The wrong combination…

This travel story I need to split up in two stories, because both topics are very different, but interesting to write about. The first is about my/our experiences in Cuba and the second is about the tour.

After three years I finally got an opportunity to go back to Cuba to guide a tour of three weeks across the most of the island. Cuba is to me one of the most interesting islands of the Caribbean, not that I´ve been to any other, but I´m fascinated by its history and their current way of living.

It is suppose to be a socialistic island and three years ago I already found out that the system my look good on paper, but in reality it doesn’t work. It is natural for people to be motivated to work harder, but if a better study or harder work, doesn’t earn you anything extra, than why be bothered? I noticed this especially in terms of quality of food and service, which was often poor in places owned by the government.

This tour we would have a local guide with us and I wanted to try to get a deeper and better impression about the Cuban way of living.

 Lets first start with going in a birds-flight (or gaviota (seagull) and name of our bus company) over the tour, to give you an idea of the beautiful places we visited during this tour.

 We started in the Capital Habana (2.2 million inhabitants), but already left the day after arriving direct to the country-side of Viñales. Viñales lays in the province of Piñar del Rio, where the tobacco plants grow which are used to make the best Cuban cigars.

 We had a guided walking tour through the beautiful surrounding of Viñales. On this walk we visited two local farms and learned that the different layers of leaves of the tobacco plants not only provide the different tastes and quality of the cigars, but are also needed to build up the different layers that the cigars are made of.

 In the evening we went to a popular local rest./bar/dancing. However the food and service were according to the expectations of a governmental establishment, luckily we could say that the music and nightlife were real Cuban style. It was lively and performed from their hearts.

After Viñales we drove to Cienfuegos, named after one of the famous revolution heroes. We stayed in a very luxury hotel on Punta Gorda, from where we had a great view over the bay and which was close to a famous street with pretty en well restored colonial buildings.

The next day, on our way to Trinidad, we got a tour through the rest of the colonial city centre.

In the famous, touristic, colonial town of Trinidad, with its pretty colonial cobbling streets with pastel colored houses, we stayed with local families, so called ‘Casas Particulares’. These are families who out rent a part of their own house to invite tourists. In order to do this legal, they have to be connected to a governmental organization named: ONAT Trabajadores por cuenta propia. They usually ask 25 CUC (Cuban Confertible Peso, or tourist peso, there go about 1.28 of these in a Euro) for a room, 3 CUC for breakfast and 7 to 11 CUC for dinner, which is often a good value for what you get. 

 25 CUC To spend one night in their house sounds very expensive if you know that the average Cuban officially earns each month only about 300 Cuban Pesos, or Moneda Nacional (there go 24 Cuban pesos in one CUC…). You can notice easily the difference in houses and families who work with tourists, but there is also a certain risk involved. In Habana for example a family that offers one room for rent has to pay each month 100 CUC to ONAT for the room and 30 CUC more if the offer food as well, no matter if they had costumers or not. They have to administrate all their income and at the end of the year they also have to pay a 10% tax. over all the money they earned that year. It sounds to me like an interesting system in a socialistic country.

The family stay was a different experience for each group member, because we were spread out with 18 tourists over 11 very different families. Some tourists had to stay in very basic rooms (basic in comprehension to western standards, but still luxury if you compare it to how most Cuban families have to live), but all tourists were content about the service and food which the families provided. It is really noticeable that these families need to provide a good service in order to be sure that tourists keep coming to their houses, or else they will lose a lot of money each month…

In Trinidad we had a special Christmas Dinner in an old colonial building and after that we joined the exciting Cuban nightlife of Trinidad.

 Around Trinidad we enjoyed some pretty beaches and two beautiful walks through an area called Topes del Collante, with cloud forest and pretty waterfalls.

After Trinidad we had a long bus ride to another waterfall, called ‘El Salton’. This waterfall was part of a hotel complex with the same name, situated in a beautiful green valley in the Sierra Maestra province. This is about the most important province for the Cuban revolution, but unfortunately we were a bit to far away to visit Castro´s old command centre ‘La Plata’. However the surrounding of the hotel offered enough possibilities hike through nature and get an impression of the Cuban live in the country side. We even got a close look of the national Cuban bird (sorry, I forgot its name again ;-). After the hike we could go for a swim in the natural pool below the waterfall, or ask for a great massage.

From Sierra Maestra it was a nice ride with beautiful costal and mountain views towards Baracoa. On our way we passed the city of Guantanamo. Yes, I say intensely the city of, because the ‘famous’ USA prison is named after the province and city of Guantanamo and not the other way around. Actually when they founded the military base around 1900 they were suppose to leave within 100 year, during this they kind of extended it until 2004, but now they are still there, being a thorn in the eye of the Cubans. Guantanamo is for Cubans known for their sportive people. They had several Olympic champions coming from this province and their baseball team is on top of their national competition.

Baracoa is the city where Columbus left the first piece of Christian regalia (symbol) introduced to the Latin Americans. It is a simple wooden cross, but its meaning had very big consequences for the history of the Americans. This made it extra special to still be able to see this cross. It wasn´t in the church at the moment, but in a Colonial house next to it. This house was turned into ‘the church’, because Baracoa and its main church got badly damaged by three hurricanes which passed over the island at the end of 2008.

