Who knows where the adventure will end..

I will be leaving Cuba for Montreal next Satyrday, May 13th at 9pm. It´s been quite an adventure and although I wasn´t gone for very long, it feels like I was gone a lifetime!!!! I´ll share all my stories with you guys when I get back, over a pint (which my generous friends will pay for until I get a job!!! hehehehe, just kidding).

It´s been fun; it´s been trying; it´s been eye-opening; it´s been an adventure. I don´t know how long I´ll be in Montreal. I´ll have to see if I can adapt to life there again but I feel that if I felt my fishbowl was too small before leaving, I might feel it even more now! We´ll see. But it will be good to be home with the people I love. See you soon.

Hello all,

Yes, I came back to Cuba in the end!!!! I guess things do happen for a reason. In the end, it was a good thing that I´d had to buy a return ticket when I bought my ticket to Cancun!!! I´ve been back for about a week and a half now and it feels like I never left. Alex was quite surprised (and very pleased) to see me in his house when he came home from training. He knew I was back in Cuba because I had written to his brother but he thought I was in Havana still.

So, what about Cancun? Well, I didn´t do too much exploring because I was sick the whole time I was there. I never got to make it out to the hotel zone but I hear it´s out of this world, a lot like Vegas in that it´s over the top. I stayed downtown and even that was pretty bad (I thought). It looked like an American tourist town and if not for the Mexicans walking around, you would have thought that you were in the US with all the big chain stores. Quite a change from Cuba!!! <When I arrived and we were driving from the airport, the first thing that struck me was all the advertising and mechandising. I´d forgotten what the rest of the world was like! Since being in Cuba, I´ve started to take better care of my stuff. I actually wash my shoesnow so that they look new! And my sneakers that I´d thought of getting rid of before coming here because they were dirty and a little broken? Well, after a good clean and a stop at a shoe repair place they look brand new. I can´t believe I had thought of throwing them out. I also mend my clothing!!! Wow. Living here has once more made me think about the over-consumption that goes on in the rest of the world. This is the other extreme.

So I´ll be staying in Cuba a little while longer. I´ve rented a casa particular in Holguin, in the city (needed to get out of the country a little) until May 13th. Then I might hang around for a few days then back to Montreal, penniless but very eager to see everybody back home. Speaking of which, I´ll be needing a job when I get back so could you all keep your eyes and ears open? Thanks. And I´ll be needing a place to stay until I get that job...

So I am now in Mexico (arrived yesterday) but this entry will be about Cuba still since I remembered lots of things that I had wanted to say in the past but forgot.

First and most important is donations to Cuba. There´s a not-for profit organization called Not Just Tourists (www.njttoronto.ca) that collects medicine and medical supplies from companies and then packs them in suitcases for business travellers or tourists to take with them to Cuba and other developing countries. Check out the website for office locations. And if you can´t bring a suitcase, bring extra aspirine and such over the counter medicines to leave with people down there. Although healthcare is free in Cuba, medicine is often lacking. This leads me to something I found out about the "free" healthcare. Dentists are free too by the way. But, if you want any hope of passing in this lifetime at the hospital, you have to give cash "gifts" to the workers. They are called gifts because these are socialist workers so it would not do for them to be accepting money for their services. These gifts also ensure a better job for example for a filling.

Other donations that you can make to Cuba which are really appreciated are toiletries, perfumes, make-up, old clothing, shoes, etc. Basically anything we take for granted really is appreciated down there. And for those people staying in the hotels, if you do have things to give, try to leave the hotel as well and give some of the stuff to the other cubans who don´t have access to the hotels. As it is now, hotel workers usually get all the gifts as well as the tips. Let´s try to share the wealth a little. And if you´re driving down the road and have stuff to give, don´t be shy about stopping at someone´s house and giving it to the family. The family will be very happy. The thing is that there are things here but it´s usually crap and expensive for Cubans to buy. Honestly, a bar of soap lasts less than a week here because it is so crappy and soft that it dissolves almost instantly in water. Toys and children´s clothing is also in short supply. And one specific thing that I was told was lacking are light jackets for small children. In January and February it sometimes gets quite cool at night but small light jackets are apparently impossible to find.

