We might be ready for Cuba, but Cuba isn't ready for us.
The day started easy enough, we were up at 5 a.m. and off to the airport. You have to get your Cuban visa at the airport, and we tried to do it last night but they said it was a "process." They said you could get there as early as 3:30 a.m. for the 8:30 flight, but no later than 6:00. Suddenly we were a little concerned, and decided maybe we should at least rehearse our story a bit for immigration.
See, technically it is still a felony to travel to Cuba on vacation. So there is no way we're here on vacation. Nope, no way, we're not gonna have fun. If guys in black suits come to your door asking about us, we are not on vacation. There are a dozen "licenses" that will get you in to Cuba, and fortunately I'm a successful and experienced travel blog writer, so i'm going for the journalism license. I expect the two or three of you who have read my blogs to testify if necessary. Shari is of course working on Professional Development and expanding her Spanish-language market. She found her first client today at lunch, Ernesto, so if you need authentic salsa lessons she can hook you up.
So anyway, we got to the airport and the"process" consisted of me paying them $50 for a visa. No one really cared where we were going, why, or what we were taking. Walked to our gate, got on the plane, and an hour later we were in 1950.
So as I sit here smoking a Cohiba, I still can't believe I'm in f***ing Cuba. Cuba.
We got here, and did the usual customs and immigration shuffle, but I don't think anyone asked us an actual question. We had a cab waiting for us, and it was a quiet half hour drive to our hostel. Quiet because almost everyone here says they speak English "a little," which generally means not at all. Now I think I can speak Spanish fairly well, especially if I'm ordering drinks or dinner or kilos of cocaine, but there is something about Cubans that just goes right by me. It's like listening to your drunk uncle that lives in the mountains of Kentucky (cb), it's not just what they're saying but how they're saying it.
We drove through the old run-down part of town, then turned and went through the old run-down part of town, then finally arrived at our hostel in the old run-down part of town. Havana is basically majestic old buildings that haven't changed, been updated or maintained since the 50's.
I think the hostel was kind of a synopsis of how we feel about Cuba so far; Shari described it as sensory overload.
It looked kind of rough from the outside, but you walked up two flights of stairs to a locked door, and when it opened everything changed. It was a very quaint, eclectic living room full of things and people. Two Danish girls were talking to the dad about things to do, the daughter was on the only computer doing their email, the mom rushed to greet us, and the son took our bags. There was a Latin woman sitting on the couch getting a manicure from a local girl. All in a room no bigger than a college dorm. But it was totally nice, and they were extremely friendly. They said our room wouldn't be ready for a few hours, so off we went to find internet to let the family know we made it here.
We found a hotel that had internet, and you basically had to buy a phone card that got you an hour for $5. Let me back up for a minute and explain something; Cuba is still quite communist, which means the government owns everything. All of the hotels are owned by the government, and exist solely for tourists. I don't think Cubans are even allowed to stay there if they wanted. But as a consequence, they are crazy expensive, $700 and up per night. One concession the government made to capitalism is that they now allow private citizens to rent rooms in their houses, so now a million of these casa particulares have sprung up, which is where we are staying for the most part. They go anywhere from $15 to $50 a night, and usually include breakfast and maybe happy hour.
Back at the hostel, they took us out of their place and walked us two doors down to a building that looked like a boarded up Hermes store... I think we would have panicked absent the rum tranquilizers. But when got to our place, once again we were totally surprised. It was a cute little two bedroom apartment, with a living room, kitchen, and a nice little balcony I'm sitting on now that overlooks the night scene on the street below. We have the whole thing to ourselves; well, except for the gay couple in the other bedroom. There's that.
We passed out, I mean took a nap, for a few hours, then went off to explore the city. Not 15 minutes into it, we meet our new friend Raul, who spoke English surprisingly well. He told us about the best places to eat, and even the best places to get cigars. He said there was a place that had a 50% sale only one day a year, and it was today. He offered to take us there ... which, surprisingly, turned out to be his friend's house where he kept cigars in his closet. Though I remember thinking I was a dumbass, I'm pretty sure Shari said it out loud...
We started off again in search of dinner, and walked around for about an hour. Shari, who has been a total trooper all day, declared that she was hungry and wanted to eat ... Now. So I stopped in one of the nice hotels and asked a concierge for a recommendation, thinking that would be a safe bet. He did the "I know the best place, I'll take you there" thing, which I am finally catching on to. We went anyway, but it was another hint when they gave us a different menu from everyone else. It was still a nice place, like a 5 course meal, 30 bucks total, and really good ... So, whatever. I had some Cuban coffee, which explains the length of this blog entry...
We walked around a little more, and came back to the room fairly early.
My first day impression of Havana is kind of mixed. It is dilapidated, run down, and sometimes dirty. When you walk down some of the side streets, every instinct is that you should be in fear for your life. But they say you are totally safe and there is virtually no crime here. Walking around the city is hard to describe. The old cars are everything everyone says they are. Endless cats. There are a million people everywhere at night, walking around, sitting in the parks, congregating in the streets, sitting in the doorways of their tiny apartments. I'm guessing there's not much TV to speak of, virtually no internet, so maybe this is how things used to be in the 50's. The whole city vibrates with life, you can feel it.
And they want the tourists, they love Obama, and they need our money. But they're not ready. Not yet.
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