JUDITH BETH COHEN

Underwhelmed in Cuba

Cuba wasn’t my choice for a winter getaway, but my husband wanted to show me the utopia he remembered from his past visit as a zealous, young Socialist. Our Moorish style Havana hotel surrounded an open courtyard filled with plants but despite the pleasant setting, drills from outside workers woke us at five a.m. The fuzzy black and white TV carried only state-run channels: a lesson in Cuban history, news of a chess match or baseball game; not a word about world events. Only the large tourist hotels carried CNN.

At night the streets of Havana were so dark we stepped carefully using a flashlight, followed by stray dogs and children, urging us to visit their family “paladore.” Up a flight of stairs, we entered a living room transformed into a cafe with six or seven tables. Statues of the Virgin and shrines draped with plastic flowers reminded us of the Pope’s visit and the population’s eager embrace of Catholicism. For ten dollars each we enjoyed an ample meal. Back at our hotel room, an elegant terry cloth swan perched on the bed welcomed us. Even our modest accommodation featured towel artistry.

By day the much-photographed vintage American cars in brilliant shades of blue and green rested side by side like idle aristocrats. Their owners’ faces were reflected in their shining chrome as they lovingly stroked their vehicles. One man confided that he’d inherited his uncle’s ‘48 Plymouth, but he’d sell it if he could get to America. Though a lottery permits a small number to emigrate, permission isn’t enough–you also need cash.

Open air bookstalls filled the Plaza des Armas, a graceful square of colonial buildings on the edge of the seaside fort. There, a retired Cuban architect urged us to buy a six-volume history of the U.S, published in 1836.

“Socialism is good when it comes to electricity or transportation,” he said, “but the government wants to control everything–even the little person struggling to make a living.” He swept his arm past the booksellers and sighed. Resignation, tempered by a sense of irony, seemed to be the dominant state of mind, captured in jokes like this: “Raoul told Fidel they should let more people leave. ‘Then we’ll be the only ones left on the Island,’ Fidel replied. ‘What do you mean, WE? Raoul retorted.”

We strolled along the Malecon, a promenade facing the sea bordered by decaying colonial mansions turned into multiple family dwellings. Tired of walking, we hailed a bicycle taxi. The sixty-year-old black man peddling us up hill was stopped three times by uniformed officers from the Interior police who checked his papers. It seemed like harassment. Tourists use bicycle taxis, but locals ride “Camel” buses, fashioned from old military trucks linked together by a skin-like attachment. They lumber up the roads spewing fumes, hauling people to work.

On the street, an old man wearing an “I love Jesus cap” approached and asked if we’re North Americans. Thrilled, he begged us to describe exactly what an American birth certificate looks like so he can get one for his nephew. I pulled mine from my wallet. When he saw the ragged, paper with its official stamp, he was so joyful you’d think he’d won the lottery. Innocently, I had supplied what he needed to forge a document, but we’ll never know whether he succeeded.

In Havana’s Parc Central, we chatted with a man who’d once managed the hotel restaurant across the street. Like almost everyone over the age sixty, he’d visited the states before the revolution. As he shared his memories of Texas, we passed a pack of men engaged in a lively debate with multiple speakers shouting and gesturing. Is it a political demonstration of some sort? He laughed. “They’re crazy. They’re here every day arguing about baseball.”

“What do they live on?” We wondered.

He shrugs – “They live on air,” he said.

When we stopped in the university town of Santa Clara, an old woman accosted us, rubbing her arms and repeating the word for soap. Outside government stores, people stood in orderly lines, waiting to buy their allotment of beans, oil, and rice. An aging man, who introduced himself as a retired cartographer, offered a tour of the city. We followed him to the colonial theater where international performers once played. Children taking free dance and music classes filled the building. As we followed our guide, I noticed that his shoes were full of holes.

“Cubans have two passions,” he says with heavy irony, “the Revolution and the black market–the two faces of Cuba.”

In the picturesque, pastel town of Trinidad, a UN heritage city, we stayed in a government run hotel perched on a hill overlooking the sea. Finding no bicycle rentals, we negotiated with two young men willing to rent their own bikes for five dollars each. The sixteen km ride to the beach passed neat villages where children waved at us. We luxuriated in the sand next to a British man accompanied by a teenage Cuban beauty. Without a shred of embarrassment, he introduced himself as a bus driver from Birmingham with a wife and three kids. “I’ve dreamed of doing this for years,” he said. Then he gestured toward his companion, “I’d like to help her, but I can’t bring her home with me, can I?” His candor unnerved me—that such shameless exploitation could thrive.

