Cuba - day 7
Day 7 in Cuba was March 17.
March 17 also being my birthday.
Journal: "The hotel surprised me with a birthday cake. It was very good although I didn't cut it until that night after returning from the day's activities. It's been a whirlwind of things to do so I will have to use photos to remember all."
Today we went to Cueto.
Like the Cueto in the song that the Buena Vista Social Club sang in Ruta Chan Chan.
i think I slept on the bus again. When we got to Cueto we found a nice little town with really nice strokes of colors on the buildings and a plaza where kids were hanging out and taking selfes with us in the background. i walked over and just jumped into their photo so they didn't have to do it on the downlow and they really liked that. We took a bunch of group shots actually. So I'm probably on a few kids' facebook pages. :-D
Oh before that at the railroad tracks we all went to check out the monument to Compay Segundo. I got one good shot and that was good enough because everyone was crowding around it seemed pointless to keep trying.
The surrounding areas were cool and the pillars were carved into the shapes of different musical instruments too.
This was supposed to be a quick 10 minute stop but we ended up staying much longer. It was a really nice square and area. A man walked up to me and I spoke to him a bit. We spoke to each other in broken English and Spanish. Then he got another man to come over who happened to be the local historian. He pointed out another man that went by Choco. In the end, these men were there for us rather than the meeting being a simple random encounter. I'm glad I was nice to them instead of being my regular snooty self! Hahaha.
So then, back onto the bus we went to take a short drive out of the main part of town into the off-skirts...
Out side of the main town there is a more residential area where the road is muddier and unpaved. We headed there.
Later, we learned that it took a lot for our group to get permission to come to this area. Apparently the government isn't too keen on letting outsiders see the poorer areas of the country for fear of spreading denigrating remarks. This was also a difficult vist because it was a week day and many of these people would normally be at work and their children would normally be at school. They took the day off for us. And the adults didn't go to work either. So we really appreciated this series of performances and an invitation into their homes for a peak into their way of doing things and opening up their culture to us.
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currently flying to tokyo from sfo
i think it's a good time to take a nap becaue we're about 5 hours into this flight and 'm going to need to be not so dead on my feet!
...
So now I'm heading to Narita to get on a plane to fly to Saipan. I'm on the Narita Express train which is pretty nice. Great if you've got a rolly bag. I usually travel lighter than this tho. Back to Cuba!
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Edit. May 7 - finally adding photos!