Let's go to Cuba

[Frank Newgent]

http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article.jsp?id=3&debateId=33&articleId=1439

His theme, anyway, is the surprise factor of paradox. The word has a semi-surreal invocation, which outsiders might find fits their preconceptions of a Latin country with its taste for magic realism and the films of Luis Buñuel. But at times I wonder if what he actually means is contradiction or downright hypocrisy. Is he too circumspect to say so? It depends, I suppose, on the degree to which you think the discrepancy between the reality at stake, and the words used to describe it, has been willed.

It is, however, an intoxicating theme. The prevalence of such paradoxes is one of the reasons no one ever understands the Cuban reality, in his view. ‘Contradiction’ is part of the fabric of daily life here.

He starts tamely enough. No one has anything to eat in Cuba but people somehow survive. No one has any soap but the Cubans are cleaner and better dressed than the Europeans who visit. No one has anything to say for Fidel, but everyone turns out in the plaza to applaud him. This is the Hotel Nacional, the great bulwark of Cuban nationalism, but it was built by the famous American company, Pan Am, in the 1930s.

The Cubans are more enamoured of America than people think, although it is their deadly enemy: they play baseball (like Americans) and not soccer (like the rest of the world); American heroes are their heroes. They watch endless streams of American TV on illegal satellites.

As for foreigners, he glances around them room, they used to come to Cuba, to discover the scope of the “new man”, el hombre nuevo (as Che Guevara put it). Now they come to rediscover the etiquette of the old ways and the spirit of the 1950s (which is what the revolution sought to escape). That may say more about the disquiet about modern development in the west than about Cuba, but it is true that a Cuban holiday is a nostalgia trip.

He pauses, and shaking somewhat, he takes a sip of his cocktail, replacing it gingerly on the glass table. He looks to see that the bolero band is louder than it was, and the waiters are otherwise engaged. He then launches his biggest paradox yet. The Americans have an embargo on Cuba, but the only reason anyone survives today in Cuba is because of the money their relatives send them from the States. That amounts to a cautious estimate of a $1 billion a year in total – more than the entire sum earned by the Cuban government in the sugar trade. That makes America Cuba’s biggest donor in aid, and the aid goes direct to the people.

Spent a week in Havana in 1988 and still remember it as one of the most fascinating places I've ever been. Though my (Mexican) Spanish is pretty good I had a difficult time understanding the clipped lisping variety spoken there and became lost in the ventilations of a large group of young men carrying on in an animated exchange one day in the street. I thought "Hey, isn't such open political discussion kinda dangerous around here?"

What else could they be talking about? At times one or another of the participants in this public display of manic fervor would have to stomp away, at a temporary loss to handle the excitement. Then he'd be back, swinging his arms, pacing in circles, carrying on as though nobody would ever be able to understand the crucial significance of what he was trying to say. I remembered the sight of the fellow in the street the day before, facing down the pelota with only his arm, batless, and understood.

Béisbol!

 

[JAR]

I didn't know freedom of speech was limited in Cuba. So that's why there are people who say Cuba's a bad place. I just thought they were saying it was bad just because it's communist.

 

[Frank Newgent]

So that's why there are people who say Cuba's a bad place

Oh yeah? Think so? The only reason the US Coast Guard had to
sink a 51 Chevy pickup was that it was way cooler than their tub.

 

[Cleopatra]

You know this is the reason why I am pissed off with Open Democracy's articles sometimes.

The idealization of communism, terrorism and now of Cuba.

I went to Cuba 10 years after you did in 1998 and I have never felt more ashamed in my life for what a communist regime can do to its population.

I went with the romanticism of the idiots who have read Hemingway, you see, when I was little I was reading Hemingway so I wanted to see Cuba.

The poverty, the seediness, the prostitution shocked me. I was walking with my husband in the streets of Havana and young girls ( younger than 15 years old) were dragging him from the shirt for sex for a couple of dollars.

The "fun" is taking place in huge hotels ( I call them concentration camps for vacation, great places for "quiet" Americans) and outside the hotels the misery is insulting for a person who considers him/herself a free thinker.

I wonder if this monster Fidel Castro who dares to be dressed in Armani while his people starve will ever apologize for the misery of his people, if he will ever apoligize to the young girls that try to support their families by prostitution,if he will ever apologize to the workers in the tobacco plantations that get paid with a few bucks and their products are sold in Zurich for hundreds of $$.

Those who write such nostalgic pieces about Cuba, I refer to the article now, watch too much Hollywood or they read too much literature for children( Hemingway)

 

[DanishDynamite]

Cuba is yet another embodiment of the trueism: "Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely".

 

[Tony]

Thanks for sharing the story Cleo, I find it sickening that the left is willing to make excuses for castro's tyrannical regime in the name of "socialism".

Frank, are you into cars? Ive heard that Cuba is full of old, classic american cars.

 

[Cleopatra]

Cuba is yet another embodiment of the trueism: "Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely".

Since I participate in political discussions for years now, I use a lot of dramatic expressions.

