Day 4: Havana

 

Old Havana Model – Architect of the restoration explained the model and procedure of the restoration. The restoration is 33% completed with money from UNESCO and EU countries. They have been working on this percentage of restoration for 20 years. The model took one family of five 3 years to build. Wood is hard to find here, since the US has the best wood and it is embargoed. Canadians have the second best but if Canada trades with Cuba, the US won’t trade with them for a year.

San Francisco de Asis

Cathedral

The Hotel Ambrose is the former hangout of Ernest Hemingway when he came to Havana for the fishing tournament (and after, before he rented a house). He stayed in room 511 where he finished the book For Whom the Bell Tolls and started The Old Man and the Sea.

National Hotel – probably the nicest hotel in Havana where many presidents and famous people stay.

We then visited a Dance School where kids ages 4-14 would study dance after school.  They are there from 4:30-7 pm.  Kids aged 4-9 were in workshop 1, 10-14 were in workshop 2. At age 9 kids must pass an audition to continue into workshop 2, the professional school. Kids attend M-F and learn 3 different styles of dance; ballet, modern and Spanish. There were a total of 470 kids in the school. After workshop 2 they stay for 5 years. There are 10 boys total and in 9^th grade they have to decide weather to continue at that school or go to the National School of Art. They start with 40 students in workshop 1, 25 go onto workshop 2. If students don’t qualify, they can stay in workshop 1 for another year. We had trouble getting answers about what they do after school or what other options they have if they can’t make it into workshop 2.

23^rd and L street is the most famous corner in Havana, where you can find the most popular ice cream shop, the former Havana Hilton, the theater showing “White Elephant” and behind it Cuban radio and TV stations.

 

Day 3: Santa Clara/Havana

Santa Clara, capitol city of the province about a 2 hour drive from the resort we stayed at. We walked around the city square called Parque Vidal – monuments and statues, surrounded by colonial buildings. This city is also home to a Jewish  For lunch they brought us to a tourist resort (the only places we’ve had food so far) and it was a buffet. I really love the papaya here.

4 hour drive to Havana

Cars seem to be rare (in the countryside) and I think gas is rationed. License plates are by color.

Blue is for tourists/state owned vehicles

Red is for rental cars

Black is for embassy

Green is Army

Yellow is private sector

Cars we’ve seen:

Restored old American cars: Oldsmobile, Chevrolet and Ford from the 1950’s

Newer cars are: Citreon, Hyundai, BMW, Fiat, Toyota, Lada, Veo, Rio, Peugeot, Kia and VW

During the drive we learned a lot about the local life and culture. Children are required to go to school, in elementary school they all wear red and white uniforms, 3 years junior high school they wear yellow and white and 3 years pre-university (high school) and wear blue and white and university or tech school (4 years) if they want. School is only mandatory until end of junior high school – around age 14. If they do, they have to take a job assigned to them for at least 2 years after graduation. School is from September to June, July and August are vacation. Education is free, there are no private schools. They have specialty schools for the arts and sports (I saw this in China too).

Men at 17 years old have mandatory 2 years in the military. Girls military service is voluntary. A person’s basic monthly salary is $10, but doctors, lawyers and police make around $40 USD a month. Most shops (and everything else really) is state run but there are starting to be small shops that are privately run.

After the economic collapse of the soviet bloc in the early 1990’s, the reconstruction of Cuba economics started with tourism. They still trade in sugar and tobacco. Private businesses are mostly barber shops, beauty schools, taxi drivers, restaurateurs, etc. and they pay taxes to the government. Most workers are state sponsored and hired by state agencies.

Housing is inherited or provided through micro-brigades. Today they can buy/sell properties but they are US prices so no one can afford them. Foreigners can only rent property. National health care workers have top priority for housing assignments. Private farmers have to pay taxes, medical care is free.

Politics:

On July 26, 1953, Che Guevara led a revolution against the Batista government which was a US backed dictatorship. Fidel Castro was also one of the main leaders.

In 1956, after being exiled to Mexico, Che returned. Revolutionaries fled to the mountains near Santa Clara.

Once in Havana we drove through the city to get to our hotel. It is obviously for Canadian and European tourists. Then we went to dinner at another place only for tourists. I’m excited to go off on our own tomorrow for dinner.

 

Day 2: Remedios/Caibarien

Today we visited the cities of Caibarien of Remedios.

In Caibarien we saw an old print shop and were able to exchange money. You CAN exchange USD but the exchange rate is fairly bad. I had CAD and still lost about $13 on the transaction. USD in the same amount lost around $25

Looked in a few of the stores but items like bottled water were hard to find. We found a store with 6 bottles and bought 2 of them. They also had a lot of ‘pizzerias’ which looked liked a tortilla with tomato sauce and then toppings. So more like an open calzone, definitely nothing like American pizza. Or Italian pizza.

We also visited an artist’s house: Madeline Perez

 

In Remedios, the main features of the town square are colonial architecture and cobbled streets. Visited the cathedral that the town was built around. It was the eighth of the original 8 cathedrals the Spanish built on the island. Everything we’ve seen so far is very poor looking. The buildings aren’t kept up and the roads are horrible.

Parade

We got back to our hotel around 2, ate lunch and tried to go to the beach but it had become overcast and raining so instead we walked around the resort.

Meeting Up & Day 1: Miami, FL/Cienfuegos, Cuba

 

Staring off the morning in Miami, still recovering from my birthday celebrations of the weekend. Met up with Margaret in the evening and went to a great Peruvian restaurant across the street from the hotel. It was SO cheap! I think $15 for the 2 of us with drinks.

We spent the next morning on a tour of the Miami neighborhoods including Coconut Grove, Coral Gables and South Beach and ended in Little Havana. We saw Domino Park, where Cuban refugees play dominos everyday. Walked around a bit on Calle Ocho (the main street) and had lunch before heading to the airport.

50 minute charter flight on American Airlines. Landed in Cienfuegos, which is home to the smallest airport I have ever seen. It had a landing strip and a small building. I think we were the only arriving flight of the day.

Immigrations and customs were a breeze. They really studied my passport and I asked the officer to give me a stamp.

Dinner @ Casa Verde in Cienfuegos

3 hour drive to Cayo Santa Maria to our resort hotel. It is an all-inclusive right on the beach. It was a long day.