Cuba
Last week I got back to the States after spending a 9 days in Cuba and I would say that it definitely was an experience. We arrived at the airport and were greeted by family from my mother's side (both my parents were born in Cuba). They brought us mangos and love and waited patiently as my dad had to deal with the Cuban authorities at the airport (they confiscated all the Viagra, Xanax and Benadryl he had brought for family in Santiago de Cuba). Fellow passengers on the flight were not happy as we held them up in the airport and eventually my father, mother and youngest sister stayed and took a cab as my other two sisters and I took all the luggage to the hotel on the bus. The first few days there I was at a resort with my family, it was beautiful and all with the pristine beaches and all the other lovely aspects of an all inclusive resort (unlimited boozing) but to be not the biggest beach person. One day we did have family come to the resort and it was probably one of the nicest if not the nicest experience of their lives.
Communism, I am not a fan of it one bit. Perhaps if the inner party members decided to live their lives equal to those around them (as is in the doctrine) then perhaps it would be fair. The Cubans are living in such an oppressive government, until 2006 citizens were not even allowed in tourist hotels or resorts unless they worked there and as of today they are still not allowed to enter the rooms. Big brother is watching you in Cuba and even though cousins who spoke of the oppression and the lack of hope and that the only thing to better your life is to escape (assuming you are an intellectual, studied or hard working, if you are a drunk or lazy as hell well then Cuba might be the spot for you). That is a terrible thing to hear, that the only chance to do better is by leaving your country, it breaks my heart.
Anyway, I say the nicest experience of their lives because the chance of a typical Cuban having the 75 C.U.C. (one of two national currencies, the C.U.C. is pegged to the Euro so 1 C.U.C. = 1 Euro) to enter the resort is nearly impossible unless you are working as an escort which you did see in the resorts. We had such a fun time but you can see the need when you are at a 24 hour eating place and these family members order and order food, simple things like bacon rapped shrimp (which is delicious I think most of us can agree) but over there as a citizen bacon is something that you are probably not going to get.
We had rented a car to drive from Holguin (northern part of island) to Santiago (southern part of island where most of my family comes from) and on the morning we were to leave we saw one of the tires was low on air. My dad and I went to put air and see if there was a flat (my dad doesn't know how to change a tire) and we picked up a hitch hiking family (a lot of people hitchhike) who were going in our direction. The family of four turned out to be very useful as when we got to the gas station there was no one to check a flat but the family knew of someone in the town we were going towards. When we got to that town (and their destination) the "ponchero" (like a mechanic) was not around luckily they knew of another town that had one and we went there and resolved our issues and later we dropped them off. Side note, I never really pictured a Hyundai Elantra as a luxury car but over there it totally was. We did see a bunch of old school cars but for the most part the roads are pretty barren and never have I seen so many horses and oxen (both used to pull carriages and carts) it was a bit different compared to what I am used to. On the way back we picked up some other hitch hikers including two escorts headed to one of the other all inclusive resort, then we got our family and made our way to Santiago. I have been to Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico and out of the three islands I would say Cuba is probably the most beautiful from the passages to the people. Alas the people are just very pretty at a younger age, the females tend to lost some of their youthful beauty after having children (and in Cuba sex is the thing to do, still yet to experience that in Cuba as dad had the family on a pretty tight leash which was quite annoying considering I am fucking 24, but hey he paid for the trip so I can't complain even though I kind of just did) also teeth are just not as nice.
Before going to Santiago we went to this town called Palma to visit some of my mother's family and unfortunately were not there too long as we had gotten set back with the flat tire we spent around 3 hours dealing with. The family is so sweet though, it is rather over whelming and what I can relate most to heart break. Heart break in the sense that you meet all these people who you have never seen (with the exception of a few older people) and they just take you in and show you love, and then to know that you have these young cousins who are doctors, lawyers people who have studied information technology and to know that they will make way less than someone working part time as a janitor is just so depressing. Your heart bleeds and it bleeds terribly just like young love. Although we were rushed we meet and they made us food and it was just so lovely.
