These are the impressions that I gathered in the travel diary the day we arrived in Cuba:
Havana, April 18, 2011
Some days it is harder to summarize what is experienced and sense on paper, and this is one of those. Since I started thinking about coming to Cuba I knew this trip would not be one more. This country is unlike any you have visited before and yet it represents for me more than others. I remember being in school when a friend first talked of Communism repeating something I should have listened to at home: Fidel Castro Cuba had saved from being the whorehouse U.S.. At that time I did not really know or what was a whore but the name of the small island stuck in my mind wrapped in a mystery.
Over time I was interested in politics and Latin American adolescents, their revolutions, their hopes and terror of the US-backed dictatorships were part of my personal myths chord hit Silvio RodrÃguez or verses of Benedetti or Neruda, nothing too original otherwise. Cuba was no longer a mystery but a symbol strength and dignity.
Much has rained and more I've read since then, also on the horrors of totalitarian regimes of any sign. My values \u200b\u200bare still intact but I believe even more strongly that social injustice must be fought through a more educated and informed citizenry that demands to deepen democracy and not through repression that generates pain otherwise.
back to what we are dealing, as in all great trip out was not easy. Our first aircraft, which would lead to Panama, was delayed and was first aware of what a Colombian work visa. Today was more complicated than ever pass through immigration controls, these barriers are insurmountable for many Europeans do not perceive that it is open as if by magic our way. In Medellin I did respond to a questionnaire administered uncomfortable without any courtesy by the officer on duty, in the office of another Havana surprised me calling my name and taking me to a "partner" who asked me every detail of my stay. A few moments before getting off the plane, we heard how a passenger was being questioned Nicaraguan who was forced to reveal to the religion he professed. Last we heard was that he was taken to a separate room in the main hall.
After the bitter pill to swallow, at least for us, touched to change money into pesos convertibles and take a taxi to take us to the house in which we are staying in Centro Habana [text was written in the first day of travel]. This route already had their interest. I can not deny that I was surprised by the condition of buildings, especially that of a hospital where the broken windows were covered with plastic, nor that I was seized with sadness. The utopia of social equality is no less noble .
In Havana neighborhood is not just peeling walls, as we show in a romantic postcards and films, some buildings, unable to stand, have plummeted. The manor houses passed at the hands of the people after the revolution without losing its charm appear to reflect the resignation of many citizens. As we told the taxi driver, a Cuban earns an average of $ 25 a month so that painting is a luxury.
That does not mean that people do not have to eat. In addition to the ration card, which for now remains, although it seems that not too long, Cuba is a kind of dual market. One is internal, where you can buy commodities at a very affordable price and whose currency is the Cuban peso, the other is abroad, with international prices and paid in convertible pesos, a currency equivalent to 25 pesos and whose value is the dollar. Painting, and utensils such as toothbrushes, as we would find later, when imports are paid with the second currency and are too expensive for Cuban salaries.
Strolling through Central Havana night, with little lighting due to the shortage of oil for energy and without windows that encourage consumption, it reminds me that a city that professed the decrease be just that. Also full of people at any time that changes the mall by the conversation with the neighbor children playing in the street instead of catching the latest video games or an evening gentlemen way of fishing and not laying work overtime to pay the mortgage. In one way or another in these streets so missed practice the creative leisure environmentalists.
And yet the arrival we were shocked. When the taxi dropped us off in front of a wall without windows that are not divined the existence of any hostel and the door of which foreshadowed a dusty, dimly lit hallway, we did not imagine that the house which we were to stay would be so welcoming. Here live two women and a young proud of her English roots. Of them speak more calmly later. Moreover, a certain feeling of old Cartagena of my childhood, high ceilings and endless corridors, like those who went jogging in the house of my grandparents when I was sent to the kitchen for a glass of water.
The day has given him. Therefore we have begun to control prices rise in an instant for the tourist, as we have seen from the Malecon how the sun sank into a sea red and no boats. Before returning to rest we decided to take a rum in a small bar owned by a couple. The drink, as happens on the premises that are not made for tourists, has been pretty bad, but not the courtesy and conversation.
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