FACES OF CUBA

During our journey to Cuba in 2001, we were fortunate enough to get some outstanding shots of the local population. I share them with you here now. (Left click on each photo to make it larger). We asked each person their permission to be phutographed and tipped them $1 for the privilege. This first guy was a happy-go-lucky fellow we met in a small shopping mall in the El Vedado district, almost to Miramar (see map in part I). The man at top left, who looked like he had been through two world wars, we saw standing in a doorway, surrounded by paintings, in Habana Vieja. The old woman enjoying a cigar at top right we caught in the same area, nearby. Men and women alike enjoy fine Cuban cigars. The two girls struck a pose for us further into Habana Vieja. Spandex is very prevalent throughout Cuba. The man below left was a newspaper salesman we caught up with in the government district near Nuevo Habana. Next to him was an old woman we saw in Habana Vieja. Nrxt to her was a saintly lady we encountered in El Vedado. At bottom right was a happy young lady being held by her mom in Habana Vieja. To their left, very near the government district, we caught that lady enjoying her stogie. As I have taken the liberty of adding a few additional photos to the previous segments of my Cuba series, you may also wish to revisit the first four segments again.

At the conclusion of this piece, I will present my opinions on Cuba, its people, its government, and what I hope for her future.








































I would describe none of these people as feeling hopelessly oppressed, or desperately itching to leave their homeland, although a number of Cubans DO feel that way. For, while the Cuban Revolution has indeed cost them their freedom, the Castro government has done more to benefit the country than all of its neglectful predecessors, and for more of the population, too. For this reason I believe the people, most of them anyway, have come to accept life as it is. It seemed to us that the Cuban spirit was too lively to be caught in continual despair. The two families we stayed with did not display any noticeable discontent, or exhibit fear in having us stay in their dwellings. Both simply let us be and went about their business in a normal way. While their living conditions were modest, both had working 19" color TVs, and both had medium-level boom boxes, and each seemed content with what they had. They unsparingly offered us food and drink, which we joined them in on occasion.

In a tobacco shop, we spoke with a woman who had good command of English. She mentioned that everyone we saw on the street was wearing a "false face." We didn't press her for an explanation, but she did mention she had applied for an exit visa for herself and her daughter, so perhaps she was speaking mainly for herself. For most of the people we encountered were basically rather happy-go-lucky and seemingly content overall, although nobody would be totally content with product shortages being a fairly common occurrence. Our trade embargo against Cuba, the major cause of these shortages, began in 1960, after Cuba had nationalized some U.S. companies. It has been a total and complete embargo ever since, covering all types of products. Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez Parrilla has described it as an "economic, commercial, and financial siege" that has now entered its sixth decade. No such embargo exists between Canada, Britain, Germany, Japan, or any other major European or Asian power and Cuba, and no one else's citizens are restricted from either going there or spending money there. A report prepared for the UN General Assembly puts the cost of this embargo at US $750 BILLION, approximately 7 times Cuba's annual GDP. In other words, our embargo has cost Cuba 7 years of development. But has it worked? Has it convinced the Cuban government to change its ways? Absolutely not: all it has done is hurt the Cuban people. Needlessly.

China, the now vitally important U,S, trading partner and major supplier, still engages in major human rights violations among its own people. Press censorship is very tight there. Yet we ended our embargo against them nearly 40 years ago. There are infinitely more political prisoners today in China than there are in Cuba. So why do we continue to pick on Cuba for that reason? 36+ years ago, we were at war with Vietnam, and not only did they kill many thousands of our soldiers, they have certainly not granted their people the type of freedom we enjoy since the North took over the entire country in 1975. Yet we trade with them, but not with Cuba. We trade freely with Egypt, even provide them with billions in foreign aid, even though it is ruled by iron-fisted dictator Hosni Mubarak who has been guilty of many atrocities over a 29 year span, but we still refuse to trade with our next door neighbor Cuba. It is a most unfair paradox to keep Cuba out of our trading circle while we actively engage in trade with other repressive dictatorships across the globe. Why do we continue this insanity and double standard when none of the rest of the world does the same?

To be sure, the Castro government has been guilty of many deplorable human rights offenses. There have been executions of political opponents, and jailings without due process (SOUND FAMILIAR?). Press censorship is a way of life, and I abhor all of that. But because Cuba does not hold a strategic trump card for us the way China or Egypt do, it is unfairly being singled out for punishment. I, for one, say it is time for a more pragmatic approach.

In many ways, our embargo has backfired on us. Right off the bat, it pushed Cuba smack dab into the broad, outstretched arms of the old Soviet Union and away from us. Overreactions on both sides almost led to nuclear war in 1962 during the Cuban mMssile Crisis. But those days are long gone. Cuba hasn't had offensive missiles pointed at us for nearly 50 years, and gone are the days when Cuba was actively engaged in trying to export revolution to other Latin American countries by sending revolutionaries and soldiers. Countries like Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia, and even Brazil have instead instituted their own revolutions in recent years, mainly due to exploitation and benign neglect by the U.S. or the tin-horn dictators we once supported. That is a fact of life. Cuba didn't cause the leftward shift of a number of Central and Latin American governments: WE did! Our penchant for supporting any pro-American government so long as it was stable and anti-Communist, no matter how repressive it was to its own citizens, is the reason we have lost so much ground in that region. Our entire history of dominating the area through military intervention and by other means is full of glaring mistakes: Chile in 1973, and El Salvador and Nicaragua in the 1980s are the most current examples. Therefore, the days for punishing Cuba should come to a screeching halt. We simply must start to treat our southern neighbors as just that: fully independent neighbors who are not our possessions.