We got to Santiago and had a small army of a family waiting for us at the hotel we were staying at. Another side note, never visit Cuba in July and August, the heat in Santiago not only made you sweat the very instance you went outside but it got the oils in your face to start going to, if you go bring acne medication. Very nice hotel, rated 5 stars but I would give it somewhere between 4 and 5, one of my dad's childhood friends (he left the country when he was 12) is an accountant for the hotel and upgraded us from 2 regular rooms to 3 rooms one which was a suite at no additional cost. Immediately my dad wanted to go with one of his younger cousins to the neighborhood which he grew up and I went with him while all the girls showered and such. Santiago was celebrating a carnival for the 26th of July (the date that Fidel Castro came down from the Sierra Maestra mountains and took the city of Santiago) so the streets were just full of party people (who unfortunately I wasn't really able to party with, I must go back to Cuba alone) and my dad with his crazy memory was just walking around and knocking on doors and reconnecting with people who he hadn't seen in 41 years which was sort of incredible.
Eventually we meet back at the hotel and went to an uncles house (I consider anyone older than me an uncle or aunt and anyone my age a cousin it was just easier when meeting 200 people in such a short span of time) and ate and celebrated and checked out carnival floats and oogled the beautiful Cuban girls and talked to my cousins and just overall had a great time. My dad did allow me 45 minutes to check out the carnival with my 2 cousins however I had to be at the hotel by 1am (it was 12:15am) which was like a mile away through packed streets so essentially I was just able to walk through the carnival, how I wish I could have partied until 6AM and really made it an experience.
The following day more of the same, through the old neighborhoods where my father grew up, taking photos and videos, walking through the colonial part of the city (early 1500's time period) and meeting lots and lots of family. Really it is ineffable to try and describe all the emotions and the feelings, we were only there for 3 days and 2 nights and I would have preferred to have spent the whole vacation there even with that God forsaken heat. The time just flew by so quick it was wild, and I wish I could have been there longer to really get the culture, visit museums get to know locals and bars etc. If anyone would like to hear more detailed accounts of Santiago just shoot me a message I wouldn't mind giving someone a call and just talking about it and hopefully I will get around to putting some of the photos up over here.
The only moment that I actually started to tear up and just feel so sad (I am pretty good at keeping my composure unless really intoxicated and in a lousy state of mind) was when my father's oldest first cousin was left alone with my 3 sisters and I. This man who is probably in his late 50's early 60's started to cry. He told us that when he was sent to join the military (service period is from 15-25) he never thought he would see any of his boy cousins again, that it truly was a dream to be able to see my father who he hadn't seen since my dad was 11 and he was just so overwhelmed with joy (geez my eyes are getting teary thinking about it), it was just one of those moments that I can't even begin to comprehend. I can't even begin to imagine being 15 years old and thinking to myself that I will never see any of my boy cousins again and really believing it, it requires a great fortitude of heart to be able to live with that.
The last day in Santiago my father sang at a 9AM mass at the church that he used to go to as a boy, we actually had a top Cuban rum mixologist (like this guys signature is on the reserve bottles of Havana Club Rum and he has worked on many other Cuban rums and has visited the world etc) who when he was younger also went to that church and he visited my father all the way from Habana (12 hour drive) just to see him and brought this bomb ass bottle of rum that was just heavenly tasting.
On Sunday we made it back to the resort and had one whole day left on Monday to just unwind after that emotional roller coaster of a weekend in Santiago, it was nice and all but I knew where I preferred to be. I also didn't mention that at 24 I felt sort of ancient, the only other people my age were newly weds who had better things to do then drink with 16 - 18 year olds which was exactly what my sisters and I were doing (Isabel who is 22 and Melanie who is 18 who fit more in terms of the age group). We had fun and learned a great British drinking game, Arrogance, it's like playing Kings but with only a King cup that you had to drink based off a flip of the coin (be prepared to black out). Isabel cougared it up a bit and made out with this one 16 year old lad several nights, it was like an unspoken agreement only when drunk and at night lol. Isabel also lost her camera and her iPhone which was an extreme fail.
