"We went hiking in the rainforest, El Yunque, a most beautiful and sacred place...A feeling came over me like none before. I felt as if I was being called home. My ancestors were talking to me..."
I kept pretty quiet about this experience and came home from the trip feeling energized, yet very grounded from the profound experience I had by that stream.Soon after, one evening I was looking through real estate offerings on the Island and this property popped up “Coffee Plantation for sale”.I was drawn to this listing. Never had I even ever had a cup of coffee in my life, yet I was thinking, “What is it with this property?” I waited a few weeks and decided to call the realtor.When we connected we had an hours long conversation about life and about the plantation. Over the next several weeks I pondered about my conversation and about the property. Soon after I once again reached out to the realtor and said I would like to go back to Puerto Rico and see the property. I was following what I felt from the rainforest. Back on the Island when driving up to the property for the first time and stepping out on the soil, walking up to the wrap-around porch at the house, I once again was overtaken by emotion. So strong I can’t say it didn’t happen.I felt as if people that I knew were around me but I could not see them.
On the way back home to California and an hour before we landed I checked my email.My offer had been accepted. This was the end of August 2017. The following month Hurricanes Irma and Maria destroyed so much on the island and also the coffee plantations. Glued to the TV and talking to friends on the Island once they had restored some cell service, I felt it was my duty to put people back to work. I flew back to the Island in April to try to close the sale of the property. I experienced a lot of complications but seven months after Maria, many meetings, and my attorney working hard, escrow was finally closed. At that time I was at the plantation and I shouted out, ”Brother, Sister, Father where are you?” All these years I had been looking for my biological family and I knew felt closer than ever to finding them.
A month after the escrow closed, I found my brother as he too had taken the 23andme.com test. As I learned about my ancestry, I realized that the three municipalities the plantation lies within are where my ancestors came from - recently finding out that my Grandfather, and many Great Grandfathers were all from 16 miles of Hacienda Don Mateo with some in the ancestry as coffee farmers.
With the help of Kamey Batiz Wilson and Victor Rodriguez, Hacienda Don Mateo is formed! I have had the great opportunity to meet many in the mountains of Utuado, Lares, and Adjuantas. It takes a village and we will all help each other. I am committed to being a good neighbor and helping the island recover. One step at a time, I consider it my labor of love.The coffee plantations will flourish and Hacienda Don Mateo will be a place of refuge and tranquility where the hard work will pay off for employees and visitors alike for generations to come!
- Matthew Batista Naylor
Five years ago, I invited a friend on a trip for his birthday.We could have gone anywhere in the world, but the thought was, “Why not go to Puerto Rico?” At the time I didn’t know much about Puerto Rico other than from the Musical /Movie West Side Story. I don’t recall as a young adult ever having actually met someone from Puerto Rico.
So off to the Island we go. Landing and getting out of the airport, I remember a unique feeling setting over me that I could not really describe.Throughout the trip while exploring the island, there was a mysterious feeling of emotions I was experiencing being there.When leaving, I cried in my heart and I was not ready to go back to home life. When returning home, I felt some emptiness and thought about why memories of the Island kept me up at night, trying to understand how I could have such an intense and immediate connection with this island.
Less than a year later I invite another friend, Michelle to Puerto Rico. When we landed I had the same sense of feeling and connection as thefirst time. Throughout that trip people would come up to me and talk to me like I was from the Island. We were dancing in La Placita, an enchanted street in San Juan, somewhat like a horseshoe in shape,with open restaurants, live music and salsa dancing. Two older women, in what I imagine to be there 80’s, were sitting in some old wooden chairs. They saw me, grabbed my hand and sat me next to them almost like it was my grandma saying, “I have missed you my sweetie...where have you been?” It was definitely a feeling of de-ja-vu.The feeling of that moment, to have a connection like that but not understand why.When leaving to come home, I cried and again didn’t know why I felt this strongly about the island.I was all alone, not knowing how to deal with my feelings nor how to explain them to others.
Soon after this trip, I was scheduled to go to a conference in San Francisco, California with a group called, The American Adoption Congress, to meet up with my friend of many years, Susan Williams. While ditching one of the classes, I began telling her the story of my experiences in Puerto Rico.She said, “Matt, go take a DNA test.” I didn’t know what that was, but she explained, and so I ordered one while at the conference. When I returned home my DNA test was in the mailbox. I spit in a tube and sent it in to 23andMe.com. Impatiently awaiting the results, after six weeks, I finally received a confirmation email that the results were in. When logging into the website, the company has your ethnicity and DNA relatives. Boy was I surprised! I had thousands of relatives from Puerto Rico.I got goosebumps and then instantly realized that my trips to the island finally made sense. As they say in Puerto Rico “La sangre llama”, your blood calls to you. My blood did call to me.
The next trip I took was with Michelle and some friends and I remember when getting some true street food one of the vendors said, “Who is your family..are you related to the Rodriguez family up the street?” I wasn’t sure at that point, but who knows what I would find…..
The following year I went New York for the Puerto Rican Day Parade and then off with my friend, Mario (the same friend I took on that very first trip) and my nephew, Alex to Puerto Rico, to celebrate my 50th birthday. We went hiking in the rainforest, El Yunque, a most beautiful and sacred place. Alex and Mario had gone up ahead and I had stayed in an area with a pond and sat with my feet dangling off a rock in the fresh water stream. A feeling came over me like none before. For about 20 minutes, tears were running down my face and the hairs on my body were electrified.I felt as if I was being called home. My ancestors were talking to me.
The Birth of Hacienda Don Mateo
