TRAVEL MEMOIR
Cuba — 9 Days Stream Of Consciousness Backpacking Solo
Travel life dramas from Santiago to La Habana. With guardian angels and lobsters searching for freedom. And rum.
Day 0 — Santiago de Cuba: Iberojet
South Cuba. I landed in the 1950s. The airport has a waiting room with wooden chairs and a coffee counter. A telephone is hanging on the wall and 3 employees hide around the corner smoking. Crowded in a small room, we are silently waiting for something to happen without knowing what.
Endless controls.
It’s damp, musty, noisy, slow. 3 hours of passport checks.
I meet another traveler. We chat and we leave, she to her hotel and me to my Casa. I smoke my first cigarette looking at the Cuban stars.
The sky is open. The air is warm.
The taxi driver, if you accept his first offer, is surprised and happy. He wasn’t so cheerful when he carried my 40 (fake) liters backpack on his shoulders to put it in the trunk.
Day 1 — Santiago de Cuba: Xiomara
Colonial house, it’s all open, and there are more rocking chairs than doors. Xiomara specifies that it’s a woman-only house but unfortunately there are still men on the street downstairs. I wake up at 8 AM to music coming from a car imported from the US 50 years ago.
The wall of the living room has a large-scale-Analena, Xiomara’s daughter, posing as a beauty queen for Santiago. The Wi-Fi lasts for half an hour and then turns off. I connect to work a bit. The URL is blocked. Airbnb is blocked. Nothing can be booked from Cuba and everything is paid in cash.
Breakfast on the terrace. The best of the whole trip. A flock of pink-breasted birds fly over the city. On the other terrace, pigeons are inside a cage. I exchange Euros for Pesos. Xiomara tells me to be careful. I go.
Walking. Hilly and ruined streets, the sun burns, people say hola and ask if I need help to visit Santiago, a place to sleep or a coffee. I get a ride on a horse-drawn carriage and buy the ticket for the night bus to Trinidad.
They mistake me for a Cuban, for the first and the last time.
Santiago is motorcycles and freedom. It’s the flame that never dies in Plaza de la Revolucion, rum on the top of the terrace in front of the cathedral, the stories from the traveler met the night before. It’s the music on the streets and the last ride in the night air. It’s pissing on my shoes rather than missing the bus.
Day 2 — Trinidad: Ignatia&Ignacio
The hope that this time the night bus will be more comfortable than the last one never dies, but it should. I wake up in Santi Spiritu with my period on the only jeans I have. I look for water, coffee, and a taxi to get to Trinidad.
I find a coffee, I find a taxi. Without the seatbelt and almost without the actual seat, for 40 euros. The driver is so happy that he stops to get water, bananas, and guavas for the journey. He looks at me, wide eyes open. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m traveling solo or I’m just wrecked.
We arrive. He blesses.
Walking with a battery at 1%. I chat around and get an Ape ride to the Casa I saw before the phone died. I book directly there ‘1 night, maybe 2, I’ll see what to do tomorrow and decide.’ For tomorrow they have a free flat perfect for me. ‘I’ll see for tomorrow and decide.’
Ignacio, my host, tells me to decide quickly. Ignatia, his wife, is fire, words, and laughs. She said to Ignacio to shout up, give me The Internet and leave me alone. I pay for tonight’s sleep and tomorrow’s breakfast. The best of the whole trip.
Finally, a warm shower and the view of Trinidad from Ignatia’s terrace.
I decide on a catamaran and then Playa Larga tomorrow. Ignacio is pissed and tells me that I’ll never get there because there are no buses nor colectivo at that time, that Playa Larga has mosquitoes, and that I’ll regret not wanting his beautiful flat. He was actually right, on something at least.
Lunch. I got a travel story from a guy who ate only lobster for a week in Cuba. I accept the challenge: lobster, fried banana, Caipirinha.
Walking around Trinidad. A man on the street leaves me cigars for my dad and tells me that they don’t even have money for shoes.
I can’t reach his eyes.
