The Problem with Miami

I've been gone for a week and thus, no posts. Before I get back to my exploration of my Western Caribbean cruise, I need to say a few things--both positive, and negative--about the city I just returned from: Miami. First, the negatives.

One of my daughters lives in Miami, so I have been there periodically over the years. Here is an anecdote about her that will best introduce my first topic. She bikes her way around the city, often peddling from South Miami to South Beach. A couple of years ago, she was riding her bike, pulling out of a parking lot when an SUV struck her and sent her flying. The woman driving the SUV rolled down her window and berated her violently, blaming her for getting in her way. And then drove off. My daughter then had to literally crawl into a nearby business which finally allowed her to make a call. She called her boy friend who then transported her to the hospital. She was on crutches for a couple of months after that, but luckily suffered no permanent damage.

Not so coincidentally, Miami was named today the top city in the United States for road rage--for a second year in a row. See the article at CBS News. But this is not road rage in the usual sense: people are not (as far as I know) pulling guns on fellow motorists after being cut off. In fact, cutting people off is considered good driving in Miami. Barely missing slamming into other cars is considered good driving. Honking the horn at someone when he or she is actually obeying the law and driving safely--this too is considered good driving. It makes it not only the top city for road rage, but also the rudest, most impolite city in the country.

I can guess at the trigger for all of this (I won't dignify it by calling it a "cause"). It is the I-95 corridor. It seems that the majority of the traffic in Miami is funneled down a single highway. It is incredibly busy, spilling over into the side streets and feeder highways. Never have I been on residential side streets that have so much traffic. But people have choices. Your surroundings can destroy your character or make you stronger as a human being. Many of the people in Miami (at least those in their cars) have a creepy kind of evil about them. They have made their choice.

A second problem with Miami is the aforementioned unfriendliness. Miami is only incidentally an American city. It is a Latin American city--which, as I'll mention tomorrow, is also one of its greatest strengths and charms. Everywhere you go--grocery stores, shopping centers,gas stations, restaurants, hotels, people are speaking Spanish, not English. It is charming, but at times it crosses over to what feels like contempt for the gringo.

Many of the hotels on Miami Beach (to some extent Miami Beach must be seen separate from Miami in more ways than geography) have horrible reviews. Rudeness is always at the top of the list of complaints. One of my theories (and only a theory) is that Macho is still a strong part of Latin culture. When you put a vibrant Latin man in a service industry role, it does not compute well.

Tomorrow, some of the things I love about Miami.