a private school, but because they were born in US they were bullied by the other kids. These kids brought newspapers with pictures of dead soldier to tease my kids by asking them if that was their dad on the cover page. When I came to te school to take care of this horrible act the answer was "Kids are being kids they don't mean it, they don't know what they are doing" REALLY I beg to differ.
Puerto Rico is not for anyone that wants to live in peace, or anyone that wants to be a productive citizen, it will never be what most people knew and to most tourist I would say stay away.
Sorry Puerto Ricans but you have failed your own kind and our ancestors. It is really sad.

[El Gitano]

[quote=nenushka;9720999]I know i will receive a klot of hate because of what i have posted BUT all puerto ricans know everything i have wriiten is the entire truth ,,, and theres more but i prefer NOT to continue as it gives me the chills to realize what kinda place i am living in ... but hopefully will be out in aug this yr ![/quote

95% of tourist that arrive in PR love it (except for the crazy driving). They rent cars and drive around this supposedly "dangerous" island with no problems. Very rarely will a tourist fall victim to a crime. Unfortunately we are the ones that talk bad about the island and honestly most of it is nonsense. Nenushka you would get along very well with a neo-nazi, you can make a speach for the KKK and get a standing ovation. 13yr olds working at strip clubs, kids bringing bombs to school this is a ridiculous and an outright lie, you should be concerned that your daughter socializes with girls that glamorize and lie about stripping.

Now lets talk about bombs and school violence.... US has the worst record for school violence let me write the 5 biggest cases amongst dozens of massacres and hundreds of school shooting that have ocurred in the US.

1. 1927 school board member Andrew Kehoe sets of 3 bombs in a Bath township school in Michigan killing 45 and injuring 58.

2. 1966 Charles Whitman after killing his wife and mother, went on a 96minute spree killing 15 and injuring 31 in the University of Texas

3. 1999 2 students walk into Colombine high school and go on a shooting spree killing 12 and injuring 24

4. 2005 16yr old Jeff Weise goes on a shooting spree at Red Lake Senior High School in Minnesota killing 10 and injuring 12

5. 2007 Seung-Hui-Cho (wow this guy wasn't even white) kills 32 and injured dozens and dozens at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia.

--- so what the hell are you people talking about I guarantee you that the next massive school massacre will not be in PR, but of course if during the course of the next couple of years a student gets shot in a PR school the newspaper will be on top of it for months and everyone will be talking about how dangerous OUR schools are.

--- there a strong anti-puertorican movement in PR and the media is using crime to scare people into statehood when in fact most US cities are out of control and have more crime than PRs cities. Although we have a disproportionately high murder rate in PR, cities like St. Louis, Detroit, Baltimore, New Orleans, Newark, Camden, Philly, Flint and more even have higher murder rates than say "San Juan" PRs deadliest city. Get your facts straight go to disastercenter.com they have state by state crime statistics that include PR and this island has the lowest "rape rates" of any states has less physical agression than most, low car theft rate, and about average robbery and burglaries.

--- but when someone falls victim to a crime, they automatically talk about how bad the island has gotten. Amazingly when on October 21 2011 7yr. old Jorelys Rivera was brutally raped killed and thrown in the garbage in her Atlanta building none of the anti-puertoricans said anything about how bad the US has gotten.





Her killer 20yr. old Ryan Brunn,

[clip314]

WOW! Had to join in to give my 2 cents.

Puerto Rico is not, or ever was a perfect place. Like all places you can find warts and paradise, hardly a comfortable medium. Yes there is an avalanche of folks leaving the island with the perception that life will be better elsewhere, and it might be. But most Caribbean people are migrants, for one reason or another, they migrate to the U.S. In the 50's , 500,000 Puerto Ricans left. And as of lately a few are even moving to Peru.

Yes there is third world poverty on the island. One only has to leave San Juan and one enters another world. There is a garbage dump in a town near San Juan where folks go through the garbage just like in Mexico City or Bogota.

Yes our work ethic has been compromised, by the billions in welfare money flooding the island. All classes depend on welfare, professionals, politicians and corporations. However we only see the poor.
Is it any wonder there is a statehood movement on the island? It's not about patriotism, it's the handouts dummies.

Yes there is a ghetto aspect to many poor areas, specially housing projects and schools nearby. But like anywhere in the U.S. One doesn't send children to schools near housing projects. Yes English is suspicious to many, but it's a legacy of the influx of Nuyorican thugs many years ago. These thugs looked down on kids who sincerely studied and wanted to get ahead. They made fun of them because they wanted to be white. It's sad that the Nuyorican lifestyle won!

Nonetheless there is another Puerto Rico. There is a Puerto Rico where kids finish school and go to college. There is a Puerto Rico of a Philharmonic orchestra , museums, institutions like The Atheneo with great talks and historic cities and towns older than any in the U.S. There is a national pride when our Olympic teams parade our flag to the world.

And yes there is crime and urban blight. Because the island is a compact country and our news papers thrive on the sensational and morbid, they have the island in hysterical mode 24/7. However has anyone picked up a copy of the NY daily news lately? Compare it to the Times. Our news is like the Daily News, crime, shoot outs, and stories like kids left starving, rapes galore with a smack of folks blaming this on Blacks and Nuyoricans.

Like in the U.S. Towns began to fall into decay when the Malls killed off the mom and pop stores, leaving downtowns to the addicts and despair. The car culture and fast foods destroyed our sense of walking and contributed to obesity like in Indiana or Mississippi. Ponce de Leon Ave is an example of what a Mall can do to a once thriving avenue.