After exchanging emails and facebook contact info with these youngins (also exchanged emails with cousins and I have been busy reading and writing emails in Spanish which I haven't done since I studied abroad in Spain 2008) we ventured off and left Cuba back towards Montreal to trek to New Jersey. We had gone in two cars, one car was my sisters Isabel, Melanie and I and the other car was mom, dad and Angela (even though on the drive home Isabel and I drove the most as the parents were exhausted). So, my parents got to the border first as we had to put gas in our car and my father had the brilliant idea to say that he had visited Cuba at the border while the rest of the family stayed in Montreal... Needless to say their car was "randomly chosen for inspection" and we had the unfortunate luck to end up with the same customs officer who put our car to be "randomly inspected". It was a blast being brought to a back room with border police after they have taken the $200 worth of Cuban cigars from your car and lectured you on traveling to Cuba and the embargo and what not. A bunch of nonsense really even though the officers were nice cause I could have easily been detained 4-28 hours if the officer had been in a sour mood, all they told us was to go back into Canada and dispose of the cigars (which I did to much sadness
) I just handed them over to a Canadian cop who told us "That sucks balls that you can't bring Cuban cigars to the States" Yes Mr. Canadian Cop, I couldn't have said it any better.
Cheers
Pictures!
father in front of random fruit stand that him and I stopped at when we went to rent a car
old balcony in the city of Santiago
beach at the resort in Holguin
random pretty building in Santiago several blocks from where father grew up
13 machetes tribute to Cuba independence from Spain,
cathedral in central Santiago
outside of father's old house (brown) with random neighbors that he remembered from over 40 years ago
assorted family members in Santiago celebrating and dancing
sisters on the beach at resort
old cars used as cabs outside hotel in Santiago
house of first governor of Spain in Cuba, built in 1600's
municipal building in Santiago
view from balcon de Velazquez (includes highest point of Cuba)
dad and I on the way to get the rental car
typical public transportation
father's primary school, former military barracks
where we fixed flat tire
assorted family mother's side
church where father sang as a child/mother's parents were married
assorted family mother's side who visited at the resort
more assorted family mother's side at the resort
street in Santiago
hotel we stayed at in Santiago
Santiago view from hotel
Last week I got back to the States after spending a 9 days in Cuba and I would say that it definitely was an experience. We arrived at the airport and were greeted by family from my mother's side (both my parents were born in Cuba). They brought us mangos and love and waited patiently as my dad had to deal with the Cuban authorities at the airport (they confiscated all the Viagra, Xanax and Benadryl he had brought for family in Santiago de Cuba). Fellow passengers on the flight were not happy as we held them up in the airport and eventually my father, mother and youngest sister stayed and took a cab as my other two sisters and I took all the luggage to the hotel on the bus. The first few days there I was at a resort with my family, it was beautiful and all with the pristine beaches and all the other lovely aspects of an all inclusive resort (unlimited boozing) but to be not the biggest beach person. One day we did have family come to the resort and it was probably one of the nicest if not the nicest experience of their lives.
Communism, I am not a fan of it one bit. Perhaps if the inner party members decided to live their lives equal to those around them (as is in the doctrine) then perhaps it would be fair. The Cubans are living in such an oppressive government, until 2006 citizens were not even allowed in tourist hotels or resorts unless they worked there and as of today they are still not allowed to enter the rooms. Big brother is watching you in Cuba and even though cousins who spoke of the oppression and the lack of hope and that the only thing to better your life is to escape (assuming you are an intellectual, studied or hard working, if you are a drunk or lazy as hell well then Cuba might be the spot for you). That is a terrible thing to hear, that the only chance to do better is by leaving your country, it breaks my heart.
Anyway, I say the nicest experience of their lives because the chance of a typical Cuban having the 75 C.U.C. (one of two national currencies, the C.U.C. is pegged to the Euro so 1 C.U.C. = 1 Euro) to enter the resort is nearly impossible unless you are working as an escort which you did see in the resorts. We had such a fun time but you can see the need when you are at a 24 hour eating place and these family members order and order food, simple things like bacon rapped shrimp (which is delicious I think most of us can agree) but over there as a citizen bacon is something that you are probably not going to get.
