Beaches are the primary tourist draw to the Dominican Republic. But the capital city, Santo Domingo, also attracts visitors because of its history. Santo Domingo is the first and oldest European city in all of the Americas. It is the location of the first Cathedral in the Americas, the first university, and the first European hospital. There is a Dominican saying which notes wryly that the country has the first of everything and the second of nothing.
Santo Domingo is also the site of the controversial Faro a Colon, or Columbus Lighthouse, the gigantic pyramid-like structure built to house what may or may not be the remains of Christopher Columbus. There is some dispute about that because Seville, Spain, claims they actually have Columbus buried in their cathedral.
The Faro appears to have been designed more for monumental scale than for aesthetics. As a structure, it has all the grace of a Soviet-style apartment complex. It is laid out in the form of a cross, and lights along the roof can cast its outline on the clouds above the city at night. A center beacon shoots out a column of light so bright and powerful that it can be seen as far away as Venezuela. The lights are impressive, but they are seldom turned on because electrical generation in the country is expensive and unreliable.
On the other side of the street, running along the north side of the park where the Faro is located, there is a wall. Locals refer to it as the “Wall of Shame.” It was constructed in the early 1990s as part of the “beautification project” undertaken by the Dominican Government in preparation for the 500th anniversary of Columbus’s arrival on the island.
The Dominican government had unfulfilled hopes that large numbers of tourists would come to the country for that anniversary. The purpose of the “beautification” program was to spruce the city up for those visitors. The wall, as well as the row of new apartment buildings which went up alongside the highway, was intended to conceal the neighboring community of Maquiteria.
Maquiteria is a barrio. The word means “neighborhood” in Spanish but has also often had the connotation of a lower income area. The people of Maquiteria live in small, concrete block homes, crowded together in an area where there is little access to running water or electrical service. Some homes appear to be constructed from scrap materials.
In 1992 the Dominican government wanted to protect the sensibilities of tourists who might drive by Maquiteria and be offended by what they saw as they made their way to visit Columbus’s tomb. So the land adjacent to the site of the Faro was expropriated in order to make room for both the wall and the new apartment complexes which would act as a visual barrier.
Other expropriations in preparation for the Columbus anniversary took place throughout Santo Domingo. Between 1986 and 1992, it is estimated that more than 30,000 families–perhaps as many as 180,000 people–lost their homes to the “urban-renewal” program.
Communities like Maquiteria are not anomalies—they are the global norm. It is in communities like Maquiteria that most of the people on this planet are born, pass their lives, and die. It is in communities like Maquiteria that most human activity in the world takes place; here we find human beings being both noble and crass; here we find people seeking, finding, losing love or dignity or a sense of purpose in their lives.
And yet it also communities like Maquiteria which we prefer to keep hidden behind walls.
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