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| Little Cuba, major threat to U.S. power? (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
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| Camaguey rooftops 2(Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
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| English: Ignacio Agramonte Square in Camaguey, Cuba (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
I have just been to Cuba for a week.
That sounds so innocent and straightforward, yet if it
were stated in the United States, which conceives itself to be the leader of
the democratic world, heaven
alone knows to what excesses of surveillance it might lead.
We went for only a week, with my son, who because he is
usually short of money, always looks for the cheapest place. Together we chose
a resort called Gran Club Santa Lucia, on the north coast of the island some
600 kilometres along from Havana. Everything went swimmingly: although, unlike
on my first visit a year or two ago no one met us as we got off the plane I was
able to find the bus that was taking all of us to the hotel, about an hour’s
drive along a rather bumpy road, from the airport at Camaguey, the third
largest city in Cuba, situated in almost the exact centre of the island.
The resort we were disgorged into was a well-appointed
hotel, out in the countryside, with many buildings scattered around handsome garden-style grounds, interspersed
with large, public buildings that
contained several restaurants, a games room, a theatre, and the hotel
administration.
Everyone we met among the hotel staff turned out to be extremely
pleasant and helpful, and the morning after our arrival they held an
orientation session at which they described tours that were available and
various other nuts and bolts items designed to make our stay as cheerful as
possible. For no extra charge one could get a key to a safe in one’s room ---
always a useful addition to any hotel room in my view --- and large beach
towels. The hotel stood just off a long beach with excellent swimming, and they
had negotiated with neighbouring hotels that we could get free drinks from them
as well as from our own hotel. We could exchange Canadian cash for the Cuban
currency made especially available to tourists, which exchanged at roughly the
same face value as our money, and the hotel gave a rate only slightly worse
than a bank 100 yards or so along the beach.
Readers may wonder why I have even bothered to describe
all this: the reason is that the very word Cuba arouses such images among the
people of North America as to lead many of us to expect something rather
outlandish. My conclusion, after driving around the country a little bit in two
areas during my two visits, is that much of what has passed as calm description
of the face of Cuba is in fact wildly exaggerated, mostly by the U.S.
controlled information services to which we are exposed.
For example, one would have the impression from American
propaganda that Cuba is literally falling apart, its vehicles all dating back
half a century, patched and re-patched, its buildings fading and falling apart
from lack of rehabilitation, its services creaking under the impact of the
unremitting American embargo.
Certainly Cuba exists under pressure from the United States,
but any reasonable person must wonder what the rationale for this pressure is,
why the giant of the Western hemisphere continues to act as if this tiny
island-nation were a deadly missile aimed at the heart of democracy, and all
that.
For my part, I am impressed by the fact that Cuba today
does not seem to be as run-down as the Americans would have us believe. I made
an overnight visit to Camaguey, a city of some 250,000 people, whose centre
appears to be a collection of extremely narrow, crowded little streets, full of
buildings of real splendour, many of which have been restored to their former
glory.
As for the vehicles, it is true that many cars are of an
older vintage, but the many buses that serve the tourist trade are almost all
of recent vintage, and there are a similar number of new or almost new
mini-vans, so that the overall effect is not one of decrepitude.
In the area of the country in which we found ourselves, the
land is unrelievedly flat, and much of it reminded me of Eastern Ontario, in
that large areas that had been cleared
for use in former times have fallen into disuse. This, apparently, is land that
once was occupied by sugar-cane, an industry that has shrunk to about half of
what it was when the revolution occurred.
A more notable sight for me was the squads of
neatly-dressed schoolchildren coming and going to and from their schools. Cuba
has free education at every level, a remarkable achievement in comparison with
most other countries of Latin America. I
also kept in mind while there Cuba’s remarkable generosity to nations
outside its own borders. For example, its provison of thousands of doctors to Venezuela;
and its pivotal use of the Cuban army in defeating a South African force, which
turned out to be one of the key events in the overthrow of apartheid in South Africa.
As for the feature most often criticised by foreign
tourists, the food, I have to say that
(to my relief) the food served under the all-inclusive package deals to
customers was of considerably higher quality, of much greater variety than was
the case on my first visit.
In Camaguey, too, we were able to visit areas that had
been fixed up wonderfully, for use by artists and others, according to
standards that reflect well on the capacity of city planners and renovation
experts.
The holiday, all in all, was extremely enjoyable, and
cheap: everything was included, including unlimited drinks, food, accommodation,
and entertainment. The hotel had a house band made up of five beautiful young
women who, classically trained musicians all of them, formed a hot band, excellent
by any standards, and in Camaguey we were invited to a show that involved a
troupe of beautiful girls and handsome men, who appeared to be ballet-dancers
in training, but who, in addition, appeared to have skills which could see them
emerge as members of the national team for synchronized swimming at the next
Olympics.
A curious feature at the hotel was a tame flamingo that
always turned up to strut back and forth along the front of the stage before
and during the evening entertainments. Sometimes irritated customers would grab
the bird by the neck and try to hustle it away, but it always returned, usually
with an indignant squawk, as if to announce that it had rights that superceded
those of the mere customers.
And, finally, the rum produced by Cuba is of the highest
quality; and some Cuban coffee we bought to take home has proved also to be
excellent.
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