The main reason we persist in this folly of punishing Cuba is due to the strong influence of the free-Cuba lobby. Composed mainly of refugees and their families who fled Cuba just after the first days of the revolution, many of whom were wealthy and/or large landowners, they see the Castro regime as all evil and one which must be toppled so they can return home and once more establish control for themselves. While I share their desire for fair, open elections, the end of press censorship, and greater civil rights for Cuba's citizens, such things do not occur merely because we have pointed a gun at a foreign government and told them to toe the line or else. Also, these well-to-do landowners did very little before 1959 to really benefit the country. They catered to American gangsters and exploited Cuban workers to make a quick buck, just as our own corporations are now trying to do to us here in America right now. Also, few governments in history have been all good or all bad, and that is especially true of the Castro government. We were certainly not good to have engaged in torture or to have practiced rendition over the past decade! Even Hitler's Nazi regime was not completely bad: it lifted Germany out of the Great Depression with massive government spending and built the first modern freeway system in Europe, the Autobahn, for heaven's sake. In terms of exactly what the Castro government has accomplished during its tenure, consider these facts:

1). It turned a population that was 23% illiterate in 1959 into one with ONLY 4% ILLITERACY IN ONLY TWO YEARS' TIME! Today, UN estimates place this figure at 6.8%, but that is still evidence of remarkable progress! Education is FREE from kindergarten all the way up through a doctorate level in college (to those whose grades qualify them for it).

2). It has now the second highest number of doctors per capita of any nation on earth (we are far behind at no. 52), and health care for ALL is universal and FREE, just as it should be here! At the time of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, the country had 6,000 doctors, of which 3,000 left right after it occurred. Now there are over 64,000 doctors providing medical services all throughout the island. Cuba currently has three times as many doctors in the Third World as the World Health Organization! She also trains hundreds of medical students from the Caribbean and other developing countries free of charge, a most unselfish gesture! Today, at 75 years, the Cubans have achieved the longest life expectancy, and the lowest death rate among every 1,000 live births (7.1) in all of Latin America, AND THEY HAVE DONE SO IN SPITE OF OUR CRIPPLING EMBARGO WHICH SEVERELY LIMITS AVAILABILITY OF MEDICAL SUPPLIES AND EQUIPMENT! Imagine what they could accomplish if they were freed from that embargo!

3). All discrimination based on race, gender, and class inequality has been greatly reduced. I saw whites, mulattoes, and blacks mingling freely with one another, without the slightest hint of racism.

Our beazen attempt to blackmail Cuba into adopting an economy just like ours, with so-called "free" markets and an ever-expanding-in-wealth yet ever-shrinking ultra-rich elite, has been an abject failure. It has only strengthened Cuban resolve to resist, and has provided other developing nations with proof that the "American way" is NOT the only way to economic development! No other nation on earth punishes Cuba like we do, and this foolish course of action MUST end!

I do NOT support Cuba's excesses in the field of human rights. I do NOT support its press censorship. I am NOT suggesting that we coddle a dictatorship, or that their way of doing things is a paradise on earth. What I AM suggesting, though, is that we take the first step in thawing a very old and now very cold relationship. Just as one can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, if we show the Cuban government we are sincere and won't dictate terms to them, they will invariably feel less threatened by their big neighbor to the north and might well begin to slowly reform themselves ON THEIR OWN. We could, and SHOULD, begin this thawing out process with cultural exchanges centered around, say, Cuban baseball or Cuban jazz music. Then, the Presidents of each country should hold a summit and lay the groundwork for eventual full diplomatic relations to be restored. Travel restrictions between each country should end. At the very least, it is worth a try, especially because an effort like this has never really been made!




This, then, concludes my reminiscences of an unforgettable trip I made to Cuba 10 years ago. I sincerely hope that, within another 10 years, I shall be able to return there, LEGALLY, and note with great satisfaction that progress has been made to amend the excesses found in BOTH of our systems!












VIVA A NEW AND FULLY INDEPENDENT CUBA!!!

MY JOURNEY TO CUBA (PART IV)!

I had previously mentioned the abundance of artists and musicians found all throughout Havana. These street musicians taking five here are representative of what you'll find all over the city. I have never visited a city quite so alive with music!


On two separate nights, we went out to experience Havana's very active, very pulsing nightlife. Throughout the Miramar district (see map in part I of this series) and elsewhere, there are numerous all-night clubs where the music and dance seems endless. We went to two different jazz clubs the first night, and the show and musicianship were excellent! Salsa dancing couples were everywhere, and the musicians played very energetically for hours on end.

