Stories Beneath the Surface.

The Pelican, the Coffee, and My First “Caña” On my second year living in the Dominican Republic, a pelican stole the bread from my breakfast plate while I was sipping a painfully hot cafecito on the Malecón of Puerto Plata. The waiter laughed, slapped me on the back, and said, “Hermano, ese pájaro tiene mejor […]

My First Tejo Explosion and the Pint That Followed The first time I felt a mecha explode in a Tejo court, I was still shaking Dominican sand out of my sneakers. Ten years of island life in Santo Domingo had trained my ear to the melodic plátano cadence of Caribbean Spanish, yet Bogotá’s brisk mountain […]

Three months ago, a rogue popcorn kernel cracked the last bit of dignity my teeth had left. That snap echoed in my Santo Domingo apartment, but the real reverberation hit a week later when my Colombian girlfriend’s mom eyed my crooked grin and said, “Mijo, eso necesita brackets ya.” “My son, that needs braces right […]

By James, a 33-year-old Brit who perfected his Caribbean tan in Santo Domingo, discovered that chilled aguardiente tastes better in Medellín, and still trips over his own accent when asking for a “fundita.” The Day the Fridge Arrived in Medellín My latest Colombian vacation started with the bang of a delivery truck back-firing outside my […]

Un arranque personal: el día en que casi pagué demás por una nevera gigante Ten years in Santo Domingo have taught me that the most dangerous part of any purchase isn’t the price tag, it’s the moment you open your mouth. Picture me, freshly arrived from North Carolina, staring at a sleek stainless-steel fridge that […]

How a Wobbly Ladder Became My Spanish Classroom I still remember the first time I tried to buy a ladder in Santiago. I had just moved from the capital to the foothills of the Cordillera Central, armed with what I thought was solid Spanish Vocabulary. The old wooden staircase in my rented house felt more […]

I still remember the first time I swaggered into Puerto Plata’s seafront market convinced my high-school Spanish would buy me the fattest dorado on the pier. I greeted the vendor with what I thought was confidence, only to hear him laugh and whisper to his buddy, “Este gringo no sabe ni papa.” That sting to […]

By James, your roving Anglo-Caribe word nerd who thinks of bifocals as a rite of passage, not a mid-life crisis. The Morning I Misread a Bus Sign and Knew My Eyes Were Toast Last August, after a red-eye flight from Medellín, I shuffled onto a carro público in Santo Domingo and squinted at a faded […]

El día que un mueble viejo me enseñó más que mil clases de gramática My first apartment in Santo Domingo looked like a bachata song gone wrong—empty echoes, a flickering ceiling fan, and a single plastic chair that wobbled like it had vertigo. Ten years ago, armed with rudimentary Spanish Vocabulary and the confidence that […]

That Time I Tried to Quit “Iron Paradise” in Medellín A decade of living in Santo Domingo has trained me to see red tape coming from a mile away, but nothing prepared me for the morning I marched into a sleek gym overlooking Medellín’s Parque del Poblado to cancel my membership. My plan was simple: […]

La primera vez que casi me meto en líos con el colmadero Tenía apenas tres meses viviendo en Santo Domingo cuando descubrí el superpoder dominicano llamado fiado. For my fellow newcomers: that means buying on credit at the neighborhood “colmado,” an institution that is equal parts corner store, gossip hub, informal bank, and emergency lifeguard […]