Clap When You Land

“I clap every time a plane lands and so do most Puerto Ricans. That’s like our thing. I love it. We cheated gravity and we’re alive,” Lin-Manuel Miranda tweeted a few years ago. 

He’s right. When a plane lands at Luis Muñoz Marin International Airport in San Juan, the passengers hoot and applaud like they’ve just won the lottery. But they’re not only marking a safe landing. They’re celebrating coming home. 

I was eight when I first left the island on a plane for a two-week vacation in Washington, D.C. Sophisticated me thought it gauche that people clapped when we landed back in Puerto Rico. I felt embarrassed for the ignorant country jíbaros. It wasn’t until I returned home from my first semester at Boston University, long after the thrill of my first snowfall had dissipated, that I finally understood the clapping.

As the plane made its approach along the island’s northern coast, I was struck by the contrast in colors, by how the emerald green terrain ended in a thin strand of white sand abutting the deep aqua of the ocean. I could almost smell the dark fertile soil and the briny sea. I itched to drench myself in the warm ocean and feel the sun’s bite on my skin. When I saw San Juan Harbor sparkling below me with the ancient El Morro fortress as its sentinel, I got chills. Then the city came into view. I spotted my school, my grandparents’ apartment building, my favorite beach, my home. 

Trying to swallow the lump in my throat, I let the tears slide down my face. A lagoon, rows of palm trees, and the cement runway blurred as we bounced onto land. My heart burst with joy, and I clapped. This jíbara clapped long and hard, and reveled with the rest of the joyous passengers that day—and ever since.