A Look at Life on The Cuban Inside

For Cubans, access to tourists often means access to money, which can create glaring differences among neighbors. One man who lives in the converted mansion drives tourists around the island for a living. He wears a thick gold chain on his neck and is renovating his apartment, something most Cubans can only dream of doing. His life contrasts vividly with that of another resident of the mansion, a doctor who shares his apartment with his wife, their grown son and the son's wife. They rip pages out of an old phonebook to use for toilet paper.

So many Cubans lack the simple comforts I take for granted. Cattle are so scarce that most people can buy government-subsidized meat only twice a year, and then only a half pound per person. Meat is sometimes available at exorbitant prices in special stores, or on the black market, at the buyer's peril: Buying clandestine beef can fetch a five-year prison term. Slaughtering a cow is worse -- it can get you up to 10 years behind bars.

One day I savored a few bites of steak at lunch in a fancy Havana hotel, then took the leftovers to my aunt. Watching her devour the meat later, I guiltily wondered why I hadn't thought to order another one. At a Chinese restaurant, a Cuban friend urged me to take a photo of a sizzling platter of beef because she thought it was so beautiful and wanted to remember it.

Although Cubans generally distrust anything their government tells them, many still believe their leaders' claims that the U.S. embargo -- not Castro's communist government -- is chiefly responsible for their lives of penury. "Because of the embargo" is another constant refrain, shorthand for any shortage of food, any lack of services, any hardship. The price of a soda is high because of the embargo, there's not enough medicine because of the embargo, children have no milk to drink because of the embargo.

And yet some aren't sure what to think. Maria, a 46-year-old single mother, told me that, having been born under Castro, she has always known only what her government allows her to know. Many understand that they're misinformed on lots of issues, but they don't have access to outside sources of news to form their own opinions.

Some older Cubans, though, who were around before the 1959 revolution, remain steadfastly opposed to their government. Manuel, a 69-year-old Havana man, told me he believes that Castro has been propped up by the money Cuban exiles send home to their relatives. He argued for even stronger sanctions. "Even if they choke me, I'd be happy if they choke [Castro]," he said.

Still, it's hard to imagine the chokehold getting much tighter. After a week in Havana, I headed east, to stay with my mother's sister in Buenaventura, a small town in Holguin province more than 500 miles from the capital, where few if any tourists venture. The lights go out more frequently there, and poverty is more extreme.

For years, my hand-me-downs had been crossing the Florida Straits in care packages for cousins I had never met. Now, I saw old belongings I'd long forgotten. My uncle's wife was wearing my pink cubic zirconia earrings. Another aunt wore my white jeans. A cousin told me how much she loves the black cocktail dress I once sent her. I smiled as I struggled to recall it. Before I returned to Havana, I left most of my clothes behind. I handed out shoes, hand cream, hairpins. Every item was received like an heirloom.

On my last night in Havana, I took my cousins to a dance club, where the $1 cover is beyond their means. Women in miniskirts and young men in baggy jeans danced to Cuban salsa and reggaeton, a fusion of dancehall and Latin hip-hop. My 41-year-old cousin, Roxana, shrieked in disbelief when she heard the lyrics of a new song: "For me, Havana has become too small." "I can't believe they're allowed to play that," she said, detecting the song's thinly veiled reference to the desire to leave the island. As we danced, I glanced at my 22-year-old cousin, Robi, who wants more than anything to do just that.

The next morning, I did it effortlessly. As I boarded the plane, I wondered how long I'd have to wait to see my cousins again, how long it would be before this outdated cold war between the two countries I love most is finally over. It made me sad and a little angry to think that so many families are being forced apart by the new sanctions.

Perhaps those sanctions have a purpose. Perhaps one day we'll all look back and think they made a difference. But it was hard to think about that as I looked at Robi's mournful face. Saying good-bye, I remembered the joke he'd cracked two years before, as I was ending my first visit: "Why don't you take me in your luggage?"

All the way home, I wished I could.

Author's e-mail:

dmarrero01@yahoo.com

Diana Marrero, a former reporter for the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, is a Phillips Foundation journalism fellow writing about U.S.-Cuba relations.