I climb Cerro de la Vigía. The best view of Trinidad, the best view to control pirates — something is burning on the coast. When the sun falls under the sea I see inside my eyes a spark spreading across the horizon and the Black Pearl disappearing into the Caribbean Sea. Circle of islands.
At home, Ignatia tells me Ignacio needs pills. I am not sure what kind. Night. Trinidad is dark because the only electricity comes from generators in the houses. Trinidad is music. I dance on the street, eat the best lobster of the whole trip, rock on a chair on the colonial house’s terrace, and sink into Elizabeth Turner’s bed.
Day 3 — Caya de la Iguana: Fidel
Sailing on a catamaran rocking on the waves and falling asleep under the sun, bouncing light on the bow net. Silence, ocean. Sparkles. Float.
The water is warm and the coral reef is colorful. Before diving in, I make sure there are no sharks. They tell me no, that the Caribbean Sea is a shallow sea. I believe them, but not too much. I swim among a rainbow of fish and corals, I’m a mermaid.
We dock at the Caya, there are more iguanas than humans.
I ask for guava juice. They ask me if I also want some rum.
‘No gracias.’ ‘Siiii… solo un poquito.’ ‘Vale, pero solo un poquito.’
The glass filled up. I splash drunk around the islets along the beach. These iguanas live in a truly lovely place full of giant shells and palms.
Rocking on the waves on the catamaran, a little falling asleep and a little talking with the captain. He said the fire on the coast is the trash burning.
Cab to Ignatia and Ignacio. I negotiate a collective ride to Playa Larga with the driver. Ignacio is no longer angry and hugs me.
The drive is supposed to take 3 hours but we arrived in 1 and a half. Somehow, in one piece.
Night on the sea. Playa Larga. 2 nights at Floramaria and Fidel’s Casa on the beach, he entertains me on the terrace and she cooks chipirones.
Fidel has his rocking chair at the head of the table and 4 boys following him. ‘Estos son mis chicos. Todos son taxistas, sabes? Yo también lo hacía, pero luego me lastimé.’ He looks at his leg rocking. ‘Entonces ahora ayudo a estos 4 aquí. Y ellos me ayudan a mí. Duermen aquí, ayudan en la cocina, llevan los turistas a las excursiones, y tambien limpian.’
Fidel goes and one of the boys sits in his place. ‘You’re lucky. We can’t even go to Caya de la Iguana. We can take tourists there, but they don’t let us dock.’ Fidel comes back and tells the guy to move his ass from his rocking chair. Fidel smiles at me with blue eyes. I realize how many colors has Cuba. I eat the chipirones and think about Ignacio’s jinx.
About the bloody mosquitoes, he was right.
I sleep with the sound of waves.
Day 4 — Playa Larga: Floramaria
Sunrise on the beach. Feet on the sand dipped into the ocean. The water, calm and low. Peace. Breakfast on the terrace with Cuban coffee, intense. Chattings with two travelers about surfing spots, adding more destinations to my list. We go diving in the shipwrecks of Pig Bay’s coral reef. Before, I do some meditative snorkeling above a deep-sea canyon that terrifies me to the point that I almost chicken out. Deep breath, long exhale. The dive instructor empties my air tank so quickly that I sink like an anchor.
I’m going to die. I calm the fuck down, get my zen, and we dive.
I really have to pee, but I have the wetsuit and the instructor behind me. Panic comes, then goes, as I realize I am floating in the ocean above the reef. I am weightless. Beyond the shipwreck, there is a crack to the abyss. Fidel told me that stuff wasn’t for him — the immensity.
I would stay here, but not the instructor. Air.
Fins off, tanks off, wetsuits off and I have the longest pee of my entire life.
Lunch and rum on the beach with the girls. I continue with the lobster. A guy climbs up on a palm tree and hangs a swing between coconut leaves. Playa Larga is screaming – what the fuck I’m gonna dieee – and have the best fun ever. Playa Larga is a beach for locals and a sunset swim.
