The only way to settle a debate on life in Cuba is
I felt quite uncomfortable with my rich, party-hound friend, Frank, and even more with the fancy hotel, so, I finally called my special contact, Carlos’ sister, Aida. She naturally was delighted to hear about her long-lost brother, and sent her husband Raul over to get me right away. We talked the day away, and, by 5 that afternoon, I was not only a bona fide member of the family, but was established in my own, very nice apartment in Chinatown.
This was really the place to be; within 3 blocks of my split-level pad, with TV and all the furnishings, including kitchen-ware and orange-juicer, were at least a dozen of the best restaurants in Havana. The Chinese, as usual, were getting along fine with what was available (also, probably since their families are SO tight, this seemed to be 4 times as well as OTHER Cubans).
Their neighborhood market had ten times what other ones did. I never found out for sure, why the disparity, but was thinking of the Chinese in Africa and Indonesia, who were regularly slaughtered by the ethnic majorities there because of THEIR great successes…I stuffed myself later that night on the best sweet-sour pork I’d ever had.
The next afternoon found me seated with a “Mayabe” at Manzano de Gomez, one of the only outside beer gardens in downtown Havana. A lovely woman walked by, slowly, and asked me the time. I told her,”4:15″, and tried to think of something, lacking inanity, to say back to her. She seemed to be going to pass right on, but hesitated long enough for me to ask if she would care “… to sit down for a moment?” She seemed not to be offended, and did indeed sit. I was gratified; this was the first time I’d successfully “flirted” in years.
Her name was Yuleimis, and told me she taught kindergarten at a nearby school and that she was off that afternoon and was looking for her cousin to accompany her to a movie. To make a short story shorter, we talked away an hour and a half, downed a couple of soft drinks apiece, and then I asked her to dinner in Chinatown, which was only a four 4 blocks walk away.
After a pretty nice meal of noodles and fish, as I was wondering if she would consent to date me in the future, Yuleimis broke the “spell” for me when she asked if I wanted her to accompany me to my apartment… and mentioned a small amount of money in the same breath; I hadn’t realized ’til that moment that she was a hooker! Later that evening my friends explained the style of life that was becoming popular in contemporary Cuba, and that those in the trade were known as Jinateras, or “cow-girls”. I didn’t feel very good…
After a few days in Havana I still hadn’t figured out what Carlos had been talking about; all his arguments concerning the repression of his people and their hardships remained outside of my tourist vision. What impressed me most about this country was what one DIDN’T see. Remember I had come directly from the “third world”, in this case Honduras, one of the most economically depressed regions in North America, and was inured to the sight of appalling events.
These were some of the things I gratefully never saw in Cuba: Infants, blind children, and paraplegics, begging on ALL city streets by day and sleeping under pieces of cardboard at night (side by side with HUNDREDS of non-cripples); clouds of petroleum-gas pollution blocking vision and burning your eyes (I KNOW that many of these things are a direct result of NOT having a modern culture, BUT I appreciated them nevertheless), trash EVERYWHERE on the streets and parks, rampant arrogance, in the form of incredibly rich people invariably pushing their way to the front of the “line”, with exceptionally meek folk, seemingly everywhere, with their weak hands held out for help, Machine guns every 10 feet (minimum), which goes along hand-in-hand with major robberies of banks and stores (hourly, some days), NOISE, crying of the hawkers, crashing of the jack-hammers, trucks all over without mufflers, and the explosions accompanying the robberies…
So, I was having a ball my first few days in Havana, and anxious to go back and tell Carlos I’d won the debate; this was, and not for the first time in my life… premature!
Read all six parts of Iowa Yankee in King Castro’s Court
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six