Yes, you can describe Castro's regime with the phrase " Power corrupts" BUT when it comes to see with your own eyes how this is translated in terms of everyday life you get really shocked and you realize the verbalism we all excercise when we are discussing politics.

Power corrupts even in our democratic societies but what is happening to Cuba is a drama or one of the dramas that happen aroung the world.

I hate to think what will happen when Castro will die and the Americans will take over.

Some nations are condemned to live in an infinite misery.

 

[Luke T.]

Spent a week in Havana in 1988 and still remember it as one of the most fascinating places I've ever been. [/B]

I spent three years in Cuba, including 1988, and I remember mushroom clouds as landmines exploded, killing people trying to escape. I remember an 18 year old Marine telling me that he had just witnessed a Cuban soldier assigned to patrol the other side of the fence trying to make a run for it and having several automatic weapons opened up on him as he was killed by his comrades.

I remember talking to two fellows who began their escape through the minefields (the largest active minefields in the world, by the way), only to abandon the idea when a jumping landmine sprang up next to them and failed to explode, thankfully. They decided to SWIM the rest of the way.

Fascinating place. You bet.

 

[Tony]

I hate to think what will happen when Castro will die and the Americans will take over.

Why? Do you think Cuba will become even more of a squalor hell-hole?

 

[Charles Livingston]

I hate to think what will happen when Castro will die and the Americans will take over.

Why?

 

[DanishDynamite]

Originally posted by Cleopatra I hate to think what will happen when Castro will die and the Americans will take over.

Why? And why do you think the Yanks will take over?

Some nations are condemned to live in an infinite misery.

That is lovely, my Queen. However, I have yet to see a nation where this is true. BTW, can you define what you mean by "misery"?

 

[Cleopatra]

Cuba is a very beautiful place, it's a paradise, after Castro's death it will become the vacation resort of USA not to mention that in Europe we will have to say goodbye to Cuban cigars....

Since Greece is a country that lives from tourism( not exclusively but tourism plays a significant role in our economy) I must confess that I am very much against tourism.

Organized Tourism they way we experience it today, has turned the world into an endless Disneyland, cultures are disappearing or they turn into "Folklore" just to serve the hordes of tourists.

Also, the country that hosts huge touristic units profits very little, even the fact that tourism combats unemployment is a myth. Cuba for example will be conquered by Americans that will take all the good jobs and the majority of the natives will stay unemployed or underpaid.

I have seen it happening here.

Danish Dynamite Misery means starvation, means prostitution, means lack of opportunities( in Cuba education is non existent), means lack of perspective for the future.

 

[Charles Livingston]

Cuba is a very beautiful place, it's a paradise, after Castro's death it will become the vacation resort of USA not to mention that in Europe we will have to say goodbye to Cuban cigars....

Since Greece is a country that lives from tourism( not exclusively but tourism plays a significant role in our economy) I must confess that I am very much against tourism.

Organized Tourism they way we experience it today, has turned the world into an endless Disneyland, cultures are disappearing or they turn into "Folklore" just to serve the hordes of tourists.

Also, the country that hosts huge touristic units profits very little, even the fact that tourism combats unemployment is a myth. Cuba for example will be conquered by Americans that will take all the good jobs and the majority of the natives will stay unemployed or underpaid.

I have seen it happening here.

Danish Dynamite Misery means starvation, means prostitution, means lack of opportunities( in Cuba education is non existent), means lack of perspective for the future.

Anything else you want to blame us yanks for? Also, why will europe have to give up cuban cigars if America 'takes over'? I for one just cant wait to move there and screw the entire native population, in addition to stopping all export of cuban cigars to anywhere except the U.S (we do like them ya know, it is a little matter of the embargo).

On one hand you say tourism plays a significant role in the Greek economy, but they you say that the country that hosts huge touristic units profits very little, using unemployment as an example. So I guess tourism plays a significant role in the economics of foreign tourists living in Greece? Or do you mean that the significant role is a negative one? I dont quite understand how businesses formed to accomodate tourists take jobs away from native people, unless the tourists or other foreign people are actually moving there. What (who) tourists have been moving to greece and taking away all the good jobs?

 

[DanishDynamite]

Queen of the Nile:

Cuba is a very beautiful place, it's a paradise, after Castro's death it will become the vacation resort of USA not to mention that in Europe we will have to say goodbye to Cuban cigars....

It is not paradise. There is no paradise. And if it becomes the vacation resort of the USA, so what? Millions of dollars will enter the economy. Ans I very much doubt that the end of Castro will mean the end of Cuban cigars.

Since Greece is a country that lives from tourism( not exclusively but tourism plays a significant role in our economy) I must confess that I am very much against tourism.

You will need to explain this for me.

Organized Tourism they way we experience it today, has turned the world into an endless Disneyland, cultures are disappearing or they turn into "Folklore" just to serve the hordes of tourists.

True. We may decry it, but that is the consequence everywhere of easy airtravel.

Also, the country that hosts huge touristic units profits very little, even the fact that tourism combats unemployment is a myth. Cuba for example will be conquered by Americans that will take all the good jobs and the majority of the natives will stay unemployed or underpaid.

Cleo, my lovely, you are starting to sound like a socialist!

