(All photography by Amanda Raquel Dorval)
I traveled to San Juan, Puerto Rico between 23 and 28 July, 2023, to observe the annual Fiesta de Santiago Apóstol which takes place over a week in the nearby Afro-Puerto Rican town of Loíza. It was important for me to travel to Loíza for my thesis project, which explores the links between the Islamic World and Puerto Rican visual culture, specifically regarding the traditional masked and costumed vejigante characters which dance around as an integral part of the cultural experience of the festival. I traveled with my husband and young son, so that they could also have the chance to experience the culture and people of Puerto Rico. I am a third-generation Nuyorican—that is, a New Yorker of Puerto Rican descent—and it was important for me to bring my family so that they could see where my grandparents came from. It was especially important to bring my mixed-raced son so that he could begin connecting on a deep and meaningful level with the cultural roots that he inherited from my side of the family.
Although the annual festival is celebrated through a week-long series of events—including parades, traditional bomba dance demonstrations, music performances, and arts and crafts displays—I attended the festival on just one of the days: Wednesday July 26. On this day, the featured highlight of the event was a traditional procession throughout the town of a sculpture known as Santiago de los Hombres. I had not timed the day’s main events properly, so I had arrived at an off-peak time of the festival. Because of this, I witnessed only a small portion of the fiesta that day. However, I was able to meet and interact with one enthusiastic vejigante character, as well as take in the overall vibe and environment of the town square as it appears during a major festival and holiday.
Loíza is about a 30-minute drive from the heart of the capital of San Juan. We rented a car, and my husband did the driving eastward, along a road that is much more jungle-dense than the capital area. As we winded through the curving highway along the northern coast, through Piñones, the first area of Loíza—known for its lush green vistas, popular beaches, and colorful shacks selling delicious fried local delicacies, lined up along the highway—I noticed how weather-beaten the area is, with many of the shacks in disrepair and abandoned. This is likely one of the physical reminders of the devastation caused by Hurricane María in September 2017. However, it is important to also note here that many of the eateries were lively and thriving, with local merchants and residents continuing in their everyday routines. When we finally reached the main town area of Loíza, I noticed many signs along the main highway road of Route 187 advertising the weeklong festival in celebration of Santiago Apóstol. The streets were decorated with flags, and we saw many people setting up for the day’s festivities.
There were multiple factors that made my travels in Puerto Rico quite difficult, and which resulted in my inability to fully experience the Loíza festival in the way that I had originally imagined. Like many areas in the world during the summer of 2023, Puerto Rico began experiencing a historic heatwave in June. By the time I had arrived at the end of July, San Juan was continuing to see above-average heat indexes on an almost daily basis, resulting in extreme heat advisories for many of the days that I was there. On the day I traveled to Loíza, the temperature was 90 degrees with high humidity and a heat index over 100 degrees. A tropical wave known as Invest 95L, which caused heavy rains and storms over the San Juan metro area the day before, caused humidity levels to remain very high into the next day. This made conditions to walk around Loíza unbearable for long periods of time. Another issue that I experienced was a logistical one: unless you rent a car or know a local to drive you around, it is almost impossible to take public transportation or hire a taxi to and from Loíza, despite its proximity to San Juan. We were able to rent a car for one day, but we did not really have the budget to rent a car for multiple days. The last issue that hampered my ability to fully immerse myself in the festival experience was the difficulty I had finding information online about exact schedule of events. When I had finally arrived in the main town square at around one o’clock in the afternoon, I was able to go into the alcaldía (mayor’s office) and ask the secretary about the day’s events. It was there that I learned that some things had been rescheduled due to the storms the day before, and that the main dance performances would not occur until later that evening. With temperatures blazing, we decided that it was impractical and risky to our health to pass the next several hours outside in the heat, especially with a toddler, so ultimately, I was only able to see a small sampling of the festivities.
Despite not being able to witness the full scope of the festival, I still learned quite a lot of information, even just by driving through the streets and seeing the architecture, decorations, and environment of the town of Loíza. This ultimately helps inform my thesis on the influence of the Islamic world in the visual culture associated with the Fiesta de Santiago Apóstol and the character of the vejigante. For example, at one point we passed by a church called Parroquia Santiago Apóstol. On the outside of this church is a wall mosaic that depicts Santiago Apóstol in his role as Matamoros, the “Moor Slayer,” in battle against the Moors as his horse tramples triumphantly over the heads of his enemies. I also saw many craft vendors selling vejigante masks, as well as wall art and murals featuring vejigantes, which exemplified for me how important the spirit of the vejigante is to the town. Furthermore, I was also able to experience other instances of Islamic influence in Puerto Rican visual culture at other moments during my trip. For instance, while walking through Viejo San Juan, the colonial center of the capital, I noticed that some architectural elements on some of the old colorful buildings are evocative of the geometric elements and arabesque arches typical of Islamic architecture. This reinforces my underlying thesis argument: that Puerto Rican culture and identity has been deeply influenced by the Islamic World.
Because I was not able to get the full experience of the Loíza Fiesta de Santiago Apóstol, I am seriously considering returning to Puerto Rico in February 2024 for the annual pre-Lenten Ponce Festival along the southern coast of the island. This is the second of two festivals in Puerto Rico, along with the Loíza festival, in which the vejigante plays an important role. Therefore, returning to Puerto Rico to observe the other festival in Ponce could prove very useful for my thesis research. The logistical lessons I learned from this trip will help inform the planning of my next trip, hopefully this February.
