6 Realities about Cuba

My Cuba trip has now come and gone, so while I'm working on getting photos sorted and stories written, I can comment on some of the things I had been thinking about in my first post before leaving for the trip.

1. Traveling makes you learn things and it's fantastic.

True story. I was so glad that I had read up on things before going. Small details, like knowing the name of the street you're on came from a war hero, or knowing the significance of the M-26 graffiti all over was really fun. I read just one book but I definitely picked the right one. I got a smattering of everything from colonial revolution times to more modern politics and some random rum facts intertwined with it all. If anyone is interested in reading a really great book on Cuban history, check out Bacardi and the Long Fight For Cuba by Tom Gjelten.

2. I'm really curious to learn the realities of how their currency works.

The money wasn't difficult, and no one ever tried to give us the wrong currency in change. CUC had pictures of buildings on it and the local CUP had people so it was easy to tell apart, plus we never had very much CUP in the first place to keep track of. In the small towns where we were able to pay in CUP, the difference in price was staggering. A nice sandwich was 25 CUP which is equal to $1, and when we got ice cream, based on the ambiguous menu, it was either going to be slightly expensive or stupid cheap. My ice cream plus an empanada was 19 cents. In CUC, you could still find a good cheap meal for $5, but prices were much more equivalent to US prices.

3. Cuban Spanish.

Cuban Spanish is definitely harder to understand. They speak pretty fast and drop sounds and whole syllables from words, especially S at the end of a word. 'Esta buena' becomes 'ta buena' and 'muchas gracias' becomes 'mucha gracia' with the ends just trailing off rather than having a definite ending. That being said, we got pretty decent at understanding their way of talking, and the two of us were usually able to fill in the gaps and words that the other missed. There was however one taxi driver in particular that neither of us could understand a single word he said.

4. All of the classic cars.

Not exaggerated at all. They really are everywhere. That being said, they're not all as shiny as in the pictures. In the States if you see a classic car, it's all painted pretty and restored and made to show off. In Cuba, that's their everyday car and it's bumper may or may not be fully attached. Despite the peeling paint and lack of door handles on some of them, the aesthetic is just as fun as I thought it would be, and the cars are still gorgeous. The lines on old cars are just more sexy than their modern cousins, and I have discovered I like big fins on the back the best.

5. Is the food really as boring as the tour books make it sound?

Nope, the food was absolutely delicious. The typical meals weren't necessarily anything to write home about as culinary marvels, but every meal was flavorful and well cooked. There were a couple of the fancier restaurants that I would write home about. (and I am?) If you ever find yourself in old town Havana go eat at Cafe Nao by the water. I had creamy shrimp on seasoned noodles that I will dream about.


6. It's great not worrying about trip details.

And my non-worry was well founded. We liked our first room in Havana so much that we booked with them for the nights when we returned at the end, and thus already had a key to get in the building when we showed up. Our rooms that were booked together with our dive package were wonderful, and our dive guide helped set us up in a great place in Trinidad through people he knew. For getting around we ended up taking taxis instead of buses everywhere, and all of them were super easy to set up. Trying to do it before would have been a mess and probably not worked anyway. So we took care of the details we needed to, and didn't need to worry about the rest.

So there's you have just a glimpse into what filled our 10 days on the island. There's so much more to come, with stories and pictures and videos both above water and below.

And very fittingly, I found the exact spot of the photo I pulled off of Google for my first post. So you can see the colors and shapes are there, it's just not so shiny as the color-corrected photo makes it look.