Heat’n Up and more Cuba

I’m kinda tired of this summer already, wait, who am I kidding? I’m totally done with this summer! It has been nothing but hot and humid. I think more so than any of the past years I’ve been in Florida. This year is also especially rainy and we haven’t had any tropical events (knocking on wood) since the little something we had just before Memorial Day and Florence and friends all stayed east. There was enough hoopla for us to cancel a trip to the Keys on Memorial weekend, but when it was all said and done, it really wasn’t that bad.

Hot and humid, yes, I know it’s Florida and is expected, but I think spending the week in Cuba really got me heated up. It was really hot in Cuba, I mean REALLY hot. I have no clue what the actual daily temperature was, but it was no fun walking the broken streets of Cuba when it was so hot. We’d pass from one side of the street to the other, looking for shadows just to keep some of the sun off. And for those that know me, I applied, and re-applied the 70 SPF sunscreen. I’m happy to say I did not get a sunburn while in Cuba, I did however manage to get one two days after I returned at a charity event called Melons for Moolah (I’ll tell you later about as it was a Guinness Book of World Records attempt). Smelling the fumes from the classical cars or the nasty stuff in the garbage bins waiting to be hauled away, certainly made one’s stomach churn. Mine was churning a lot while in Cuba.

My overall experience with Cuba was a positive one. It certainly isn’t a place I choose to go for vacation, even if we were allowed to as American’s, but it was an eye-opening experience. There is great need for assistance in Cuba as many of the people there do not receive a working wage, have little food to feed their family, and just have difficulties many in the United States do not. Things we take for granted are not afforded to many people in Cuba.

The first thing that made me go “hmmm” was just the amount of time I saw people queuing. They queued for a Wi-Fi card, they queued for food, for clothing, for soaps, pretty much everything. Wi-Fi cards are only available at certain stores, and they are only good for one hour, and they are very limited in supply. Individuals could queue outside a telecom store just waiting for the opportunity to buy a Wi-Fi card.  Once you buy the card, you can’t even go back to the comfort of your home to use it, no, the government does not allow for private Wi-Fi hubs in the homes. That means you would have to use one of the public Wi-Fi places, usually outside in a park or hope to catch a signal from a hotel or restaurant. We usually saw individuals hanging around outside restaurants trying to catch a signal.

We purchased a Wi-Fi card the day prior to our final day as we wanted to be able to check-in for our flight. We had to pay $7 for the hour card from the hotel. We found out the next day, had we bought the card in the bar of the hotel, we could have gotten the card plus a drink for $5. It was in the same hotel! The Wi-Fi worked, but it was about as slow as dial up. You remember those days, when AOL was popular with the “You’ve Got Mail!” announcement.

Just prior to our leaving we were informed starting in July, the Cuban government was going to open up the ability for Cubans to get data on their phones so they wouldn’t have to be dependent up the Wi-Fi cards. I do hope this will bring some comfort to the Cuban people because even though I didn’t have a problem going a week without any technology, I do appreciate being able to open my eyes to what’s going on around me in Florida, the United States and even across the world with what’s on internet. Granted, one still has to be careful with what they read on internet because all isn’t properly sources/vetted, but in general, I do think internet has opened my eyes to people who aren’t necessarily like me, really aren’t that different either. Everyone is just doing what they feel is best for their survival and their family’s survival.

I said queuing is probably the biggest time killer in Cuba. The concept of a Sam’s Club, Super Target, or even a Publix (I am in Florida gotta give a thumb up for a local) is totally lost on a Cuban person. In Cuba they have stores (very small ones) scattered through out the city. Remember, my Spanish is nada, but one store we kept seeing over and over and always had people lining up so we were intrigued so my husband walked in. For those of you who remember my blog from India, I thought it was ok to be intrigued here, I mean it was a store, not a somewhat isolated corner, or a road median if you remember.

The store had only soap for sale; hair soap, hand soap, laundry soap, deodorant etc. That’s it, soap! Everything was nicely stacked behind the counter and if you wanted something, you had to ask the counter attendant to hand you the item you wanted then check out with the cashier.

Same was true for the small stores. They were closer to the size of a small gas station convenience store. I’m not talking about a WaWa, or RaceTrack or ShopEz (had to put that one in for those reading from Nebraska), QuikMart, Casey’s, etc. it is small. Again, there would be 3-4 people standing behind the counters and then the person would have to take the item to the cashier to cash out. This is the way everything we saw was sold in Cuba. An attendant removes the item from the shelf, passes to the customer, then the customer takes the item to the cashier.

