Orenjestad, Aruba, Mon Jan 11 10

We put into this dreadfully ugly port at dawn this morning. In the 18th century, the Spanish named this island one of the lesser Antilles, meaning “useless island.” Today tourism is probably 80-90% of the island’s economy, but through the years it has been based on salt, agriculture, grazing, gold, guano, and oil. Save for today’s oil refineries, which are diminishing, nothing but tourism has succeeded. To walk the streets of Orenjestad, well, the main street anyway, is to wander between trashy souvenirs, high-end shops selling Rolexes and diamonds, and casinos which are even uglier than US casinos, because they are invariably painted in bright, Dutch inspired colors. The chimes of the slot machines are the same, the cigarette smoke is the same, and the loss rate is the same or higher as Reno or the nearest Indian Casino in the United States. And although there is a lot of poverty here, having (and driving) a car seems to be more of a birthright than it is in LA. Intersections controlled by stop signs invariable have backups of 15-25 vehicles. This, oddly enough, makes it simpler to cross the road than it would otherwise be. Since the flow is so poor, it’s somewhat simple to walk between cars stuck in line.

To walk the back streets where people live, is hot, dirty, and unpleasant. Most of the buildings here are cinder block or poured concrete or something similar. Concrete walls surround each house, making each one seem oddly fortified, except for the worst houses where there is no yard, no setback. The streets are badly patched, dirty, and there are vehicles everywhere and sleeping dogs who ignore most of what goes on around them. In this tropical climate, windows and doors are often open, and the interior walls are also ugly, furniture sparse.

Many buildings are painted bright colors in the Dutch tradition, but with few exceptions, the architecture is decidedly NOT Dutch, and the bright colors seem ridiculous. If the idea is to brighten a barren landscape, everyone would gain far more just by picking up the trash and cutting down some of the weeds. I suspect that most Arubans don’t have much civic pride, and it doesn’t seem to be a priority for the town or state officials. Some people enjoy this as a vacation destination, and it may be cheap for those purposes, but it’s ugly and dirty, and I’d rather be somewhere else.
The Aruban language is either Dutch or Papiamento, but English is very much mixed in, perhaps in the style of Spanglish. Newspapers are in Dutch and Papiamento with some Spanish, but many ads are partially or wholly in English. This lets me find out about the tire sale that expired on 31 Dec., the chaos caused when someone hit a fireplug near the Parliament building, and the craziness of Hugo Chavez over there in Venezuela, who is screwing up the oil income for Aruba. Speaking of which, the only gas stations I’ve seen are Valero stations, which are partially owned by the Venezuelan government.
The historic museum is in an 18th century fort Zoutman. It’s very small (maybe a third of an acre?) and not terribly stout, made of a calcareous, cement like substance, using ocean sand and coral remnants that, and I’m thinking that if the British had used sledgehammers instead of cannon, they probably would have breached the fort. Apparently its main claim to fame was to resist a British attack in the 18th century, though later the Brits did capture the island and were assaulted by the Dutch. Even though the British won that battle, they probably popped up their heads, looked around at what they had defended, and left anyway. To this day, no one else has wanted Aruba, but the Nazis shelled the island to destroy the oil refineries.
It didn’t work.

But back to the museum. It makes no sense at all. There are artifacts in a reconstructed building that supposedly represents an early Aruban home, and the signing (unlike some other foreign museums I’ve visited) has literate and well written English translations, but each little vignette lacks context. A panel describes, for instance, the pre-historic period with almost no trace of human habitation save for spearpoints and saltpans, and sitting in front of them are two rather complex shells. Another panel describing early agriculture has a copper pot on a shelf.
Many of the artifacts are there to touch and examine, with apparently no security. It’s interesting to pick up and examine tools and things, but who in the world curates this stuff?

There are old nautical charts and maps on the walls with no explanation. Photos of apparently famous or significant people with no labeling. There are some English labels so that I can identify a scale, sheep shears, smelter pot, kitchen goods, an inkwell and other things that I recognize anyway, but WHAT IN THE WORLD TIES THESE TOGETHER???? I know that as an American, I’m not the primary audience, but when I look at the Dutch, Spanish and Papiamento texts, there doesn’t seem to be any additional information. Places like this make me think about my dream job of consulting with small museums on how to give them context for the visitor, to establish themes.
I know, all of this is very boring.