And finally, any cyclists (competitive and pleasure cyclists alike) going to Cuba might think to bring extra bike parts and clothing to donate since Cubans who compete have to provide their own and things are expensive and hard to come by. I may have a specific address where you can donate these things at a later time but if not, in most major cities there are sports complexes (escuela de deportes) where the athletes train. You can ususally see cyclists on the road around there training so you can just give it directly to them. Don´t just give it to the school though since the trainer will often just keep the stuff and sell it. He won´t give it to the cyclists.

So, now that that´s out of the way, here are some other things I observed while in Cuba. There don´t seem to be any bald Cubans. I don´t know why. In Cuba, you are either considered fat or skinny. There is no in between. If you are not skin and bones, you are fat. Needless to say, I am considered fat (but Alexei doesn´t think I´m fat so that´s good). Although men in Cuba are macho and there are definate gender rolls, they don´t seem as bad as in the rest of Latin America. And I have seen on more than one occasion different men cooking (or helping with the cooking)! Speaking of food, back to the price of food. Again to say that it is terribly expensive. Meat (crappy pieces of pork with the bone) cost between 20-25 cuban pesos a pound. So to put it in perspective, imagine your salary is $350-500 per month and meat costs $20/pound!!!!

About my last blog entry, about the cigars, I forgot to mention that I had of course met people who were repeat buyers of these street cigars and others who were buying them. So it´s not like I just took the Cubans´ word for it. Pricing in Cuba is interesting. If something cost $1 for one buying a box of 25 will cost $25. And beers cost 1cuc in the store, at the bar, at the restaurant. I was told that this was because if there was a better price for buying things in bulk, the cashiers might pocket the money from the individual sales and say they sold the box. Pricing is also funny in taxis (for Cubans) and cars of particulars. If the taxi is going to point B 50km away and it costs 10pesos, it doesn´t matter if you´re only going 1, 5, 20km of the journey. The cost is the same. Another thing that took my a while to figure out was changing the money from convertible pesos to cuban pesos. You get 24pesos per 1cuc, at the bank or on the street. I couldn´t figure out why people on the street would sell it at the same rate as the bank, what´s in it for them? Eventually I found out that there are stores and places where you can only use convertible pesos. But when you buy them from the bank, they cost 25 pesos per 1cuc. So the people on the street are buying convertibles at 24 instead of 25 pesos. And be careful with prices. Something the price is in cuban pesos but tourists think it´s in convertible pesos and pay with them. Most cubans will not tell you that you made a mistake!

Transcard sucks! I got an amigo travel card for this trip thinking it was a better alternative to credit cards since you are charged 12% when you withdraw money with your credit card. Turns out I was charged about 12% with the Transcard too (it was supposed to be 1% plus $2.50). And then found out that not only was I charged in Cuba to withdraw, Transcard also charged me for the transactions. Plus the initial fee I had to pay to buy the card and the cashiers check I had to get to put money on the card. And, as stated before, I had trouble getting money in Havana. I wrote to Transcard about all of this and never heard back from them. And the few times that I´ve tried to call them, I always get a recording saying to leave a message. In brief, transcard isn´t worth it.

In Cuba, the good bathrooms are the ones at the gas stations!!!! Of course you have to leave a tip to the attendant (and make sure you ask for paper because they don´t always give it to you) but ladies, wouldn´t you pay $0.25 if it meant having really clean bathrooms at gas stations? I´ve also found an advantage to outhouses. When someone has been in there for a while and you want to use it after them, you never have to worry about it smelling like shit. It always smells like shit!