‘Fuck US. My biggest dream is to go to India and work in Bollywood,’ the guy from the swing said.
‘In India, you could live in an ashram for free just helping those staying there. You just need to save just for a flight.’ he replies colorless that a monthly salary in Cuba is 1050 pesos.
I argue with Fidel about the room, he wants cash, not Airbnb. Floramaria calms him down, that I don’t have any cash left neither there’s a place to withdraw. He gets pissed and leaves. Floramaria asks me if my boyfriend is good. ‘Yes,’ I say. I tell her he wakes me up with coffee in bed. She tells me that also Cuban men are good, but they get angry. She folds clothes.
‘Is it difficult to live here?’ I ask her as she keeps folding.
‘How many friends I’ve seen die trying to escape.’
Her skin is scarred.
The last dinner in Playa Larga is on the beach, with the girls, a dancer, and the sand flies. ‘Girls, you can’t spend money to come here and just sit to eat and drink. Live the real culture! Who wants to dance salsa?’
Day 5 — Viñales: Oleksandra
The door of the Casa was locked last night. I’ll never know if was done by accident or by Fidel. In the morning he hugged me – hasta la vista Fidel.
I hit the road again and change two taxis. In the first one, we dance and smoke. In the second one, the driver fixes the crucifix on the mirror and polishes the steering wheel, messaging and circling up to spiral roads honking at everyone on the street. For 1.5 hours.
Viñales is hills, rocks, and plantations. Viñales is the first Casa I’ve seen owned by a woman, Blanca. Riding motorcycles and horses with her brother. Viñales is smoking Cuban cigars in honey in the middle of a tobacco plantation. ‘90% of the production goes to the government. With the other 10% we make cigars to sell here.’
‘Which one do you make more money from?’
‘The 10%.’ Silence. ‘But you can win a prize from the government, the best plantation in Cuba. Then they make you a contract.’ I buy cigars and honey from that 10% and go with the horse.
Top of the hills, eagles above the setting sun. Hot wind. Way back. The full moon rises from the hills and my butt hurts from the ride.
Viñales. Walking. The girls from Playa Larga. Oleksandra.
‘People here are equal. Equal in poverty. Everyone has a house but no one knows when they will get soap. Or anything else.’
‘Today the guy from the tobacco plantation told me that if a married couple goes out separately, they are called European. Couples always go out together here.’
‘Everyone acts the same. If they don’t, they won’t get any water, food, or help from the rest of the community. And they will be isolated. They need to think and act as a community. If they don’t get approval, they’re fucked.’
I take out cash from a rare ATM in Cuba: money never credited to my bank account.
Music on the streets. Lobster dinner. Stray dogs. So many, so skinny, so sick. I can’t eat this. I go to bring my dinner to the sick dog, hoping she will get food also tomorrow. A girl sees me, stands up with her plate, and feeds the other dogs. The owner of the restaurant tells me they leave leftovers outside every night.
Day 6 — Cayo Jutías: Blanca
2 hours on bumpy roads and I am in a Caribbean paradise.
Thin and white sand. Shallow and blue water. Warm.
I walk by the shore, swim without waves, and collect shells. I bring one to Blanca. ‘For the kids!’ She tells me that even though the beach is so close, it is impossible for her to get there because the taxi colectivo is too expensive. I think about what Oleksandra told me — people here are equal. Tourists are not. Currency and opportunities are different.
Day 7 — La Habana: Marilù
The Airbnb is art.
A penthouse with high ceilings and a circular terrace overlooking the city. The Airbnb is no Wi-Fi. The streets are alive. People are outside, and windows and doors are open.
The city is art. I walk all around the old town and watch the sunset on Cristo de La Habana. Havana means Heaven.
The city is music. Music frames time.
Double dinner of tapas. Lobster disgusts me now.
A secret bar between buildings. It’s like a geode, a crystal inside the stone. Rum and malanga chips. I look for a tobacco shop.
‘Sabes dónde tienes cigarros?’