Cuban jazz is a mixture of many influences: lovely, melodic, and sensual Spanish guitar; African rhythms and percussion; and American horns. Let us not forget the ever-present melodic keyboard, too! The very catchy rhythms make you want to hit the dance floor nonstop. The music reflects the same subtle blending the Cuban population does: roughly 65% white, 10% black, 24% mulatto, and perhaps 1% Asian. Whites and blacks and mulattoes all mingle and dance together without a second thought, just as it should be. For an excellent representation of authentic Cuban jazz, much of it performed by actual old Cuban masters, go to Amazon.com and pick up a copy of the magnificent Buena Vista Social Club. Named after a 1940s members club in Havana, Cuban musician Juan de Marcos González and American guitarist Ry Cooder traveled to Cuba to record this gem of an album which I highly recommend. It won't be long before YOUR toes start tapping, too, and you'll be blown away by the musicianship!

We also attended an all-night cabaret which featured one fabulous troupe of dancers after another. The custumes were all richly colorful, and the acrobatic energy of each performance was incredible! So THIS Vwas what Havana was like in its 1940s-1950s heyday! Decadent and sensual, with an unending supply of drink and rhythmic music.


Shopping in Cuba is interesting. Apart from tiny kiosks in market squares, Cuba has two kinds of stores: peso stores, which accept and trade in pesos, and Dollar stores, which trade only in dollars or Euros. We stopped by a peso store but didn't stay very long. For one thing, as foreigners, we couldn't use the peso. For another, shelf after shelf was bare and there was hardly any reason for the shop to be open. This, unfortunately, is what locals not brandishing any dollars have to put up with - empty shelves and shortages. Dollar stores are much better stocked, but the goods found in them tend to be higher priced, although still a bargain by our standards. There are loads and loads of Columbian soft drinks (even the diet variety), but no Coke or Pepsi products to be found ANYWHERE! Much like an American convenience store, the Cuban dollar shops stock a wide variety of goods that can be purchased only with dollars. But there was absolutely NO American brands of anything to choose from! No Kellogg's Corn Flakes, no Schick or Gillette razors, no Kraft cheese or Swanson TV dinners - nothing. Our long term Cuban embargo has seen to that, so Cuba was forced to purchase similar, non-U.S. products from elsewhere in the hemisphere. Even though these dollar stores seemed well-stocked, we did find a curious shortage in one of them. We went to get toilet paper and a few other household odds and ends for our kindly Havana hosts. We couldn't find ANY toilet paper! There were several shelves of baby diapers, but no toilet paper! We summoned a clerk who said they had run out and he didn't know when more would come in. I wondered how many other Cubans would have to do without this basic household staple due in part to our embargo, and for how long...

It took me a few days to realize the peace and quiet one gets from not being continually bombarded with product ads, be they on billboards, TV, radio, or in print. For in Cuba, advertising simply doesn't exist. For that matter, neither does American football. While we were in Cuba over the Super Bowl weekend, we had no clue the Baltimore Ravens had defeated the New York Giants in the game until after we had landed back in Cancun, Mexico! The Cubans, it seemed, got along just fine without our overly abundant advertising or Super Bowl hype, and that was fine with me! The "Colon Lady" would never fly in Havana, and it made me stop to think how corporate America pesters and overwhelms us constantly with silly ads...













On our very last night in Havana, we thought we would go stay in a room at the Lincoln Hotel, which, if you remember, was where we had told the Customs agent at the airport where we had intended to stay 6 days earlier. Man, was that ever a mistake! We paid $30 each for the stinkiest, most mildew-infested dump I have ever stayed in! I went in the bathroom to shower and found that there was no hot water. I turned the dial over and over, but nothing came out. The bed smelled so dank and humidity-ridden I was almost afraid to sleep in it. I went over to each of my compatriots' rooms and found that there was something major league wrong with each of theirs, too. We decided to chalk it up to experience, and, what the hell, we'd be out of there in about 7 hours anyway! I've never slept in such a musty bed, and I hope I never do again, either. So much for medium-priced state-run hotels in Cuba---they can have them!

We made it to Jose Marti International Airport and soon were on our way back to Cancun. We surrended our tourist visas upon boarding the plane, so no one would be the wiser. Upon disembarking at Cancun, we had one last hurdle to overcome. As we went before the agent who was seated by himself at a table, we mentioned being Americans returning from Havana, and told him restamping our passport with "Cancun" only six days later, with no other stamps in between, might pose a problem with U.S. Customs once we got home. The agent looked at us slyly and said in heavily-accented English, "But is requirement for me to stamp passport. However, for a small gift, I may be able to make an exception..." We then put $5 in each of our passports. The agent snatched each bill and then dismissed us without restamping our passports. We figured he was used to such transactions and was very happy to get some extra American cash to bolster the Mexican pesos his paycheck would come in! You can always count on the corruption of a Mexican official, and once more we had dodged a bullet, seemingly miraculously! It was a calculated risk that paid off. We then booked our regular Northwest Airlines flight back to Minneapolis, where sailing through Customs there was a breeze (even for my high school friend, who had loaded up his heavy winter parka with various Cuban wood carvings he had purchased on the streets of Havana, and me with the souvenir Che Guevara beret I had bought).

In the aftermath of 9/11, such a trip like this, done the way it was done, may no longer be possible. I hope to return to Cuba someday, before it once more falls to American corporatist influence and becomes perverted with profit motive and that wretched advertising, much as the rest of the world has. Good as well as bad, my six days in Cuba I will always remember and treasure, for its lack of corporatism as well as for the art and beauty of its people!