One time while going to the beach, Alex and I were stopped by the police. Well, I was not stopped, Alex was. As I mentioned before, Cubans can´t just be walking around with foreigners. These were cops that we´d already had a run-in with and at the time Alex had said that we were waiting for the marriage papers to come through. So now we get stopped again and of course there are no "papers" that say it´s ok for us to walk around together so there´s trouble. LOng story short, the cop tells Alex that he can´t come to the beach with me. And then turns around and tells me that this all for my safety. But of course, if I pay for some special permit or something or get married (about 700cuc) and the government gets some money, dangerous Alex becomes no longer dangerous and I´m safe. Funny that. It also means that he can go into Cuban hotels (which no Cuban can do even if they have the mmoney to pay for the room or are invited). I´ve come to realize that it´s not that the government wants to "protect" tourists from Cubans, it´s just that they are finding more and more ingenious ways of milking more money out of us.

But to end on a more positive note, Cubans are very warm generous people who will share what they have. They have an attitude of sharing what they have with others because they know that tomorrow, they might be the ones in the need. The have a great sense of community that way. They are also hardworking and would just like the chance to make something of themselves, have something. What I got from most people I spoke to was that they see no future for themselves and their children. They can´t work towards anything or for anything. And that´s what they dislike the most about Cuba and why so many of them want to leave.

So like I said, I´m in Mexico now. Don´t know how long I´ll stay though. Left my heart in Cuba again (although this time not with the country but with the Cuban). Who knows what will happen but I have to say that after Cuba, Mexico is not intimidating at all. My stay in Cuba has given me a lot more confidence in myself and since my spanish has improved a lot, it´s a lot less scary. The fact that there are stores here where I have access tgo whatever I want makes it easier. I really want to go back to Havana. I really love that city. We´ll see...

I haven´t gone anywhere except Holguin since I came back from Havana so all I can write about are thoughts, feelings and observations that my time here has given me. And I apologize if anything I saw is a repeat f another blog entry.

Things I´ve learned while in Cuba:
-one bucket full of water is plenty to wash and rinse with (including the hair). That leads me to think about how much water we waste in Canada!
-We were misled...roosters do not only crow in the morning. They do it all night long too! Did I mention that I now dislike roosters very much? I did go to a coq fight last weekend. Couldn´t pass up the opportunity to see one at least once in my life. It wasn´t as vicious as I had imagined. And I wasn´t as upset as I thought I´d be. I was in fact a little numb. I wonder if Cuba is doing that to me? It was interesting though to see and hear the crowd cheer though. They loved it! Animals aren´t worth much in Cuba. But I guess that´s understandable as they have bigger problems. Haven´t seen a dog fight. I think THAT would definatately upset me.
-Baby goats, although very cute, are extremely stupid and Í´m surprised there are any left since they have a lot of trouble crossing the road without getting killed. I was in a car that ran one over and the very next day, I was in another vehicle that almost ran one over. And goat, tastes like beef not like chicken.
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I saw an ad (propaganada) on TV the other day and I burst out laughing. It was an anti-Bush ad (don´t get me wrong, I hate Bush as much as the next sane person) that finished by saying "Thankfully, we live in Cuba Libre" Hd to laugh because Cuba is many things but libre isn´t one of them. The more I stay here the more I want to leave. This place is insane. Everything is controlled. I thought it was pretty bad that people couldn´t leave. Yeah that sucks. And I thought it was a violation of freedom that a cop can just stop as you´re walking down the street for no reason, ask to see your id (a special card which you must have when you leave your house. If not, you risk 3 days in jail) and confiscate a walk-man from you if they feel like it. Yeah, that´s annoying but at least there are benefits. I´ve been to other parts of Ltin America and it´s worse there for the poor. So I thought it sucked but at least they got something for it. But now...I find it crazy. It is illegal for Alex and I to be together since we are not married. The government can summon you and send you to work in another country for 6 months and there´s nothing you can say about it (they´re doing that a lot with doctors and medical professionals). Your house that you somehow managed to acquire with you meager salary isn´t yours. Tomorrow the government can decide that it wants it and it can take it. Like I´ve said, it´s illegal for foreigners to stay at a Cuban´s house. And if caught, the Cuban goes to jail. The governent, in an attempt to save energy, is FORCING everybody to change their refrigerators and tvs and stoves. These things cost about 12 000 pesos. A good salary in Cuba is 500 pesos per month. If yu do the math, it doesn´t add up. The low salaries is why most Cubans are involved in the black market. Everything can be had that way. That´s a way to make ends meet and they don´t feel it´s wrong since they´re stealing from the government. But now that government is cracking down on the black market so things are harder to come by, things cost more, people have less income...and at the same time they have to buy all these expensive things.´Again, I´m all for energy efficiency but this is rediculous!

