Eating healthy in Puerto Rico

... is not inexpensive.

True, tropical fruit is fabulously cheap: papaya - 69 cents per pound, a large pinaple 75 cents....

....but vegetables, wow, $ 8 for 6 organic bellpeppers (that's more than a dollar for a bellpepper!) - and only slightly less for nonorganic - imported from USA; $ 6.45 for a small container (less than a pound) of organic tomatoes - imported from Canada ($4.50 for a similar container of nonorganic).

The prices for lettuce and other available veggies are sky high and .... there is no variety, nothing but a few anemic lettuces ( mostly romaine, sometimes iceberg), celery, bell peppers, tomatoes, cilantro and a lot of brown tubers with different shapes, which I avoid, presuming them all being - like potatoes and yams - starches rather than vegetables.

Every time I try to shop for veggies I dream of a Whole Foods store with its fabulous assortment of hundreds of kinds of fruits and vegetables, many of them organic, or of Atlanta's World Farmers Market, where veggies are almost as plentiful as at Whole Foods, but cheaper - though far fewer are organic.

What's with all those vegetable imports in Puerto Rico??? Don't veggies grow in the tropics?

Perhaps I'd believe it, had I not seen on zoom's blog that she has a vegetable garden - and my institute also has an organic farm and greenhouses where tender greens (sunflower, purslane, etc.) and - mostly green - veggies, like kale, spinach, etc. are grown.

Next Friday I am planning to visit a local farmers' market in San Sebastian, a small town in the mountains, otherwise famous for its hammock weavers and its splendid, though not easily accessible, waterfall in the jungle.

Meat, on the other hand is cheaper here than in the USA and a lot of it (beef) seems to be imported from Urugway. I wonder whether Urugway meat industry is any better than USA or if that meat is as inedible as nonorganic American meat: equally loaded with hormons, antibiotics etc.

And - for the true health gamblers: the fabulous, fluffy, melting in your mouth Puertorican pastries with almonds and guava cost only 79 cents for a large one. Yumm :-(((

Yesterday afternoon and this morning I inspected the plot for my future garden and found it being in a dappled sunlight in the morning, shaded in early afternoon and in more direct sunlight in the late afternoon. Now, a question to tropical vegetable gardeners: what herbs and veggies I should most luck growing there?

To buy.... or not to buy. That is the question

very suitable for the days of after Christmas shopping madness.

No, I do not participate in the general shopping madness - but am pondering a question whether to buy furniture. If I want to move to the unfurnished apartment I need to either buy new furniture (which seem rather ugly here: the preferred furniture color here seems to be all the "lovely" shades of poo: from beige to brown. Brr... And the shapes are either too countryish crude or too twisted ornamental - definitively not me. I am afraid I would have constant nighmares surrounded by this type of furniture) .. or get my remaining ones shipped.

Yet - less than three months ago - I promised "kids" who help me with my countless moves, that there would be no more moves with furniture and stuff. And I sold and gave away most of my Finnish and Swedish well loved arctic birch pieces, my white Italian leather sofa and armchair. And now I am dreaming of IKEA - something light, simple, unassuming, unpretential, unserious even - something that would function perfectly as furniture but did not feel confining.

Uh, huh, why oh why IKEA aren't you here? Shopping would be so easy - and so enjoyable.

Without you I have to wander among many small local furniture stores with really, really heavy, dark and ugly pieces, almost crying... yet I can't move to the apartment I like and sit, eat and sleep on its pristine white ceramic floors!!!

My secret Christmas wish list

I have been nursing my secret blogger' s Christmas wih list for a few weeks.
I wished that I could paint like Heather, photograph like Carina, write like Jen or Sara, etc. etc.

But when a time came to post it.... the monopoly cable company operating in Aguada, Choice Cable, the most incompetent, uncaring and, perhaps, corrupted cable company in the entire world, gave me - and everybody else here a Christmas present we are likely to remember a long time: 4 days so far- and counting - without internet!

(I finally got connected through a slow like molasses, but working! oh miracle! dial up connection. )

So my top priority wish is a different cable company! What's yours?

Tropical Christmas party dress

Today is a Christmas gift exchange and a Christmas lunch party at the institute, and later a festive gourmet dinner at Natural High Cafe in Rincon for the graduating program participants.

So I spent a moment this morning in front of my closet trying to figure out what to wear: evening wear being too "evening" for the occassion, party cruise wear too "cruise party", resort wear too "resort": the western coast of Puerto Rico has a - difficult - style all of its own: not the San Juan Puerto Rican smart dolled up in the absolutely latest fashion, but either a very sporty casual (wore mostly by surfer guys) or if more festive, than " I pretend I don't care about fashion or elegance... yet I don't want to look dorky" ( wore mostly by gals and local guys).

Finally I noticed a long, Caribbean sea blue silk dress with a deceptively simple cut, which I bought for myself in July, because I loved the color, even though the dress was at that time " a tad" too tight for me - and in a size I wasn't able to wear since 1999.