UP NEXT: "FACES OF CUBA" and my final conclusions about this magnificent journey!

MY JOURNEY TO CUBA (PART III)!

My Canadian friend had heard of a lovely natural hot spring southwest of Havana called San Diego de los Banos [the baths at San Diego], so we decided to hire a driver to take us there. We went to a sort of taxi stand where there were dozens of old American cars parked. After haggling with a few of the drivers on price, we eventually settled on $15 one way to make the roughly 75 mile trip.

We crawled into his mid '50s Chev and soon we were off. About 4 or 5 miles outside of the city, all traffic seemed to vanish. Here we were at midday, on what appeared to be a major 4 lane superhighway, and we were the ONLY car on the road! It was eerie passing under one freeway overpass bridge after another and seeing absolutely no other cars! Eventually we came to and overtook a horse drawn wagon carrying what appeared to be 8 or 10 farm workers slowly moving down the right hand lane of this major thoroughfare. Bizarre! After another few miles, we eventually saw another car, and after a few more miles, yet another. But for long stretches of time, it was only us. It had the feeling of being in a strange Twilight Zone episode!

Left click on each photo to make it larger.
It wasn't long before the landforms around us began to change. Slowly, they got more hilly and then mountainous. We were enthralled with the incredible beauty and peacefulness of the Cuban countryside. We were truly in the tropics, and they were gorgeously lush, green, and forested, with beautiful palm trees everywhere.

Eventually, we reached our destination. We went inside the structure at left, paid our admittance fee and locker rental (both were a mere pittance), and then were advised to strip completely naked before entering the bath. We put our clothes in a locker and then went down a long descending walkway, and suddenly there we were. It was a large pool, for males only (the females had a similar one nearby, which we understandably didn't see). In each separate pool, fresh hot spring water was piped in. It was only us and maybe 2 or 3 other bathers. Funny thing, though: off to the side was a middle-aged WOMAN sitting there minding the pool! She didn't even bat an eye at us as we went into the delightfully warm (93 degree) water. We joked that it didn't really matter because she had obviously seen it all many times before in her job, but it still seemed weird to be swimming like naked jaybirds right in front of this lone female. Unaffected, though, we swam stark naked for about 15 minutes under the watchful eye of this onviously disinterested woman. Then we got out, toweled ourselves off and headed back up for a relaxing massage. This time, we were advised to cover ourselves with our towels before we each climbed up onto our own individual massage table. None of these also-female masseuses was notably attractive, but could they ever give a massage! For the next half hour, we were in massage nirvana! At the end of our session, we were fully relaxed and went back to our lockers, put on our street clothes, and reemerged back into the ticket area. Here we began speaking in half Spanish, half English with one of the attendants. She asked where we were from, and where we were going. We told her, and mentioned that we wanted to see some tobacco and sugar cane fields. She told us to wait for about an hour; she would be off work at that time, and then she and her boyfriend who had a car would be along to pick us all up and take us on a little tour. We couldn't believe our luck! For the next 45 minutes, we walked through the small village we were in, noticing several thatched-hut dwellings and one small but very ornate Catholic church. During Pope John Paul II's visit to Cuba three years before, he persuaded Fidel Castro to allow more freedom for the church. Both this church and the one in Havana were open during our stay, as a result. We also saw a unique above-the-ground cemetary during our walk around.

Sure enough, an hour later the boyfriend came by. He spoke no English, so after a short explanation from the attendant, we hopped into his back seat. It was getting near supper time by then, so we decided to treat them both to supper at a nearby private establishment. At that point in time, the Castro government was allowing private restaurants seating no more than 12 people to exist in private homes. The owners of these restaurants paid a fee to the Cuban government for the privilege. I am not certain if this is still the case ten years later, but the policy was definitely in effect back in 2001. This couple knew of a spot like that nearby, so we all settled in for a nice authentic Cuban supper of beans, rice, pork, banana chips, Havana Club rum and Cristal beer. We were already in Pinar Del Rio province, so the boyfriend said after our meal that he would drive us to the nearby provincial capital city of the same name, where he said he knew of a couple who could put us up for the night. Then, the next day at 10:00 AM, he said he would pick us up and give us a tour of nearby tobacco and sugar cane fields. After that, he would take us back to Havana - all for the unbelievably low price of only $40!!! We happily agreed. (I learned later that baseball players Tony Oliva, Jose Contreras, and Alexei Ramirez all hailed originally from Pinar Del Rio)! Regrettably, though, I was never able to attend a Cuban baseball game, although if I do ever return, that will be at the top of my priority list!

We stayed that night for $25 each in two separate rooms with a nice young Cuban couple who had 2 young boys. She spoke no English and he only a little, but it didn't matter. He was brimming with curiosity about the United States and Canada. Where were we from? How cold did it actually get there? How did we like Cuba so far? He mentioned that he had applied for an exit visa to move he and his family to Spain, where he said his great-grandfather had originally come from. He mentioned that it may take a few years to get that coveted visa. That was as close as we came to a political discussion; we were never in a situation where one was called for, really. We told him so far we had very much enjoyed our stay in Cuba, and how much we loved the kindness and hospitality shown us by its people. Our Canadian friend took a photo of this Cuban family sitting together with my high school friend and I before we parted the next morning. We mailed him a copy after our return home, and we hope he got it. Perhaps he was successful in finally getting that visa. We can only hope so, but have no way of knowing!