Speaking of the black market, what aboput those cigars? I´ve learned a lot about cigars while I´ve been here. And yes, you can get real cigars on the street. Of course you can also get bad ones but it´s not true that all cigars sold outside of the stores are fake. Just remember who is pushing that idea and what they lose if you buy from the Cubans directly. And I´m not saying that the reps ayt the hotel who tell you this are lying to you. I think thewy actually believe it. But remember, the government allows these hotels to be here and make money. It´s easy, everybody in the cigar chain gets a small cut to get the cigars out of the factory. That´s how it works. It´s not brain surgery. I´ll share with you what I´ve learned about cigars.

Apparently, the banana leaf thing is a myth. The bad cigars are not banada leaves but cigars made for Cubans. They have these cheap cigars here that they sell to Cubans for 25pesos (about 1cuc) for 25. These get passed off as Cohibas or MonteCristo. Or, another thing that is done, they roll cigars with little tobacco bits as opposed to larger leaves. When you buy a box of cigars, look to see that all cigars are approximately the same color. Check both levels of the box. Tobacco color varies but a box should be all the same color more or less. Apparently, the odor is unique but I couldn´t find out more since it´s difficult to explain how it would be different to someone who knows nothing of cigars. I figure that cigar connaiseurs will be able to tell. Check the cigars by rolling them between your fingers. If the were made with those little bits of tobacco that I mentions abve, they will fall apart at the center. The tobacco leaves should also have some veins (obviously) but not too many. If you buy a box and want to check your cigars, once you light a cigar, put the lit end in you mouth and blow out. Plenty of smoke should come out. If not, the cigars were rolled too tightly. Once it´s burning, a good cigar should burn pretty much evenly all the way around and the ash should but light grey. Bad cigars will have black ash. The ash should also not fall off easily as the cigar is burning. Anyways, I hope that helps. Just be careful but it is possible to get good tobacco outside the stores.

Another interesting thing about Cuba is the relationship between men and women. I guess things are different here from other parts of Latin America since religion isn´t influencial here. People here don´t tend to get "married". They live common-law although they call this married. They are very liberal when it comes to being with someone then being with someone else when it doesn´t work anymore. So, unlike the rest of Latin America, mistresses are a no no here (or if you do, keep it quiet). Cubans don´t have religion hanging over their heads telling them that they got married and it´s for life (or else they will burn in hell). It also makes for intersting families. Some people here are very white, others darker and others black. All this mixing means that you can have brothers or sisters that look nothing alike.

Cuban couples are also very affectionate with each other. I find it very cute to see couples all lovey-dovey sitting on a park bench. In young people, that´s not too surprising but when the couple looks like they´re in their 50ies or 60ies, it´s cute! Of course, like I said above, this could be a new couple.

