moving onward
hi guys!
so for those of you who have stumbled upon this, i have started another blog since my adventures to cuba. please follow my new blog to see what i’m up to now!
amoebas!
alright, this may or may not be my last entry, seeing as i’ve been terrible at regularly updating. we’ll see!
so on saturday, march 29, the group headed out to Santa Clara for a week. i’m fairly certain that this week turned out to be the best week of my entire life.
we all piled onto this yellow school bus that the driver mayke (pronounced mike) had personally decorated. on one side, he painted in big red letters “END THE EMBARGO IN CUBA!” and on the other “U.S.-CUBA FRIENDSHIPMENT.” yes, friendshipment. needless to say, during our drive i saw numerous cubans stop in their tracks to stare at this giant yellow nightmare. i made a point to give the thumbs up to those who looked especially confused.
we left the hotel at 8 AM, and didn’t make it to Santa Clara until dusk. now, this bus ride should have only taken a maximum of 5 hours, but we made some very important stops on our way. first and foremost, there was a mini-petting zoo on the side of the road that was an apparent must-see. the first point of interest was “Fifi’s.” who is Fifi you might ask? well, she happens to be a fairly majestic guinea pig. She sat upon a sort of throne in the middle of a circular table, surrounded by rum bottles and mini-fifi-sized houses. A stout cuban man appeared from behind a booth yelling that we should “try our luck” at fifi’s. you see, the man puts a small box over fifi, and when he takes it off, she runs into a certain house. if we threw in a collective 50 cents, we could bet on which house fifi would run into, and potentially win a free bottle of rum. luckily fifi must have liked the look of us, because we left victoriously, carrying a bottle of havana club.
as we continued on, we saw an alligator, birds, turkeys, bunnies, etc. nothing compared to fifi though. we then went on to the beach where the Bay of Pigs invasion occurred. the museum there was a bit strange. they literally put everything on display, including someone’s toothbrush they found in his pocket. gross, unnecessary… oh well.
the actual bus ride was really cool. i got some great pictures of small houses, people, even a guy riding a bike with his horse following behind on a leash. i guess it enabled us to see the “real” cuba. we also stopped at a couple beautiful beaches, which is always good. as the bus ride continued, a few of us in the back decided to crack open that bottle of rum. as time progressed, the entire bus decided to participate in the festivities, which led to a pretty interested rest of the trip.
i really liked santa clara. we all stayed in separate hostels. most of the kids stayed at “Orlando’s,” who fought in the revolution with Che. they even have a picture together. but, i was a little skeptical of Orlando, because he had Arsenio and Adam stay at his mistresses house in secret. they had to say that they were staying with the rest of us at “Marta’s,” so he wouldn’t get caught. hmm…
Meanwhile, the five of us who actually did stay at Marta’s were the happiest of everyone. Marta is an elderly lady, who weighs a good 250 pounds. she kept telling us that we were her children, and that we should call her mother. her husband Pepe was also very nice, and i’m pretty sure he wore the same gym shorts, sleeveless shirt, and slippers the entire time we were there. Olga was the very skinny black cook. her voice was low and gravely, and she fed us a ridiculous amount of food. i’m pretty sure that all the food in cuba has been hiding in that house this entire time.
the next day we headed out to Trinidad, which was only about an hour away. it’s a very small colonial town. there wasn’t too much besides a few shops, churches, and brightly colored houses. the good news is that i finally got a fedora. we ate lunch and headed back to santa clara, where we spent the night learning how to play dominoes. i don’t really understand how dominoes became so popular here, but you will often see groups of men who have pulled out card tables to the sidewalk to play intense domino tournaments.
the following day we went out to a farm in escambray. it was really beautiful. they breed worms there to experiment with different types of soil for better growth of banana trees. we spent some time shoveling manure….and Arsenio milked a cow, haha. we then were shuttled around on the back of a tractor, and made stops at a swimming hole, guayaba tree, the goat barn, and then finally a place where we could ride horses. actually, it was just one horse, carmela, who i don’t think liked us very much. we made it back to santa clara that night fairly exhausted.
other stops in our trip included the che guevara memorial, where he is buried, the university of santa clara where we met some nice students, and another beautiful beach. then we headed off to cienfuegos, which was my favorite. by the way, cienfuegos translates directly to “one hundred fires.” badass.
i’m pretty sure cienfuegos was beny more’s birthplace, because they have a few statues of him, and a few clubs named after him. if you don’t know who beny more is, he is a jazz musician. cienfuegos is right on the water and has decent shopping. the people we stayed with were hilarious. along with an older lady, there were two ancient men who didn’t wear shirts the entire time we were there. one of them kept coming outside to show us the cologne’s and knick-knacks he had. at one point he proudly produced a bottle of axe. very impressive… they also had this dog named sisy, who looks exactly like my aunt’s dog wilma. she didn’t do much except lie with her stomach in the air. one of the old men kept telling her to get up and run, but i don’t think she ever did take the advice.
in comparison, this week has been fairly lack-luster. i’ve been kind of anxious to get home, and i’m glad there is only two weeks left. it’s been an amazing experience, but also a draining one. for instance, i was supposed to go to two different towns yesterday and see some caves and waterfalls, but was unable to because i had to go to the doctor. i couldn’t stop throwing up the night before, so i figured that maybe, perhaps, something was wrong. the trip to the doctor was pretty interesting, and they told me that i have amoebas. basically i have parasites living in my stomach. gross, right? i guess that’s kind of personal information, but i think it’s grossly interesting. anyhow they said it was really common here, that it often comes from eating fresh produce, and gave me some meds that should make them go away in about 5 days. and guess what; it was all free! yeah. even so, i’ll be glad to get back on american soil.
anyhow i’ll try to write one last entry before i get home, but i’m not making any promises. hope everyone is doing well!