True to his word, our driver from the previous night showed up with his girlfriend at precisely 10 AM. He took us out to a nearby tobacco field and I got out for a picture. Workers around us continued their tasks and didn't even take notice. It was an incredible experience to stand right among those who were producing the finest and most sought-after tobacco in the entire world! My own smoking days had ended years before, but I had always wondered what it would be like to stand in a Cuban tobacco field, and now here I was with them!

On the way back to Havana, we stopped briefly on that previously described abandoned superhighway and ran across to the other side, where there were huge amounts of sugar cane growing wildly. We each snapped off a stalk and sampled it. I had never tasted sugar cane before, and I was amazed at the liquid and part-granular texture of what came out of the stalk and its pure sweetness! Wow, I thought - this stuff was so pure and good, it could be drunken by the gallon!

We made it back to our spot in Havana, collectively $40 poorer, but immeasurably richer in the rewarding experience. We bade the couple farewell, and they were back off to San Diego de los Banos once more while we returned to our apartment overlooking the Gulf of Mexico. That night, we would attend a jazz club and partake of Havana night life. It would definitely be a very full and rewarding day!


For some SUPERB videos, Google Havana: City: City Guide, weather, and facts galore from Answers.com.


UP NEXT IN PART IV: HAVANA NIGHT LIFE, AND SHOPPING IN CUBA!

MY JOURNEY TO CUBA (Part II)!

For some SUPERB videos, Google Havana: City: City Guide, weather, and facts galore from Answers.com.

This was as close as I came to seeing any "propaganda" and I found it hanging inconspicuously in a small shop window. In a nearby mall, perched over a staircase, I saw a small sign which read "Revolucion Victoriosa en el Nuevo Milenio" [Victory to the Revolition in the New Millenium], and painted across another wall was "Rio Revolucion" [Revolution River]. But that was IT as far as political signs or slogans! I had expected much, much more. We discussed it later and surmised that perhaps the regime was trying to tone it down to attract western investment after the Soviet Union had ceased to exist and was no longer subsidizing the Cuban economy...

Left click on each photo to make it larger.

Early the morning of our second day in Havana, Cuba, we took to the streets to explore the city. We began in our home El Vedado district with a large open air craft and art show about 1 block from where we were staying. Here we were astounded to find huge galleries of paintings and other handicrafts for sale in a vacant lot nearby.

I picked up a small painting and my friend bought some exquisite wood carvings. We soon found other such exhibits all over Havana. The art and music you find virtually everywhere is truly amazing. Artists display their wares all over, and sell them very cheaply. The wood carvings are gorgeous and of very good quality, as you can see here by this artisan's work.




There is seemingly not a single bar or restaurant without a small samba music group performing either inside or right out on the street. Cuban jazz is incredible. We stopped by a nightclub and saw firsthand the spectacular musicianship and energy of the performers. They played for literally 2 hours without a break, and their stage presence and musicianship was not only good, but frantically energetic as well.

Dancers abound and will often give an impromptu performance. They, too, seemed to erupt with boundless energy, and I soon became aware that I was probably one of the fattest men in all of Havana! For the Cuban diet consists mainly of fruit, beans, rice, nuts and grains, chicken, and fish. Red meat is rare, and you can bet their foods contain NONE of the fattening crap like the high fructose corn syrup and corn starch we find in overabundance in our American diets! Wherever we saw a food kiosk, we saw the same things being offered: hot dogs (they were always out of these, so I have yet to comment on a Cuban hot dog), and Jamon y Case (a ham and cheese sandwich). We early on ordered a very flat dish pizza, which was bland. I don't know what kind of cheese they used on it, but it sure wasn't mozzarella! Overall, the food is fairly bland, without spices. (I attributed their lack of spices to the trade embargo we have had them under since 1960, but I could be wrong). I DID, however, have two exquisite meals in Havana. One was a delectable shrimp dinner right in Cathedral Square, and the other was an all-you-can-eat brunch for $12 at a hotel on the waterfront. It was only open to foreigners (perhaps only they could afford it) and it had everything: ham, potatoes and gravy, beef, chicken, many kinds of fruit and pastries --- you name it!


We even got to "perform", dancing and singing, with one of the groups in a small bar we stopped in as they sang the old Sandpipers' tune from 1966 called "Guantanamera!" The song was actually written by a Cuban, I am told. As you can see, I had a very good time singing harmony and shaking the castanets with the young senorita!

While we walked much of the way, we did indulge in several mini-taxi rides. These little yellow taxis are found all throughout the city, and are relatively cheap to ride. They are for the most part 3-seaters, and sure came in handy when we were fatigued. We rode them down the Malecon, a wide esplanade running 8 km from El Vedado into the old original harbor. All along the way, we were captivated by the beautiful well-kept-up Spanish baroque architecture which surrounded us on all sides. We took dozens of pictures and were never bothered by anyone, including police.