Danish Dynamite Misery means starvation, means prostitution, means lack of opportunities( in Cuba education is non existent), means lack of perspective for the future.

Thank you. Can you point out some nations which will in perpetuity live in misery?

 

[Segnosaur]

I hate to think what will happen when Castro will die and the Americans will take over.

Just out of curiosity, has Castro done anything to secure a successor? Or will it be a free-for-all when he goes?

In some dictatorships (like Iraq was, or Syria), there are often sons or other relatives to take over. Other dictatorships (Like China or Russia pre-1990) have 'parties' that are behind the scenes (so everything isn't based on the personality of one man.) Does cuba have anything like that, or is Castro the only figure who has real influence?

 

[Cleopatra]

Danish Dynamite I felt like a socialist indeed while I was composing my previous post so I took off my pc to take my temperature

Charlie Livingston I don't accuse the Americans about anything.

The loses of tourism for small countries outbalance the profits. Yes, in the huge tourist units, in tourists areas etc foreigners run the tourist industry.

Tourists come to Greece for 10 days and they spend their vacation in a hotel that belongs to a foreign company and they don't even get out of this hotel.

This is what happens to Cuba right now and things of course will deteriorate, if you share my opinion that this constitutes a deterioration.

Segnosaur I do not know at all about Castro's successor's and this is a good opportunity for us to check.

Danish Dynamite

Can you point out some nations which will in perpetuity live in misery?

Why do I have the feeling that you want me to tell you something specific ? What are you having in mind? Palestine or do I hear voices again?

 

[Charles Livingston]

Charlie Livingston I don't accuse the Americans about anything.

Really? How bout this: "Cuba for example will be conquered by Americans that will take all the good jobs and the majority of the natives will stay unemployed or underpaid."

The loses of tourism for small countries outbalance the profits. Yes, in the huge tourist units, in tourists areas etc foreigners run the tourist industry.

Tourists come to Greece for 10 days and they spend their vacation in a hotel that belongs to a foreign company and they don't even get out of this hotel.

This is what happens to Cuba right now and things of course will deteriorate, if you share my opinion that this constitutes a deterioration.

You didnt really address any of my specific questions. I understand that some of the new tourism jobs will be taken by foreigners, but I would imagine some new jobs are created that go to the native population. Also, how do the new jobs take away existing (non-tourist) jobs? Please address my specific questions from this response as well as my previous.

 

[renata]

Segnosaur I do not know at all about Castro's successor's and this is a good opportunity for us to check.

Fidel Castro's successor is his baby brother, Raul. Fidel is 77, Raul is youthful 75.

 

[Frank Newgent]

Frank, are you into cars? Ive heard that Cuba is full of old, classic american cars.

True. Most of them seem to double as cabs. Wouldn't you rather get there in a 1955 Chrysler New Yorker?

My (then) girlfriend and I took the pedicabs, too. One night we just went ahead and asked the driver/peddler to take us to a restaurant he'd recommend. Wheeled through the bowels of old Havana until we got to his neighborhood (of course) where we met his mother who told a hooker with a broken arm to get the speakeasy on the second floor across the street to toss down the key. Had a fine plate of rice and fish surrounded by folks who looked to be from Castro's inner circle. What, was I supposed to kill them?

Prostitution is rampant. I imagine that that's part of the draw these days. The one time in the day we saw the other folks from our budget tour out of Mexico City was at breakfast when we got to see who had been out too late the night before. There was some kid in an Atlanta Braves baseball hat who apparently developed an affection for a likely transvestite three times his age. They ate together every morning and we had to undergo witnessing a tearful separation in the hotel bar the night we flew out.

I still have an old can of potted meat that I purchased in Havana. It's more of an art object really, with a beautiful red cow head graphic and all Cyrillic writing. May be road kill from a Soviet tank. Because I believe that opening this can would cause my immediate transmogrification into some herbivore, I am afraid of it.

 

[JAR]

Danish Dynamite I felt like a socialist indeed while I was composing my previous post so I took off my pc to take my temperature

Charlie Livingston I don't accuse the Americans about anything.

The loses of tourism for small countries outbalance the profits. Yes, in the huge tourist units, in tourists areas etc foreigners run the tourist industry.

Tourists come to Greece for 10 days and they spend their vacation in a hotel that belongs to a foreign company and they don't even get out of this hotel.

This is what happens to Cuba right now and things of course will deteriorate, if you share my opinion that this constitutes a deterioration.

That's the spirit Cleopatra!

White Americans should stay out of Greece and accept that they aren't Greek people and remain in America.

T.E. Lawrence says in page 31 of Chapter 1 in his book "Seven Pillars of Wisdom: A Triumph":

Pray God that men reading the story will not, for love of the glamour of strangeness, go out to prostitute themselves and their talents in serving another race.
A man who gives himself to be a possession of aliens leads a Yahoo life, having bartered his soul to a brute-master. He is not of them. He may stand against them, persuade himself of a mission, batter and twist them into something which they, of their own accord, would not have been. Then he is exploiting his old environment to press them out of theirs. Or, after my model, he may imitate them so well that they spuriously imitate him back again.