Dominoes

by Chelsea Badeau (United States of America)

I didn't expect to find Puerto Rico

Have you ever wondered why hurricanes are named after people? It makes them easier to remember. That’s it. It doesn’t seem fair though that something that can wreak so much havoc on the earth and the people who inhabit it would take on a human persona. It seems especially cruel when that name is one that is common in the place the storm destroys. We were scheduled to fly into San Juan on March 24, 2018. Six months after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico. Should we go? Should we cancel? After much deliberation and research, we continued with our trip, in part because we knew the island needed the tourism dollars more than ever and we had family to see, and in some cases, meet. Our crew included me, my two children, my sister, her husband and their four children. My brother-in-law, Roberto, is Puerto Rican and we were staying with his Tia and Tio in their hillside home in Vega Alta on the north side of the island. Maria had triggered many landslides in this area, demolishing homes and knocking down trees like dominoes, one after another. We arrived after 1 a.m. and groggily awoke around 4 a.m. to the sound of roosters crowing and coquí frogs calling “co-kee, co-kee.” Tia and Tio owned dozens of chickens, along with several goats and dogs. Tia Carmen greeted us in the kitchen with café con leche and bachata music. They still had no running water. It was delivered in tanks on a monthly basis. We had to limit showers to under one minute, turning the water off while adding shampoo to our hair. Roberto’s grandmother lived a few minutes away, up an even steeper hill. Maria had ripped off the second story of her home. The neighbors in the five closest dwellings had left after the storm destroyed their homes. At 78, his abuela was left alone on the hill among a graveyard of house bones. She greeted us with hugs and heaping plates of arroz con pollo. Maria may have washed away much of her neighborhood, but her spirit was not dampened. Driving up a winding calle full of colorful homes with patches of missing paint, we arrived at the tattered home of Roberto’s great aunt. She was in her nineties and had never met him. Roberto’s mother had moved to Philadelphia with him and his siblings when he was very young. Maria had blown her front door off and sucked nearly all of her possessions out of her home, breaking and scattering them into pieces. Inexplicably, her photo album had been spared. She broke down in tears when she saw her great nephew, bear hugging him with all of the strength her frail frame could muster. The smile that spread across her face infected us all, and we cried and smiled right along with her. She pulled out her album and showed Roberto photos of his father, with whom he shared a remarkable resemblance. Food, family and history dominated the days. Dominoes, music and laughter enchanted the evenings. “El Domino,” I learned, is not simply a game in Puerto Rico. It’s an important part of the community and culture. While they play the traditional Double 6, relationships are formed or strengthened. The youngest children learn from the older generation. Every home we visited had a domino table, ready to be pulled out at a moment’s notice. The WMO Hurricane Committee retired Maria from the list of rotating names for storms due to the death and destruction caused in 2017. Good riddance. Now, we can focus on the Marias who bring joy to this world. Not knowing what we’d find in Puerto Rico after Maria, we left filled with hope. If a hurricane can cause a negative ripple effect, people who have the capacity to withstand great force while refusing to give up can create their own storm of positivity and possibility.