‘We Feel Like Home’: Displaced Puerto Ricans Celebrate Traditional Christmas Parranda
A musical group playing traditional Puerto Rican bomba music performs at a parranda in Hartford, Conn. Photo by Ryan Caron King for WNPR
Merely Torres-Garcia has been living in a hotel room in Hartford, Conn., with her husband and two kids after losing part of her house in Puerto Rico to Hurricane Maria. She said spending the Christmas season in the northeastern cold has been hard for her family. But on Saturday night, in the noisy atrium of Hartford City Hall, it felt a little bit like Christmas on the island.
“My kids are happy. We feel like home in here right now,” she said.
Torres-Garcia was at a Christmas celebration called a parranda, where members of Hartford’s Puerto Rican community greeted families displaced by the storm with a musical parade and a hot meal.