Living & Recreation

Ponce Museum of Art Opens Major Caribbean Photography Retrospective

The Ponce Museum of Art inaugurated a retrospective showcasing six decades of Caribbean documentary photography, featuring over 200 works by Puerto Rican, Dominican, and Cuban photographers. The exhibition, which runs through September, includes never-before-published images from the museum's permanent collection.

Jun 16, 2026·via Metro PR

Guánica Coral Reef Restoration Volunteers Set Weekend Dive Record

More than 120 volunteer divers participated in a weekend reef restoration event off the coast of Guánica, planting over 1,500 coral fragments on degraded sections of the La Parguera reef system. Organizers said the turnout was the largest single-weekend effort in the three-year-old program's history.

Jun 14, 2026·via NotiCel

Background

Culture, Food, and Life in Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico blends Indigenous Taíno, West African, and Spanish heritage into a culture that is unmistakably its own — expressed through music (salsa, reggaeton, plena, bomba), food (mofongo, lechón, tostones, alcapurrias, sofrito), festivals, and an enduring diaspora connection to communities across the U.S. mainland. The island's 78 municipalities each have distinct identities; Old San Juan's 16th-century fortifications and cobblestone streets sit alongside the beaches of Condado and Isla Verde, the mountains of the Cordillera Central, and the bioluminescent bays of Vieques and Fajardo. Puerto Rican identity — boricua — is a strong cultural anchor both on the island and among the estimated 5–6 million Puerto Ricans living on the mainland.

Music: Puerto Rico gave the world salsa, is a global center of reggaeton, and preserves older traditions like plena and bomba rooted in African heritage.
Food: mofongo (mashed plantains), lechón (roasted pork), tostones, pasteles, and the sofrito-based cooking tradition are cornerstones of the cuisine.
Festivals: Las Fiestas de la Calle San Sebastián (January, Old San Juan) is one of the Caribbean's largest street festivals; municipalities hold patron-saint festivals (fiestas patronales) year-round.
Nature: El Yunque National Forest (the only tropical rainforest in the U.S. National Forest system), bioluminescent bays, karst country, and some 270 miles of coastline.
Diaspora: an estimated 5–6 million Puerto Ricans live on the U.S. mainland — larger than the island's resident population — with major communities in New York, Florida, and New England.

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