This weekend a friend and I visited Santo Domingo's Chinatown, an uptown street that Chinese immigrants have made their home. Some of the ones we met didn't speak any Spanish, some spoke Spanish with a heavy accent, but we saw two of them that were listening to merengue, my friend commented that they were aplatanados.

If you are Dominican I am sure you know what that word means. If you are not, I will explain. Roughly -- and maybe wrongly- translated -- aplatanado means 'plantain-like'. Being that plantains are a typical, indispensable and common addition to our meals it has apparently being chosen to represent our sense of being Dominicans in the same manner that Americans have chosen the apple pie.

It is not necessary to be a Dominican citizen to be aplatanado, actually it implies that you are a foreigner that has adapted to our culture. Being aplatanado means that you eat our food, have learnt to dance our music, you drink our rum and beer, and have learnt to love our country. Being told that you are aplatanado is a compliment in a way, it implies that you have been accepted, we think of you as one of us.

So, if you are not a Dominican citizen but you visit our website often, if you recognize yourself in our stories, and you know the taste of the dishes in our site. If you know the difference between locrio and asopao, we hereby declare you Officially Aplatanado.


By Aunt Clara


*Photo by Amity. Used with permission.

My stepfather is Ecuadorian, and my mother is Dominican. He is aplatanado. He swears he's Dominican! But I love the fact that he tries to compartir and to learn about our family and culture and history. He loves the food and the music. This makes the family setting make better and easier to get along with him.

This past May I was in DR and I got my nails done by a Chinese. I think he knew how to speak Spanish better than I do!