I will sing a true song of me myself and tell of my travels. [Havana, Cuba]
“¡MÁS SOCIALISMO!”
--Billboards at the Havana airport
I am actually absurdly proud of myself for pulling this latest one off. For Christmas 2013 I successfully arranged and executed a solo trip to Cuba, and I made it while Castro was still alive like I have always wanted. My adventure came despite several relevant life situations major and minor, right down to Fate’s last-ditch hurdle of the $87 cash payment for unspecified “fees” in order to board my flight in Nassau.
Zoe and Victor had sent their driver to the airport to pick me up but I had to push through the perimeter of the tourist handlers to get to him and his (gasoline-powered!) Peugeot because he is Cuban. I was immediately grateful for the ride when I saw the public Metrobus jam-packed, hip-to-hip with commuters, and then I arrived at the Cerro apartment in the middle of a 50th wedding anniversary celebration so they graciously and enthusiastically welcomed me in with rum and salsa dancing, what a joyous start.
From Monday onward I was on the move, walking untold miles through streets named after authors, poets, and commemorative revolutionary dates, zig zagging through Vieja, surviving on mostly mamay and beer after my astonishingly filling chorizo omelette breakfast every morning. There still are as many old Detroit-born automotive beauties here as the Godfather II would have you believe but anyone who didn’t learn to drive stick on the family Škoda won’t be as delighted by the rest of the Cold War-era treasures: Lada, Moskovitch, even the odd Trabant or Dacia. Fewer people smoke than I would have predicted but a non-negligible proportion of the ones who do light up fat stogies in front of the telecommunications center.
Havana is dirt cheap and lots of fun if you speak Spanish and pay the hell attention, although you can skip either of the above qualifications if you are from Miami. The first rule is obvious and much more important than in Mexico; the second means keep an eye to your purse and watch out for the parallel currencies because convertible pesos have 25x the value of national and the bills look similar; the exception is because I think people can sense a kindred spirit. More generally I would say that Havana is a cross between Manila and Oakland or something, because it’s superficial and unfair to say that it is “like Miami” since the material ethos is so different. That being said, well, Marielitos and property refugees from the fifties do their best to make Calle Ocho just like home and vice versa. The dirty marble Art Deco buildings are in a catastrophic state of disrepair that makes Oakland look good but the underlying architecture is glorious and recalls precisely the era of Havana Nocturne, when the Mafia ran everything from the casinos on up as the bordello de los gringos.
--Billboards at the Havana airport
I am actually absurdly proud of myself for pulling this latest one off. For Christmas 2013 I successfully arranged and executed a solo trip to Cuba, and I made it while Castro was still alive like I have always wanted. My adventure came despite several relevant life situations major and minor, right down to Fate’s last-ditch hurdle of the $87 cash payment for unspecified “fees” in order to board my flight in Nassau.
Zoe and Victor had sent their driver to the airport to pick me up but I had to push through the perimeter of the tourist handlers to get to him and his (gasoline-powered!) Peugeot because he is Cuban. I was immediately grateful for the ride when I saw the public Metrobus jam-packed, hip-to-hip with commuters, and then I arrived at the Cerro apartment in the middle of a 50th wedding anniversary celebration so they graciously and enthusiastically welcomed me in with rum and salsa dancing, what a joyous start.
From Monday onward I was on the move, walking untold miles through streets named after authors, poets, and commemorative revolutionary dates, zig zagging through Vieja, surviving on mostly mamay and beer after my astonishingly filling chorizo omelette breakfast every morning. There still are as many old Detroit-born automotive beauties here as the Godfather II would have you believe but anyone who didn’t learn to drive stick on the family Škoda won’t be as delighted by the rest of the Cold War-era treasures: Lada, Moskovitch, even the odd Trabant or Dacia. Fewer people smoke than I would have predicted but a non-negligible proportion of the ones who do light up fat stogies in front of the telecommunications center.
Havana is dirt cheap and lots of fun if you speak Spanish and pay the hell attention, although you can skip either of the above qualifications if you are from Miami. The first rule is obvious and much more important than in Mexico; the second means keep an eye to your purse and watch out for the parallel currencies because convertible pesos have 25x the value of national and the bills look similar; the exception is because I think people can sense a kindred spirit. More generally I would say that Havana is a cross between Manila and Oakland or something, because it’s superficial and unfair to say that it is “like Miami” since the material ethos is so different. That being said, well, Marielitos and property refugees from the fifties do their best to make Calle Ocho just like home and vice versa. The dirty marble Art Deco buildings are in a catastrophic state of disrepair that makes Oakland look good but the underlying architecture is glorious and recalls precisely the era of Havana Nocturne, when the Mafia ran everything from the casinos on up as the bordello de los gringos.