We went to and drank in a bar that Hemingway used to frequent, called La Bodeguita Del Medio. It was adjacent to the beautiful cathedral I stood in front of for the beginning of part I's post. In this bar, I made an amazing discovery. It had the ONLY toilet seat I saw on ANY toilet ANYWHERE in Cuba! That's right, folks: I don't know if toilet seats are viewed as expensive and unnecessary utility parts for toilets, but I saw NONE anyhere in Cuba except in the bar Hemingway favored! Cubans evidently sit on the rim or squat and tend to their business, I guess. Another curious phenomenon: after wiping, toilet paper is never thrown into the toilet bowl and flushed away. Instead, it is thrown into a basket besude the toilet (which is emptied out regularly). But back to the toilet seat in Hemingway's favorite haunt: it was SO soiled with urine, I couldn't imagine anyone ever sitting on that seat!!!

We eventually ended up in the government section of the city and walked all around each government building. On our way there, we were surprised to see several dangerously open slits near the sidewalk right along the huge, wide boulevard leading up to the capitol. We found it odd that such a thing would exist only a half a mile or so from the Cuban seat of government, but then we reminded ourselves that horrible slums exist only a very short distance from our own Capitol in Washington, D.C. The Cuban "White House" and Capitol are housed together in one building shaped eerily like our own Capitol. Just beyond this area lies the office and business section of the city, which we didn't bother to explore. Seen one; seen 'em all.


I had my picture taken outside the Interior Ministry building, home of Cuba's secret police. Its notable characteristic is a huge neon light in the shape of noted revolutionary Che Guevara, who was killed by the CIA while trying to export revolution to Bolivia in 1967. The only thing I can say about a tightly-run dictatorship like Cuba is that I felt far safer at night on the street there than I do even in my own town! Street crime is simply not condoned in Cuba, and no one ever accosted us at all. Though I'm sure we were being watched, I could never detect anyone tailing us, so evidently the sceret police do their job most professionally in that country. I would guess after having had 41 years' experience at that time, that would be the case. We roamed all over at will and were never interfered with, nor were the other foreigners (Danes, Swedes, Germans) we encountered in various bars and other places. Of course, we kept mainly to ourselves and stayed inconspicuous, but it was clear to anyone that we were tourists. To be honest, I was kind of disappointed that we were never stopped or questioned even once!

One of the amazing and amusing things about Cuba is the fact that 1 out of every 5 or 6 cars on the road there are original 1950s-style American Chevys, Fords, or Dodges. As you can see from the photo at right, many are still in pristine shape! It is a tribute to Cuban pride, ingenuity, and determination that they have been able to keep these things running after having been deprived of the necessary spare parts due to our embargo against them for the past 50 years! To be sure, many belch smoke while being driven, and others lack working door or window handles, but it is still incredible to find them running at all. It was exactly like stepping out of a time machine and emerging in 1960!


COMING IN PART III: PINAR DEL RIO ["RIVER OF THE PINES"] - AN EXCURSION INTO TOBACCO AND SUGAR CANE COUNTRY!

MY JOURNEY TO CUBA (Part I)!

Jack Jodell surrounded by two native beauties in Cathedral Square, Havana. (Left click on each photo to make it larger).

Map of Havana, by district. We scoured the city in 4+ days.

George W. Bush had barely been installed in office 7 days when I, an old high school friend, and a Canadian we both knew who financed our trip (the only legal way a U.S. citizen could make such a trip) left from Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport to visit the communist country of CUBA. We flew down to Cancun, Mexico, and, upon clearing customs, immediately booked a flight with the Mexican airlines to Havana, the capital city of Cuba. There was a three hour wait for the flight to begin boarding, so we sat down to pass the time.

Having done quite a bit of advance reading on how best to travel in Cuba without running into difficulty, we went over our story to relate to Cuban customs. We know that the Castro government at that time was permitting a limited number of its citizens to accept foreigners as house guests, and that was our aim, rather than staying in an overpriced state hotel. We also knew we needed at least $50 per person per day in US Dollars (the going rate 10 years ago, and the figure our Canadian friend had given my other friend and I before we had all boarded the plane). The US dollar was the accepted currency back then. The Cuban peso was and still is basically worthless on the world market, so US dollars were required for all foreigners to have and spend in Cuba, an ingenious way for them to have access to a stable currency for trade with the rest of the globe. I understand now that the Euro is the accepted currency in Cuba, but at the time it was only our greenbacks foreigners were allowed to spend. We also knew to tell the customs agent that we were planning on staying at the Lincoln Hotel, a low-to-mid-priced hotel in Havana often frequented by tourists. We also knew to avoid doing or saying anything controversial, as the last place we wanted to end up in was a Cuban jail, without hope of intercession from a non-existant U.S. Ambassador!

My friend and I had long talked about visiting Cuba, just to see what it would be like living in a tightly-controlled police state (if indeed that was what it was) for a few days; to see if our government's anti-Cuban propaganda had any merit (it really didn't, as far as we could tell); to see evidence of anti-American posters and such (oddly enough, we saw NONE); and to basically see if the stories we had all heard from childhood were true about how most of the population was trapped, miserable, wamted to leave the island, endured constant shortages, etc. Oddly enough, rather than a dour, unhappy populace, we found the country to be a lively mecca of art and music, with little outward evidence of unhappiness. We also wanted to see all the old 1950s American Chevys, Dodges, and Fords still in use and in operation throughout the country. We got all that we wanted and then some, but let me return here to our departure.