We had rented a car to drive from Holguin (northern part of island) to Santiago (southern part of island where most of my family comes from) and on the morning we were to leave we saw one of the tires was low on air. My dad and I went to put air and see if there was a flat (my dad doesn't know how to change a tire) and we picked up a hitch hiking family (a lot of people hitchhike) who were going in our direction. The family of four turned out to be very useful as when we got to the gas station there was no one to check a flat but the family knew of someone in the town we were going towards. When we got to that town (and their destination) the "ponchero" (like a mechanic) was not around luckily they knew of another town that had one and we went there and resolved our issues and later we dropped them off. Side note, I never really pictured a Hyundai Elantra as a luxury car but over there it totally was. We did see a bunch of old school cars but for the most part the roads are pretty barren and never have I seen so many horses and oxen (both used to pull carriages and carts) it was a bit different compared to what I am used to. On the way back we picked up some other hitch hikers including two escorts headed to one of the other all inclusive resort, then we got our family and made our way to Santiago. I have been to Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico and out of the three islands I would say Cuba is probably the most beautiful from the passages to the people. Alas the people are just very pretty at a younger age, the females tend to lost some of their youthful beauty after having children (and in Cuba sex is the thing to do, still yet to experience that in Cuba as dad had the family on a pretty tight leash which was quite annoying considering I am fucking 24, but hey he paid for the trip so I can't complain even though I kind of just did) also teeth are just not as nice.
Before going to Santiago we went to this town called Palma to visit some of my mother's family and unfortunately were not there too long as we had gotten set back with the flat tire we spent around 3 hours dealing with. The family is so sweet though, it is rather over whelming and what I can relate most to heart break. Heart break in the sense that you meet all these people who you have never seen (with the exception of a few older people) and they just take you in and show you love, and then to know that you have these young cousins who are doctors, lawyers people who have studied information technology and to know that they will make way less than someone working part time as a janitor is just so depressing. Your heart bleeds and it bleeds terribly just like young love. Although we were rushed we meet and they made us food and it was just so lovely.
We got to Santiago and had a small army of a family waiting for us at the hotel we were staying at. Another side note, never visit Cuba in July and August, the heat in Santiago not only made you sweat the very instance you went outside but it got the oils in your face to start going to, if you go bring acne medication. Very nice hotel, rated 5 stars but I would give it somewhere between 4 and 5, one of my dad's childhood friends (he left the country when he was 12) is an accountant for the hotel and upgraded us from 2 regular rooms to 3 rooms one which was a suite at no additional cost. Immediately my dad wanted to go with one of his younger cousins to the neighborhood which he grew up and I went with him while all the girls showered and such. Santiago was celebrating a carnival for the 26th of July (the date that Fidel Castro came down from the Sierra Maestra mountains and took the city of Santiago) so the streets were just full of party people (who unfortunately I wasn't really able to party with, I must go back to Cuba alone) and my dad with his crazy memory was just walking around and knocking on doors and reconnecting with people who he hadn't seen in 41 years which was sort of incredible.
Eventually we meet back at the hotel and went to an uncles house (I consider anyone older than me an uncle or aunt and anyone my age a cousin it was just easier when meeting 200 people in such a short span of time) and ate and celebrated and checked out carnival floats and oogled the beautiful Cuban girls and talked to my cousins and just overall had a great time. My dad did allow me 45 minutes to check out the carnival with my 2 cousins however I had to be at the hotel by 1am (it was 12:15am) which was like a mile away through packed streets so essentially I was just able to walk through the carnival, how I wish I could have partied until 6AM and really made it an experience.
The following day more of the same, through the old neighborhoods where my father grew up, taking photos and videos, walking through the colonial part of the city (early 1500's time period) and meeting lots and lots of family. Really it is ineffable to try and describe all the emotions and the feelings, we were only there for 3 days and 2 nights and I would have preferred to have spent the whole vacation there even with that God forsaken heat. The time just flew by so quick it was wild, and I wish I could have been there longer to really get the culture, visit museums get to know locals and bars etc. If anyone would like to hear more detailed accounts of Santiago just shoot me a message I wouldn't mind giving someone a call and just talking about it and hopefully I will get around to putting some of the photos up over here.
