Tourist for a Day

Frozen Yogurt I ordered. 

For the tourist for a day activity I chose to go to Old San Juan and explore the various shops that are around. I wore a maxi dress along with sandals and my sunglasses. My goal of the activity was to see how the locals treated tourists and what suggestions would they give to a tourist.  My grandfather dropped me off in front of the Tourism Information Center at plaza Dársenas, I went inside at the woman greeted me in Spanish but once I said “hi” in English she quickly changed to English. I asked for a flyer and started making my way around San Juan. On my way to the shops I asked a girl for suggestions on what to do, I told her I was spending the day at San Juan and didn’t know where to go. She was happy to help me and gave me directions towards El Morro. I kept walking and went inside a shop where the lady also said hi to me in Spanish. 

As I kept going inside more stores, I noticed that this kept happening. I would be greeted in Spanish and the person would look really surprised when I would start talking to them in English. I assume they believed I was from Puerto Rico but were surprised when I would only speak English to them. As I was looking at my map, two women were looking at me and I overheard one of them said “Ay que chulita ella” which means “Aw what a cutie”. I don’t know if that’s a good translation, but I can’t think of another word for “chulita”. A group of Argentinians were walking in front of me and they asked a lady that was looking to the outside from her store directions to a street, she just pointed towards her right and went back inside. I heard one of the guys say “Wow que amabilidad” which means “Wow so nice” but in a very sarcastic tone. I kind of understand why the guy said it like that because the lady looked very annoyed to have been asked even though the guy asked very nicely.  After that I asked a woman about where I could eat, she asked me if I wanted Puerto Rican food and when I said yes, she suggested “Raices”. She told me she didn’t know a lot of English but was able to tell me that it was a very good restaurant and even gave me directions to it.

To finish my trip, I kept walking then I asked a lady that was walking next to me what was a good ice cream shop, she was very nice and even took me to one of the shops and gave me suggestions of other yogurt and ice cream shops around. I ordered in English and once again, I was treated  very nicely. Overall, I had a really good experience walking around Old San Juan. Everyone was extremely nice to me and I didn’t feel judged or unwelcomed. Locals smiled at me and didn’t mind me asking for directions or other things. It made me very happy to see how nice people were treating me and seeing how many tourists there where was very exciting. There were many groups of tourists along with tour guides walking around and taking a lot of pictures. It’s just nice to see people admire Puerto Rico, since it's my home and I love it so much.  

This is a comic strip I did about my experience as a tourist. I added a slide that I forgot to mention in my blog. I always wonder what the tourists think when they see the door with the black Puerto Rican flag. I would love to know what meaning they must think it has.