Eventually, the time to board our flight to Havana arrived. We got on the plane and we were off. An hour or so later we would be disembarking in Havana, and we couldn't wait! Once we were airborne, we noticed a woman speaking in accented English with another passenger.

We learned that her name was Maria, and she was an Italian national who had married an abusive American (whom she later divorced), and was living by herself in Nevada. She was on her way to visit her brother, also an Italian national, who was LIVING IN HAVANA and coordinating visits of Cuban dancers and musicians between Cuba and Italy. We looked at each other and realized we had discovered gold: here was the chance to pick the brain of a guy who knew Havana inside and out. We mentioned our desire to her and she said, "That would be fine. I'll mention it to him when we arrive, but only one problem - he doesn't speak a word of English, so I will be happy to be your interpreter. He will also help us find accomodations!" We couldn't believe our ears at this stroke of luck. We spent the rest of our flight getting to know one another, and agreed to meet her and her brother once we had all gotten out of customs.

Keep in mind, this was before 9/11, so boarding and unboarding airline flights were FAR less cumbersome than today! Once we filed into customs, we spoke to a guard sitting behind a tall counter, which obscured our view of anything below his chin. He asked each of us why we had come to Cuba, and we told him we admired the Cuban revolution and wanted to return home to tell our friends about its accomplishments. The agent glared at us and said nothing. Finally, he asked for our passports. I mentioned that two of us were American citizens and that stamping our passport "Havana" could cause us much political trouble back home. He simply glared back and took the passports. He examined each for a moment and then we heard the unmistakable "kerplunk, kerplunk, kerplunk" of three passports being stamped. I thought, "Oh, shit! How will I ever be able to explain this to American customs back home?" Even though we were observing proper protocol by letting our Canadian friend be the one who was treating us, we simply had wanted to avoid ANY evidence of our trip to Cuba, just in case. But my fears were short-lived, as the customs agent handed our passports back, broke into a huge smile, and said enthusiastically, "Welcome to Cuba!" Upon examining our passports, we found that he had stamped a separate document, a tourist visa, and had inserted IT into our passports. We were to hand this document in to airline authorities when we boarded our return flight to Mexico. Whew! I thought: we had dodged our first Cuban bullet!

We soon met up with Maria and her brother. Night had fallen and we had no idea where we were going to bed down. He, through her, advised us to remain quiet as he flagged down a taxi-van, and soon we were off into the night. After about a 40 minute ride, we stopped and left the taxi. He told us that he had a friend who could put us up for $25 per person per night. He had us wait outside while he went upstairs into a 10 story apartment building which we found out later had been made by the Sovirts in the 1960s. After a short time, he invited us all in to meet and pay our new host, a mid-30s-ish man with a wife and small boy. He and his sister stayed on the fourth floor and we three others each had our own separate bedroom.

Spartan yet immaculate, up one floor higher than Maria and her brother, we each settled in. . Turns out our host had government permission to house foreigners and therefore had the necessary rooms. We all then had a small meal of fish and rice, washing it down with a lovely Heineken-like Cuban beer called Cristal. Hey, we were home free and settled at last! It was now quite late at night, so we all settled down to sleep in a perfect little spot in northernmost Havana, the El Vedado region looking out directly over the Gulf of Mexico. The very next day we resolved to scour the city itself.

COMING UP IN PART II: Habana Vieja and Plaza de la Revolucion!

And, for some SUPERB videos, Google Havana: City: City Guide, weather, and facts galore from Answers.com.

A NEW LATIN AMERICAN TSUNAMI

"People don't give one shit [about Latin America]."
- Richard M. Nixon -

"Well, I learned a lot. You'd be surprised. They're all individual countries."
- Ronald Reagan -

"[Latin America] is a dagger pointed at the heart of America."
- Henry Kissinger -

Gone are the days we could smugly consider Central and South America "ours." The arrogance and ignorance which led then-Vice President Nixon to dismiss Cuba's Fidel Castro as "a communist" after meeting with him for only one hour in 1959 (and for President Eisenhower to blow off that meeting altogether to play golf), and for President Ronald Reagan to assume that Latin America was monolithic, was as fatally flawed then as that condescending attitude is today. Nixon and Reagan would shit hemorrhages if they could see the state of Latin America at present. For what was once an entire region wholly dominated by the United States is now one acting completely independent of, and often contrary to, the wishes of Washington. Nixon, Reagan, corporate America, and even Bush never realized it, but their short-sighted and self-centered policies have pushed nearly all of our southern neighbors into the varying degrees of anti-Washington frenzy they are now in. Unless we soon alter our course and apractice, we will feel negative consequences from this for many years to come.