On our return trip, one bike broke down, forcing us to hail a taxi willing to carry us and the bikes. We offered to pay for repairs but Josfeng, the bike owner, was distraught. He insisted it’s impossible to find the parts for his Japanese made cycle, but he could buy another for $30. Without protest, we paid for a replacement. In gratitude, he insisted that we have dinner at his house, clearly determined to make our exchange reciprocal and not some form of begging. That evening, he escorted us to the modest, cement block three room dwelling where he, his young wife, Yameley and their baby lived with her mother. Though his mother-in-law was probably younger than us, she had no teeth, a common problem for older folks. Gnawing on sugar cane must have caused the damage before the revolution brought dental care to the poor. Josfeng was in the process of building their own house next door, but it went slowly for he could afford only one bag of cement at a time. Yameley, a thin woman, dressed in skintight shorts and a tank top, smoked as she loaded platters of food onto the kitchen table. Their baby girl, wearing a ruffled pink dress and a ribbon around her head looked ready for a party. Her large eyes took in everything as we dined on rice, beans, and their weekly ration of pork in a spicy sauce, along with bowls of cucumbers and tomatoes, and fried plantains–a filling, tasty meal.

With our mixture of elementary Spanish and Josfeng’s few words of English we covered many topics. They fell in love on the street, he said. He held his dark-skinned arm next to his wife’s light one and boasted that their color difference means nothing in Cuba. Everyone goes to school, he said. Education is mandatory through high school, and all get free medical care, but the medicine shortage caused by the US embargo means many can’t get treated. Our earnest host had attended art school where he learned to craft items for the tourist market, but he was dependent on hotels to allow him to sell near their entrance. Josfeng had harsh words for those who hustle tourist dollars through illegal means, like the black marketers who urged us to buy cigars. His painted gourds show folk art figures dancing and he insisted on giving them to us as gifts.

“What do you think of Cuba?” he wanted to know.

“People seem much better off here than in Mexico,” my husband said.

“Why?” he wondered. “Does the US have a boycott against them too?”

As he struggled to make sense of his country’s poverty, we were surprised that he knew so little about the world outside of Cuba, making me wonder what version of history they taught in the schools. He knows that life was better before the Soviet Union collapsed, and the new focus on tourism has brought some improvements, yet his old art school can’t afford to buy paint for their students. Josfeng walked us back to the hotel, reluctant to let us go, as if some magic might rub off on him. By the time we said goodnight, we’d bought more crafts, added more dollars to his bicycle fund, and made new friends.

Cuba left me feeling ambivalent with its conflicting images: begging government workers, empty highways, dark city streets and crumbling colonial buildings along with dancing children, high literacy, and free health care. To celebrate Cuba’s tattered socialism perpetuates a romantic myth, but to condemn it for being undemocratic is equally naive. A highway billboard message echoes long after our trip: “Five hundred thousand children in the world will sleep in the street tonight and none of them are in Cuba.”

Judith Beth Cohen’s new story collection Never Be Normal is available from Atmosphere Press. She depicts sixties rebels, political activists, struggling couples, and singles looking for love with humor and empathy. Readers meet a Jewish bus driver in Texas, a Yoga Guru, A Palestinian peace activist, and an obese child with a terminal disease. There’s a therapist who brings a live python to his disturbed charges and a single woman who joins a scheme for borrowing married men. A feuding couple fight a forest fire on an Indian reservation. Devastated by a fatal hunting accident, another woman resists police efforts to help her, and a radical South African priest hides in Ireland. These rebels and self-identified outsiders confront their demons. Most of the stories have appeared in literary magazines and journals but this volume makes them available to a larger audience. Cohen’s novel Seasons (The Permanent Press, Sag Harbor, NY), and Jahreszeiten (Vermont Diary), Rowohlt, Frankfurt, Germany, is available as an eBook. She has taught at Harvard and Lesley Universities. Reviewers have said: “Almost every story features a woman who observes life with a beguiling mix of intelligence, skepticism, hope and humor. Perfect for these pandemic times.”