‘You’re not in Spain cariño, cigarros means cigars. Come in, I have some cigarettes here.’ Night talking with Marilù in her living room.
She left me the cigarettes for tomorrow.
‘Come to visit mañana! Ciao.’
Day 8 — La Habana: Diego&Orfeo
El Dandy. Breakfast at the gallery bar. On the fridge, there’s a sticker saying Dump Trump. 3 hours at the artisans’ market in Almacenes San José. Manuel Larrañaga has a photoserie of Cuba’s drags.
Yimer González has my favorite piece – Havana fee. Walking around La Habana is like walking through the history of the arts. The salsa, graffiti, architecture, crafts, Hemingway. A blind artist does me a portrait on the street. I look at old propaganda.
Sky Green. Pink clouds at sunset. The cars color the city. Night, drinks with the traveler from the first night and Cuban friends. We pay the cab 50 pesos, in total. I learn salsa drinking beer in a parking lot under the full moon talking about life and freedom. I tell Diego that maybe Cuba needs another revolution.
‘You see this food at the corner of the street? It’s an offer for the gods.’
‘Do you have gods?’
‘They are more like angels,’ Orfeo walks, ‘you see this woman wearing white? She met her angel. She’s enlightened, that’s why wears white.’
Sitting on 24-hour bar stools with metal bars on the window, we talk with the girl. Her angel gave her clarity. She doesn’t doubt her decisions. She knows. She didn’t meet the angel, she felt it.
Cuban Art Factory. Dancing and bouncing. Sweaty, salty. Full of rum. Art on the walls. A large piece goes to the roof and we watch it following the line of the story it tells searching for hidden messages. We dance, and we laugh. A bit of a bus and a bit of a walk on the streets of La Habana.
Almost daylight. I am not as drunk as you think I am.
At the corner of the street, there’s a pig head inside a pot.
Day 9 — La Habana: Elian
I’m desiccated.
Hungover wake-up means breakfast in Casa. The best of the whole trip.
Elian is happy and smiles. Puts palm leaves, gold cups, and a guava smoothie on the table. I talk to a dude drinking coffee. He recommends I read Padura. He tells me that he always comes to La Habana because salsa makes him happy. He takes lessons from a Tropicana dancer.
‘They keep saying that Cuba is a socialist country without realizing it’s a dictatorship.’ He goes to wake up the dancer talking with Elian as if they know each other for a long time. Elian not really.
‘When you are limited you create more.’ The dude tells me.
‘Like Cuban art.’ The dude smiles.
Backpack ready. Elian gives me the hotspot and I find out that flight check-in can be done only at the airport. Fuck.
‘Where are you flying to?’
‘Venice.’
‘Venezia! Io amo l’Italia! È il mio sogno visitare l’Italia. Lo parlo anche, un po’ di italiano.’ Silence. ‘You know, I really love Cuba. The nature. The music. The art. The people. But.’ Exhale. ‘L’avventura. Leaving, and not knowing where you’re going or what the people will look like. Seeing different architecture and eating different food. Experiencing a different life. I don’t know if I can dare to dream of this. A friend of mine saved enough money for the flight. She was about to leave. But she couldn’t. They stopped her because she didn’t have the official invitation letter from a resident vouching for her.’
‘A te la scrivo io.’
At the artisans’ market, Elsa Santana told me that art is expression.
In Cuban art, I’ve seen resignation and I’ve seen hope. In life, I’ve seen art. Swinging on a tall palm tree. Dancing on the street. Helping each other. Living in the moment. Laughing a lot. The rum.
— Eat and drink locally. Sleep in Casa. The cash you think you need is not as much as you should bring. Just disconnect. Buy more art than you think you want. Don’t fuck with the reef. Take the trash. Airbnb ain’t work. Your card neither. ATM’s exchange rate is higher than your host’s. Sunset on the beach means: bring repellant. I always felt safe (not on the colectivo to Playa Larga). Men catcall – Hola linda. Every breakfast is the best of the whole trip. Love.
