TURiSTA: A hymnal about love and Puerto Rico

Editor’s note: Bad Bunny is not just a global music star; he is a cultural and political force whose work reflects how many Puerto Ricans experience identity, migration, power, and belonging. Ahead of Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl performance, Pasquines is publishing a short series of essays, explaining songs like TURiSTA from across his discography for audiences who may be encountering his music — and its meaning — for the first time. We will be unpacking individual songs and what they mean to the writers who live with their echoes — on the islands and in the diaspora. Through music, memory, and context, these pieces explore Puerto Rico as lived reality, not metaphor.

TURiSTA was my top-played song on Spotify last year. The familiar bolero track brought me back to Sunday mornings with my family and the Los Panchos record my dad had on repeat for years on end. I was so sick of it then, but it grew on me, and now it’s my hymnal. It was the one with José Luis Rodríguez, aka El Puma. You should give it a spin.

Turista hit home. Benito croons to a former lover who only ever saw the better parts of him. And that’s fine, he says. It’s not on you to heal me. La pasamos bien (We had a good time). Reminds me of a breakup I had, but I was given a word limit.

In his track-by-track commentary for Apple Music, Benito tells us that Turista is about his experience as much as it is about Puerto Rico itself. In dating apps, as in tourism ads, we embellish and promise to be a good time. We all have our seasons, and we market accordingly. Blissful respite for the privileged. Nostalgia to bait the diaspora. Go to these three places and do not stray. Take a few selfies and learn the salsa step, then hurry back with the memories. Sin saber el porqué (Without knowing the why).

But a certain class of extremely wealthy tourists has decided to stay in Puerto Rico, enjoying blissful respite from taxes while opportunities shrink for young professionals and the local poverty rate hovers stubbornly over 40% (over 50% for children). They are living large and leaving it to the locals to pick up the pieces, like Benito in the music video for this song. Policies that were pitched as economic development tools have only exacerbated inequality, leaving us to question who gets to have fun in this relationship.

We could change these laws to something more equitable. Smarter people than I have floated proposals to repeal or pare back Act 22 and its progeny, to make sure everyone enjoying the wonder of Puerto Rico chips in to help others thrive. It’s worth a shot. 

Si se da, pues se da. Y si no, pues también.

(If it happens, it happens. And if not, that’s fine too.)

Until then, college grads and young professionals will keep lining up at TSA and leaving their families behind. And more of us will become tourists, wherever we can find jobs, homes, or any kind of future. Sabiendo muy bien el porqué de estas heridas (Knowing very well the reason for these wounds).