The only moment that I actually started to tear up and just feel so sad (I am pretty good at keeping my composure unless really intoxicated and in a lousy state of mind) was when my father's oldest first cousin was left alone with my 3 sisters and I. This man who is probably in his late 50's early 60's started to cry. He told us that when he was sent to join the military (service period is from 15-25) he never thought he would see any of his boy cousins again, that it truly was a dream to be able to see my father who he hadn't seen since my dad was 11 and he was just so overwhelmed with joy (geez my eyes are getting teary thinking about it), it was just one of those moments that I can't even begin to comprehend. I can't even begin to imagine being 15 years old and thinking to myself that I will never see any of my boy cousins again and really believing it, it requires a great fortitude of heart to be able to live with that.
The last day in Santiago my father sang at a 9AM mass at the church that he used to go to as a boy, we actually had a top Cuban rum mixologist (like this guys signature is on the reserve bottles of Havana Club Rum and he has worked on many other Cuban rums and has visited the world etc) who when he was younger also went to that church and he visited my father all the way from Habana (12 hour drive) just to see him and brought this bomb ass bottle of rum that was just heavenly tasting.
On Sunday we made it back to the resort and had one whole day left on Monday to just unwind after that emotional roller coaster of a weekend in Santiago, it was nice and all but I knew where I preferred to be. I also didn't mention that at 24 I felt sort of ancient, the only other people my age were newly weds who had better things to do then drink with 16 - 18 year olds which was exactly what my sisters and I were doing (Isabel who is 22 and Melanie who is 18 who fit more in terms of the age group). We had fun and learned a great British drinking game, Arrogance, it's like playing Kings but with only a King cup that you had to drink based off a flip of the coin (be prepared to black out). Isabel cougared it up a bit and made out with this one 16 year old lad several nights, it was like an unspoken agreement only when drunk and at night lol. Isabel also lost her camera and her iPhone which was an extreme fail.
After exchanging emails and facebook contact info with these youngins (also exchanged emails with cousins and I have been busy reading and writing emails in Spanish which I haven't done since I studied abroad in Spain 2008) we ventured off and left Cuba back towards Montreal to trek to New Jersey. We had gone in two cars, one car was my sisters Isabel, Melanie and I and the other car was mom, dad and Angela (even though on the drive home Isabel and I drove the most as the parents were exhausted). So, my parents got to the border first as we had to put gas in our car and my father had the brilliant idea to say that he had visited Cuba at the border while the rest of the family stayed in Montreal... Needless to say their car was "randomly chosen for inspection" and we had the unfortunate luck to end up with the same customs officer who put our car to be "randomly inspected". It was a blast being brought to a back room with border police after they have taken the $200 worth of Cuban cigars from your car and lectured you on traveling to Cuba and the embargo and what not. A bunch of nonsense really even though the officers were nice cause I could have easily been detained 4-28 hours if the officer had been in a sour mood, all they told us was to go back into Canada and dispose of the cigars (which I did to much sadness
) I just handed them over to a Canadian cop who told us "That sucks balls that you can't bring Cuban cigars to the States" Yes Mr. Canadian Cop, I couldn't have said it any better.Cheers
Pictures!
father in front of random fruit stand that him and I stopped at when we went to rent a car
old balcony in the city of Santiago
beach at the resort in Holguin
random pretty building in Santiago several blocks from where father grew up
13 machetes tribute to Cuba independence from Spain,
cathedral in central Santiago
outside of father's old house (brown) with random neighbors that he remembered from over 40 years ago
assorted family members in Santiago celebrating and dancing
sisters on the beach at resort
old cars used as cabs outside hotel in Santiago
house of first governor of Spain in Cuba, built in 1600's
municipal building in Santiago
view from balcon de Velazquez (includes highest point of Cuba)
dad and I on the way to get the rental car
typical public transportation
father's primary school, former military barracks
where we fixed flat tire
assorted family mother's side
church where father sang as a child/mother's parents were married
assorted family mother's side who visited at the resort
more assorted family mother's side at the resort
street in Santiago
hotel we stayed at in Santiago
Santiago view from hotel
VIEW 6 of 6 COMMENTS
tore:
Aw. The buildings are gorgeous! Looks like a beautiful place.
nanette:
i love the pictures everything looks beautiful!