Culture Clash: My Stories of Growing Up in Puerto Rico and New York

Born into a loving family in Puerto Rico stricken by poverty after World War II, five-year-old Jose Camacho was whisked from his homeland and dropped into an urban borough in a foreign nation. He spent the next decade split between the gritty, uncompromising streets of the Bronx and the warm safety of Caguas, leaving him feeling like a foreigner in both lands. These collected stories span his lifetime, from childhood to old age, in colorful detail and sometimes bawdy language, lacing together, in rich vocabulary, the startling contrast of clashing cultures that led to his dual identity.

Jose recounts how his grandfather rebuilt his fortune after the boy gave him a winning lottery number, earning Jose a horse that he rode in the Puerto Rican countryside. In sharp contrast to this idyllic life, he relates his challenging adolescence in the Bronx during an era of teenage gangs and how he navigated being a budding intellectual while maintaining connection to his tough community. His heartwarming stories of holidays and family activities enjoyed by Puerto Ricans in both lands define the shared bond that helped him find the balance between these mismatched societies.

Each vignette in this collection is a poignant personal reflection. A recollected dream, a fanciful description of an attack by a malevolent spirit, and confessional late-life reflections express Jose's deep self-awareness. Although this is a memoir of one man, Culture Clash is also a chronicle of cultures, places, and times that no longer exist.