I´ll be leaving the island soon. Next week I´m going to Havana and then on to Mexico. Alex starts to train (cycling) on April 3rd. I´ll be looking for work in Mexico. If I don´t find any, expect me back home shortly. If I do find work, then I´m thinking of coming for a visit towards the end of the summer. I have to say that my idea of Cuba has, not changed, but become more 3-D. What I thought of Cuba before is still true but now I just have more insight and understanding, which is why I don´t ever want to live here. It´s not the difficult living conditions or the transportation problems. It´s the fact that the government must control everything and everybody that drives me crazy. If it weren´t for that, this would be a beautifulk place to live. I do plan on coming back for a visit (or many visits) but I now know that I could not live here, not at this time anyway. I´ll keep all of you posted, probably from Mexico.

I spent last week in Havana. It is a beautiful city and I think everybody should visit it at least once in their lives. The architecture is amazing although many buildings are falling apart. You can tell from all the mansions that Havana must have been something in i´t´s prime. I´d be curious to know the amount of money there was there (and there is there today). The malecon is beautiful. I loved walking along it, day and night. I loved Havana and would like to go back soon...

We went by truck...but not the same type of truck we ride in the cities. We actually sat in the cab of this one! Friend of Alex´s stepdad is a truckdriver and was going up when we wanted to go. It was cheaper, more comfortable and faster than the train so we took the ride. In Cuba, knowing people is definately a plus. You get by a lot more easily that way. For example, in Holguin, I now know a casa particular owner well enough that he charges me less. Connections are even more important here than back home.

In Havana, transportation is better. They actually have buses and a fair number of them too!!!! But oh my, riding one is quite something!!! I have never been so squished in my life. When you see a bus that is jampacked, full to the gills, about to burst, there´s room for at least 5 people more. And when those 5 have somehow managed to squeeze on, there´s room for at least 5 more! Alex and I actually managed to get on one of these buses with our huge backpacks. We had to take the bus because of money problems...More on that below. An interesting point that I noticed n the buses...Cubans don´t stink. I was on one in the middle of the day. It was crazy hot, wé were packed in like sardines and I noticed that there was no BO stench like there would have been on a bus in Montreal on a hot summer´s day. And later that day, to confirm my theory, I stuck my nose right up into Alex´s armpit and nothing!!! This was after a long day of walking around in the hot sun. I stank like week old fish and he didn´t at all. I don´t understand it. Another interesting thing about the buses is that although people in Cuba are very friendly, on buses it´s every one for themselves. If there´s a seat available, you take it. And on some buses, people will shove and push to get on. I think it´s because the rule is, if you can touch the bus, that´s the same as actually being on it. I saw a man have his arm in the bus, the bus starts moving and he´s running alongside it in an effort to get his foot on the step. I don´t know if he ever managed. Needless to say, I don´t think I will ever find a bus in Montreal full again!

The food...We ate street meat basically all week. I don´t know how Cubans manage to stay alive on this shit! Very cheap but my god. Bread with ham (processed or not), bread with bologne, bread with hamburger (made of pork), bread with croqueta (as far as I can tell, deep fried dough), etc. I was so fed up of eating these sandwiches. At least in Holguin they have bread with tomatoes. It´s funny. They sell bread with mayonaise and bread with butter as well. I always think, here´s an idea, combine the mayonaise with the tomatoes and you´ll have something!!! But I survived. They have a place called the Coppelia where people line up for ice cream. And after tasting that ice cream, I understand why. It was delicious. Definately a place worth visiting.

The money problem was that my card wasn´t working. I couldnt wuthdraw money and all we had left was 4cuc and about 30 cuban pesos!! Quite stressful. In the end I managed to withdraw some money but then it turned out not to be enough for Alex and I to take the train back. So we hitched, all the way from Havana. We were lucky and it didn´t take us too long. We met a guy on the way who had left Havana 3 days earlier!!! We got to Holguin at about tyhe same that we would have had we taken the train (and assuming the train hadn´t broken down which apparently happens frequently) and it only cost us a total of 300 cuban pesos including the food! Not bad. Otherwise, it would have cost 56cuc to take the train. But I was able to take money out in Holguin so all is good.

More to come...