Tourist

Me, being a tourist and taking a picture of a tourist sign in a tourist town.

Going back to the States, and particularly to Michigan, this time was kinda strange. We've never lived in Milwaukee (although we love it there) so we're always "visitors" there. But we spent a little time in South Haven, Mich., a beach town I know very well. In fact, South Haven is one of the two Lake Michigan beach towns (Grand Haven is the other) that convinced me I wanted to live near water, on or near a beach, in the first place. So I found it odd that sitting at breakfast in a little restaurant, looking out the window at the row of shops across the street, that I felt like a...tourist! I found myself looking at things through different eyes, through the filter of our home in Puerto Rico.

Because of where Ola Lola's is - near the vacation resort Villa Montana and the beach-side vacation apartments at Villa Tropical - and what Ola Lola's is, we see and talk to a lot of tourists. We hear a lot of what their expectations are and whether or not Puerto Rico meets those expectations. It was that lens through which I viewed South Haven.

There are lots of cutesy shops in South Haven, selling lots of cutesy things, from local produce to local artisan wares to made-in-China trinkets. My sense is the tourists coming to PR especially miss the local artisan stuff. There are artists and artisans, but you just don't find the shops with that kind of stuff here. In all honesty there really aren't many places where such shops would work. The pueblos (towns) are primarily for the local residents to do business. There aren't rows of quaint cutesy buildings along a main street or plaza, especially one within walking range of the beach or good parking, that's designed for tourists. In fact many of the tourists who visit this area at least never see the pueblos of Isabela or Aquadilla or Moca or San Sabastian.

There is a little more of this kind of stuff in Rincon, but then Rincon has been more tourist-driven (because of the surfers) for decades.

Living here, I'm not at all sorry we don't have all the tourist-y stuff. Even in tourist towns like South Haven, it's always seemed vaguely silly to me. When we travel, we'd much rather see local (what's the point of traveling if your destination is just like where you live?). On the other hand it's important to meet some of those tourist expectations to keep them happy and coming back.