They had fruit stands on carts or corner shops were open air, the eggs were sold from a broken corner building (not refrigerated like in Europe/Asia) and from what we could tell, individuals getting eggs were being tracked, with their names being taken as they received eggs. Meat was also sold from little corner shops and it was fresh meat.

We also saw some shops reminded us of Soviet Era in which people received beans and rice rations. We were told the government does provide some rations to the Cuban people, but it certainly isn’t enough to feed a family for a month.

The inefficiencies with queuing and the lack of transportation for Cuban people would make the like most of us in American are used to living very difficult. Most of us own cars and if we don’t, it’s because we can depend upon public transportation. For me, I grew up in rural America so the first tax I ever rode in was in Philly a few years after I graduated from high school. The first public bus I rode in was in Chicago and that was well after I graduated from college.

In Cuba, Havana and even the country side, public transportation is minimal. We didn’t see very many city buses in Havana, most of the buses we did see were caring tourists. Same with the classic cars; most were transporting tourist, very few were carrying Cubans and when the car did, it was nothing to see 6-10 people get out of them. They mostly shared the fares; car after car would pass by the Cuban people in hopes of picking us up as tourists. I’ve never been whistled at so much in my life! That plus there was the constant call of “Taxi?”. It didn’t matter, the calls were coming from classic cars, modern cars (from 80’s – 90’s), bicycle cabs, rickshaws, and we even had a motorcycle side car trying guy trying to pick us up with “Taxi?”.

I find it hard to believe Cubans are able to make it to work on time without the use of reliable transportation. There is no way they could be to work at 9 am on a regular basis unless they had pre-planned for the transportation. It would drive me bonkers if I lived in Cuba. I was raised that you were always “On-Time” and “On-Time” meant you arrived at someone’s house at least 10 minutes early and then you waited in the car. When the agreed upon time arrives, you are at the door step knocking/ringing the door bell, no exceptions! This was done out of respect for the other individual but also because time is important. Their time and your own.

What we did see over and over in Cuba was people helping people. They were genuinely happy to see the tourist there, and us as Americans. They don’t necessarily know the difficulty we go through to get to Cuba, but they do see the Americans as the group of individuals that are most supporting of them. While I wouldn’t rate my trip to Cuba’s as one of my top vacation destinations, but if I take look back at it in context, it was a trip to Support the Cuban People, I would say it was a satisfying trip.

We supported the Cuban people by learning as much as possible about their culture, their beliefs and their day to day struggles. We didn’t spend time in hotels lounging around the pools or drinking infinite amounts of alcohol; we really tried to immerse ourselves with the locals. In fact, the top three things to do in Cuba are (this is not the official list, but according to the Cuban people it certainly could be), 1) drink rum, 2) some a Cuban Cigar, 3) eat pork; so, when we were constantly telling Cubans that we didn’t do any of the three, they would politely ask “Why are you in Cuba?”, our response was to support you, and other Cubans.

We ate mostly street food each day; and many times, were buying three meals as we could usually find a person near the establishment that looked like they could use a good meal and a bottle of water. We know we were just two people in Cuba for a week, but we wanted to make that week count and even though we couldn’t make great change, we hopefully changed that Cuban persons mind for an hour or two as they didn’t have to wonder where their meal was coming from for that day. It’s that kind of simple work that really makes you feel good and made the difficult trip worth while because end the end, we did what we were supposed to do, we supported the Cuban people.

If you’re able to take the heat, and open your mind, I would recommend a trip to Cuba too see what it is like since it is so different than the United States.  With that said, I would recommend going via cruise ship as I don’t think most people will find the Old City a place where they want to be more than 24-48 hours. Many cruise ships are making Havana a port of call now, and even with the restrictions for Americans you can still legally land in Cuba. Most are docked less than 24 hours so it is a little easier to make an itinerary that fits the government regulations, plus the ships dock in Old Havana so you don’t have to travel far to see most of the stuff you’re wanting to see.  You can catch a ride in a Classic Car and ride down the famous Malecon and they will take you to Central Havana too (see capital). I’m certainly not an expert on government regulations, but I’m certainly open to answering any questions that you have about my trip to Cuba; please fee free to contact me.

Did I mention it was hot? It’s nearly 8 pm and it’s still 85 degrees outside (and it just finished raining, so it was a lot hotter earlier) and, here’s the kicker, it feels like 97! It’s 8 pm! (yes, the exclamations are me talking just a little… bit… louder).  Sunday evening, at about 5:30 it was 95 and ‘feels like 111!!!) Time for me to cool off my fingers, I’ve typed too much; thanks for hanging in to the end and reading my post.