One might assume that our current dicey scenario in Latin America is all the fault of Republican rule. That is not the case. Democratic Presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson also contributed, albeit with GOP pressure and influence never far removed. The Cuban embargo, begun under Eisenhower (but tightened under Kennedy) remains in force to this very day. The ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion (another Eisenhower/CIA gem) was foolishly followed through upon by Kennedy. Both actions pushed Cuba further away from us and firmly into the outstretched arms of the Soviet Union. Johnson sent American troops into the Dominican Republic in 1965 to "restore order," but the end result was the same it has always been: The overthrow of a democratically-elected leftist government and its replacement by a military junta or repressive right-wing dictatorship beholden and subservient to the United States. There is a shamefully long list of countries in this region we have directly or indirectly interfered with just in my lifetime: Guatemala, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Chile, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Jamaica, Grenada, Panama, and Haiti. Our business interests and CIA have also worked diligently and clandestinely in Honduras and Mexico to influence their economies and politics. These actions have not spoken well for our supposed desire to spread freedom and democracy all across the globe, our moral and ethical standards, or our credibility. For, in much of Latin America (as in Iraq) we have often attempted to forcibly install democracy at the point of a gun. In extreme cases, we haven't even attempted to install a democracy, but have instead overthrown governments we felt would threaten our business or strategic interests, and then accepted whatever new, U.S.-friendly group came in to fill the power vacuum. In 1973, for example, our CIA (with Nixon White House backing) even directed the coup in Chile which resulted in the death of the first democratically-elected Marxist President, Salvador Allende. No matter that he won fair and square, or that he was committed to democracy and a free press: He threatened our business interests and was too friendly with Cuba. His replacement? The brutally repressive and murderous military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Shameful indeed. But, at last, there are clear signs today that Latin America as a whole is finally throwing off the burdensome yoke of Yankee domination in favor of radical reform designed to greatly reduce our influence and relieve longstanding, widespread poverty.

Since 1959, Fidel Castro's Cuba had been a lonely voice repeatedly calling out for an end to U.S. domination of Central and South America. In 1999 it was finally joined by Hugo Chavez's Venezuela. Both countries nationalized American and foreign-owned companies and subsidiaries and began a long series of radical reforms designed to aid their poor and end the poor's exploitation by big business interests. Regrettably, Cuba's revolution evolved into a dictatorship, with murder and imprisonment of opponents and political prisoners, as well as suppression of press freedom. But Cuba now has universal education and a literacy rate of 96%, compared with an ILLITERACY rate of 95% when its 1959 revolution began. It also has universal health care in many ways superior to that received by the "free" citizens of many other Latin American countries! Thankfully, subsequent change in Venezuela and other Latin American nations has not been as brutal or undemocratic. In the past few years, Cuba and Venezuela have been joined by a tsunami of popularly-elected leftist governments dedicated to similar reforms. Their degree of radicalism varies from Cuba's, Venezuela's, and Bolivia's to more moderate forms found in Brazil, Chile, and Argentina. The extent of this wave of change is phenomenally widespread, from Daniel Ortega's Nicaragua, to Evo Morales' Bolivia, to Rafael Correa's Ecuador, to Fernando Lugo's Paraguay, to Argentina's Cristina Fernandez De Kirchner, to Michelle Bachelet's Chile, and beyond. These are indeed monumental and exciting times south of our border! ALL of these governments are leftist, which would give both Nixon and Reagan severe indigestion. In fact, a recent conference of Latin American countries held in Costa Do Sauipe, Brazil, was attended by 33 like-minded nations and included our neighbor, Mexico. They called for a regional union of these countries (to EXCLUDE the United States), and for the U.S. to end its unnecessary 49 year embargo against Cuba. A number of these governments are now even courting direct Chinese investment. Such occurrences would have been unthinkable even 15-20 years ago!

Naturally, little of this amazing transformation has been covered in much detail by our corporatist, sensationalist media. They have been far too busy dazzling us with stories about the excesses of Paris Hilton and Britney Spears, Sarah Palin's clothes and calendars, Barack Obama's beach physique and basketball prowess, and Joe the phony Plumber's attempts to secure a country music recording contract. They have severely underreported the breadth and scope of Latin American change. The overwhelming majority of Americans are as painfully ignorant about events in our own back yard as Sarah Palin is about foreign affairs generally. Unforgivable. Our media provides us with more info on the planet MARS than it does on our southern neighbors! This is disgraceful and cannot serve us well long term. For the days are gone where we can immorally prop up corrupt and friendly Latin American regimes doing our bidding and representing only the 1-2% wealthiest elite while the rest of the population struggles and suffers. Our government, media and people MUST begin developing a better knowledge and understanding of our southern neighbors. Continued ignorance and benign neglect of these countries is inexcusable and cannot continue.

We are NOT the center of the universe! Readers of this blog, and ALL Americans, can take the lead by Google-ing each Latin American country and each leader and learning more about them. Hopefully, with a new and more enlightened administration set to take office soon, our CIA will finally be directed to keep its nose out of Latin America's private affairs and will begin to aim its focus where it should, as in defeating the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. The incoming Obama administration can work wonders in Latin diplomacy right off the bat by ending the ridulous Cuban embargo. ALL of our friends and allies alike, including Canada, Mexico, and the European community, trade with Cuba. So does China. And so, at long last, should we. Our new administration can also encourage new and greatly expanded cultural, educational, and trade relations with Latin America. Properly doing so will restore good will and may also limit China's penetration and influence in our own neighborhood. We can even learn from these countries and gain from their experience, but not if they hate us or we have blinders on. Brazil, for example, took only about a decade to become fully energy independent, and achieved this long ago. Rather than fight the forces of change, as we have so often done in Latin America in the past, we now have a golden opportunity to embrace and ride the crest of this exciting new wave of Central and South American independence. Doing so will benefit all nations in this hemisphere immeasurably!

NEXT WEEK: AN END TO DIVISIVE WEDGE ISSUES!