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Todo por la Revolución |
In negotiating a price for a taxi from the airport, I told the driver that we were headed to Marianao. He looked at me perplexed, saying that it wasn’t the usual tourist place. “I guess I’m not the usual tourist”, I replied. He quoted me a final price. I decided to opt for a standardized state owned taxi. After waiting for bags to emerge from the carousel, and patiently waiting in a stoic line to exchange currency, it was now mid evening. “You’ve been here before, huh?” the driver asked as we drove through the dimly lit streets. “Yep”, I nodded. The late November air was tranquil and cool with a dark sky dotted in gently swaying palms. While I soon recognized the neighborhood, I couldn’t quite remember the configuration of the triangular streets where my godfather’s mom lives. As is custom, the driver began to solicit passersby for directions to the closest corner. I’m not one to have a sweet tooth, but by the time we located the other side of Calle 86, I found myself in the back seat with an insatiable craving for ice cream.
After 52 years of a failed policy, it’s not unusual for a US citizen to spend 16 hours in transit to travel to the largest island in the Caribbean. Although less than 100 miles from southern Florida, we first had to literally fly over our destination to Cancún. Like most things here, you can’t just go in a straight line from point A to point B. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not that you CAN’T GET from point A to point B. You absolutely can….but you may have to go to Q and back first.
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| Boarding the national airline |
Of course many things have changed since I first started coming here in the late 90’s. On my first excursion, my airline ticket was actually hand written on carbon paper. Now there’s a computer that prints your ticket information out at the airline counter. My first flight here was on a 1950’s Russian made propeller plane that was like a bus in the air with small circular windows. The national airline now has a fleet of modern planes. On the island there used to be scheduled and unscheduled blackouts of electricity and water. I have not encountered blackouts at all on this trip and was told that it’s quite rare that they occur these days. There had been 3 currencies and 2 economies. Depending on the transaction, you could use the US dollar, a convertible peso that went between the two currencies and the local peso. There are still 2 economies; the local Peso economy (moneda nacional) and the Convertible Peso economy (“Chavito”). The tourist industry mainly functions with the Convertible Peso and there are many goods and services that can only be purchased with this currency. I physically blend in and can function within the local Peso economy, especially if I don’t speak too much. The Spanish spoken here is rapid and thickly flavored. Entire words are at times seemingly swallowed. The Spanish that unfolds from my mouth is slow in comparison and likely has a northern California flavor of sprouts and wheat grass. It’s a definite giveaway that I’m a foreigner.
While many things have changed, many things have remained the same. There are still the carts of rum and cigars that follow the beverage cart on the national airline. The vintage cars still rumble through the streets. In the countryside, the leaves of banana and palm trees still slowly tickle the sky amidst the seemingly endless fields of sugarcane. The music…oh my god the music! It’s so intoxicating and irresistible; the clave runs the rhythm with the life force of a cardiac pulse. You can’t help but want to dance.
One of the most painful things that remains the same is the policy that my country of birth has maintained towards the island. Political and economic ideology aside, it’s heartbreaking. I’ve seen firsthand the affect that the policy has had on people’s lives and the way that families have been separated.
52 years …there aren’t words for it really.
