Cuba 2003
So, what's it like? What's Cuba like? An easy question to ask, not an easy question to answer. Cuba is a complex mix of many things. It is about emotions and feelings and frustrations and love. It's about family and friends and hustling for money. It's a dance, it's a song. It's the art. It's the politics. There are police on every corner. There is fear. There are rules. You are a tourist. You observe. You experience the finest the island has to offer. In better days, there was a lot to offer. Today, there are meager bits and pieces of a country frozen in time. There is decay. The faded patina makes for beauty and sadness. Once great powerful buildings stand sobbing where glory has left them. Where once housed a single family, now many crowd for shelter. Grand castles and fortresses crushed to rubble without caretakers to feed it with life. Cuba is many things to many people. It is one country to the courageous people who live there. It is a tropical playground to foreign travelers seeking fun in the sun and a warm beach to roast their lily-white skins. It is a sexual playground for those who can sneak around the curfews and laws. It is a life-altering experience if you let it be. One that will change your view of the world forever. One that will make you thankful for every waking day. One that will bring into your life new friends you will have for a lifetime.That is the way of the Cubans I met. They are family, they are friends, they are lovers, they are you and they are me.
My quick trip to Cuba required a religious visa and nine hours of pre-paid salsa lessons. Maybe not all white girls "don't salsa," but this white girl tried and did not get the hang of it!
In 2003, Americans were not supposed to be in Cuba and that is what made my visit so exciting.