I tried it again just before Thanksgiving and - despite having lost 16 pounds - the dress was still too tight for me. 'Oh, my', I thought, I would never have guessed that I was that much of an optimist when I bought it.
But this morning the scale showed an 19.6 pounds of a total weight loss during the two months I have been here trying on this Living Food Lifestyle. So I tried the dress again.... and finally it fit me like a glove! Hurra!

I added a strand of discarded corals of the same azure shade of Caribbean sea, which I got for my nameday ot the beginning of this month - and voila, I was ready to "dazzle" and dance salsa, merengue , bomba and whatever else we were going to dance today... and no matter whether I knew how to dance it or not (women my age can get away with a lot, lol)! Who needs food when you feel good!

Merry Christmas partying everybody!

Caribbean birthday

I don't think I ever had my birthday party at a beach bar - after all my birthday is in December.

But this year I have been celebrated on my birthday in balmy Puerto Rico, so a beach bar was appropriate - and this particular one - Shipwreck Bar and Grill was perfect! It is fun and colorful during the day and fun and imaginatively illuminated by night, its menu is creative and the food really good. But I am getting ahead of myself fast forwarding to the evening party, while there is still the whole day to be described.

The day started very early, with a 7 am trip to the first secret birthday destination, which turned out to be a snorkeling/diving excursion (by Taino Divers)

to Desecheo Island:

The coral formations there are great. See for yourself:

We stopped at three different sights, one most suitable for divers, the other two for both divers and snorkelers. I was with a couple of friends, one of them an avid diver. He claims he spotted a large nursing shark, but nobody else in the tour group of 12 - 6 divers and 6 snorkelers - seen it. The whole tour was a such a quintessential Caribbean experience: the azure water, corals in all shapes and sizes, balmy weather, international company. We returned to port at 2 pm - after lunch of sandwiches on board and had to scramble to the next secret birthday destination, which turned out to be one of my most favorite places in Rincon: the Secret Garden Art Gallery!

Secret garden has great art by local artists and a fantastic location: a huge tropical, jungle like garden right on one of the beaches (see their video)!

I have visited the galery before, shopped there for a few of Christmas presents and had my eye on a couple of Roberto Ortizs (who runs the gallery) paintings for myself...and today I was going to get one of them as a birthday present. Wow, was I elated! (If you browse through Roberto's paintings on the Secret Garden's web site, you can see it: the painting of a fan like cliffs of Cabo Rojo) .

But we could not linger at the gallery or in the garden this time, since we had to hurry (hurry, hurry!) to a third secret location this day: a sunset whale watching sail with Katharina Sail Charters on a sailing catamaran.

Well, we haven't seen any whales, but the trip was lovely and the sunset amazing - as usual.

Hungry we disembarked and entered the Shipwreck Bar. Their menu is inventive, but we haven't hesitated much ordering our appetizers: mussels in white wine sauce, shrimps won-ton and calamares in a spicy sauce.


We wolfed all this accompanied by a bottle of wine... and discovered that we were completely satisfied with just appetizers. (Their portions are for very young and very hungry surfers). But for the sake of a birthday tradition we order one piece of cake for the three of us and I was reminded that I am not young any more, when my friends started discussing with the waiters how to squeeze the appropriate amount of candles on that piece of cake. Finally, a compromise solution was reached - just one candle! Suits me perfectly.

I would not mind having more fun and active birthday like this. Viva Puerto Rico!

Parranda or noise pollution

One parranda - especially one I participated in (see post: Yet another car, another cat and another dwelling) - was fun. But today a parranda at a beach bar and camping - three properties away from mine - started at noon with such an incredible noise volume, that not even ear plugs are able to help at this distance. So instead of a deserved weekend rest, at the beach, at a hammock, reading, I was forced to hide from that noise pollution in my office. And I wonder: are ALL Puertoricans deaf? They must be, if nobody protests either the construction noise (see post: I am moving... again) or a perpetual parranda in a quiet residential area. I certainly can't stand it without a permanent damage not only to my ears but my brain, as well.

The day would be glorious... if only the natives could celebrate Christmas a lot less noisily!

To listen to some parranda music (at a decent volume) go there: http://www.magiealbumpr.com/parranda.htm

A poor raped virgin

I went to the vet yesterday with my new find. Kitty was at first terrified by the pet carrier, but soon calmed down despite of - or may be because of the examination, parasite and ear mites tests and receiving three shots.

When we were at the vet a truck came in with a young, white horse on it. The horse looked very sad and had scratches near her eyes. I asked the people who came with her what kind of a problem the horse is having and was told that she was raped last night... by a guy, whom they managed to put under a citizen arrest and deliver to the local police. But the poor horse felt really sad and really sick. The horse's owner announced that she was looking for a big, guard dog, and since I just joined the newly formed local association for the protection of animals, I was able to point them to the association as a source of guard - and other - dogs, and at the same day they adopted an abandoned German Shepherd/Husky mix.

I hope the horse will feel better soon. But I still wonder what can posses a male human being to rape a horse!