The Hotel had a great view over the bay where more than 500 years ago Columbus anchored his ship to change history. For dinner we ate sail fish in a colonial Paladar (a restaurant in the living room of a family, which also works according to the ONAT rules). The next day we got a detailed explanation about how the best chocolate of Cuba is made in the province of Baracoa. After this we made a short boat trip over a river, had a short hike on an island full with palm trees and pigs. One of its previous inhabitants we ate, after being barbequed above a fire, for lunch. This was a local specialty and indeed very good.

On the 31th of December we drove to Santiago de Cuba, the second biggest city of Cuba and full of historical locations and stories about the revolution. It was this city where Fidel Castro held his first independency speech on the first of January 1959. Off course this had to be celebrated, so it was a double party for the Cubans these days. They celebrated it mostly on the plazas and streets, while we, on advice of our local guide (security reasons) celebrated New Years Eve with part of the group watching the Tropicana show of Santiago. Unfortunately it wasn´t as good as the famous one from Habana, but it was still fun to watch.

The next day we made a city tour along the most important historical places inside and just outside the city. These included passing by the Moncada Barak’s, where Fidel and a group of young followers on the 26^th of July 1953 made their first attack against the dictatorship of Batista. This attack (the bullet holes are still visible in the walls of what is now a university) is seen as the real beginning of the Cuban revolution.

 After that we went to the Cemeterio Santa Ifigenia where the remains of most of the brave men out of this first revolutionary attack are buried. Next to them it is also the last resting place of important and famous men like: Jose Marti, Frank País, Bacardi (ones a mayor of Santiago), Secundo of the Buena Vista Social Club and many more. We got a very clear and interesting explanation about this cemetery and also witnessed twice the change of the guards of the tomb of Jose Marti, a ceremony that happens each half hour.

 Our last visit was to Castillo del Morro, and old Spanish fort, build to protect the bay of Santiago against Pirates. One of their pirates, who spend 6 years in the prison of El Morro, turned out to be the Dutch Buccaneer (and later hero) Piet Hein. He used his time in this prison to learn Spanish and it is said that this helped him in being able to defeat the Spanish Silver fleet in the Cuban Bay of Matanzas.

From Santiago we drove to Camagüay, a colonial city build like a labyrinth to confuse the pirates who wanted to attack the city. We used bicycle taxi´s to guide us through the pretty streets, many of them filled with buildings in soft pastel colors.

 Camagüay is also the only city with a sculpture of Fidel Castro in public (on plaza the Revolution). He doesn’t like to see public images and/or sculptures of himself and our guide had no idea how this artist got his permission.

On our way to Santa Clara we made a short stop in Sancti Spiritus. It is said that its church is the oldest of Cuba, but in fact it is only the foundation that´s still original.

 Santa Clara is famous for being the location where Fidel and Che attacked ‘El Tren Blindado’ a historical attack that meant the final end of Batista’s regime. Since they got transported from Bolivia to Cuba in 1994 it is also the final resting place of the remains of Chè Guevara’s and some of his companions who fought with him in Bolivia. The museum about Chè´s live is also interesting.

After all this historical places, it was time to enjoy some time on the beach of Varadero.

We stayed in a big luxury all inclusive hotel with swimming pool and direct access to a beautiful white beach. The first day was too windy to go swimming, but still nice to go for a stroll on the beach. The second day it was good weather to lay down and relax on the soft white sand.

The 3th day it was great weather, but we had to go back to Habana. On our way we made a short stop at a statue of Piet Hein, looking over the Matanzas bay. It was a donation from the Dutch government to honor who was to some a hero and to others a pirate.

 In the afternoon we enjoyed the sunshine on our skin, and also on the facades of the colonial buildings of Habana, a beautiful and strange city full of history and contradictions.

It is a city full with colonial buildings and different balconies, but also the city where fancy Chinese made tourist busses drive on the same road with local horse cars and American old-timers and the city where you can see a fat, old and ugly man with a pretty young girl ‘having a drink’ on the roof terrace of a five star hotel. It is the result of a mix of poor socialism and wealthy capitalism brought together in the Cuban tourist industry. It is my opinion that this industry is already breaking down Cuba’s socialistic system. People who work in tourism earn far more money than anyone who doesn´t work in tourism and they are getting more greedy doing so. Young Cubans are loosing their interest for long and difficult studies, because in the end they will still earn less than the tip money from a waiter in a restaurant. One of the few ‘good’ reasons they have left to start a difficult study, is because this gives them better opportunities to find a good job in the United States or in Spain.

 It seems that the ONAT system is Castro´s answer to this. It is a way to give Cubans a change to earn more with having their own business and it might be the beginning of the end of Fidel’s socialistic dream.

In a country where men and women are equal and discrimination officially not exists, tourism and money have now created a new form of discrimination, one not only between the tourists and the Cubans, but also between the rich and the poor. A tourists for example is allowed to use the internet everywhere he wants without showing identification, but a Cuban needs to show his passport and even then they can still deny him to use the internet. Unless he stays in a luxury hotel with internet service, then he is allowed to use the internet without being questioned, hell he can even watch the American CNN if he wants. However even with all the money he has, he can still not buy himself a house. The government is in charge of dividing the houses among the Cubans and before you can get one, your name will probably stand for years on a waiting list, because there is a big shortage of houses in socialistic Cuba. So much for a state that is suppose to equally take care of its citizens.

Luckily the Cubans are in general inventive and not lazy people, skills that made them capable to deal positively with their daily difficulties and still enjoy the good things of live. My hope is that tourism and capitalism in the future can improve the live circumstances of the Cubans, but doesn´t spoil their mentality of being happy with the things they have.

Saludos,

Martijn