We landed in Havana late on Monday and after passing through immigration we got pulled aside by a cop. He then proceeded to hard core interrogate us for 15 or 20 minutes. "Do you know anyone in Cuba?" "Why are you here?" "Why did you chose Cuba?" "Where are you from?" "What do you do?" "What are you bringing with you?" "What types of cameras do you have?" "What kind of memory for the cameras?" "How long are you staying?" etc etc. My SO likes to think it's because of my American passport, but they didn't even see my passport until after they started questioning. I think it was random. Luckily, they didn't search through our stuff like they were doing with another lady. A really thorough search, like squeezing toothpaste tubes and everything.
The next day we had breakfast early and then walked down the Malecon over to Universidad de la Habana. It was very pretty and we just loved spotting all the old cars. Our entire time in Cuba, the old cars never got old! We also had our first run in with people trying to get our money. I was taking a picture on the Malecon and this Cuban guy walks up and asks to take a picture for us. I immediately say no, but my SO says yes and hands over the camera. He then tries for a good 15 minutes to get us to pay him to take us on a tour. We keep saying no, no, no, but he keeps asking. Finally my SO says "here's some money, thanks for taking our pictures" and we left. I've had more travel experience than my SO and I know it's bad to say but in a lot of the countries I go to, people try to hit me up for money. They see a white girl and think "that one has money!" so I'm used to being a bitch to people and telling them "no" right away or simply ignoring them. My SO got used to it after a while as well. Sooooo many people asked for money. Like we were just sitting on the grass having a beer and this guy walks up, tells us this sob story and asks for money. I ignore him, and my SO gives him some money (just 50 cents or so, but still). Anyways, he learned eventually.
Traveling to poor countries always makes me feel like an awful, horrible bitch. Everyone tries to get money or food from you. In Nicaragua kids would ask for my bottle of water. In Peru, kids would walk up to my table while I was eating and point to (or straight up TOUCH) food and ask for it. Don't even try to walk out of a restaurant with a box of leftovers, you'll basically get mauled. Here in CR, moms with babies go house to house asking for sugar or flour. And it's so damn annoying. Isn't that awful of me? Thinking that homeless kids and poor people are annoying? But it is. You just want to enjoy your vacation and you can't because people are constantly bothering you. We went on this bus tour our second to last day in Cuba and this group of students were with us. We got off the bus to go to this rum factory and one girl had out a bag of candies. This mom and her kid begging on the street saw the bag and started running after the girl yelling "GIVE US CANDY" I walked behind the girl blocking her from the mom and kid attempting to keep them away. The kid tried to push past me and I moved in his way. The mom stuck out her hand and said again "GIVE US CANDY!" The girl looked confused and scared and handed over two pieces of candy. The mom then said "GIVE ME ONE!" The girl reached in her bag to get out another piece and I said "no, no more" And the mom and the kid left. I wish I had spoken up earlier.
Anyways, what a freaking tangent.
So we went to la U and then over to the Napoleon museum. Which my SO loved. I know it's strange to have a Napoleon museum in Havana, but evidently some rich Cuban guy was a big Napoleon fan and bought a whole bunch of his stuff. Then made this museum. It had his hat, his parascope, lots of pictures, armor, cannons, everything. Very cool stuff.
Malecon
Universidad de la Habana
Napoleon museum
Next we walked over to la Plaza de la Revolucion where all the shit goes down!
With el Che
Afterwards, we were hungry and went to get a taxi to somewhere to eat. The taxi driver was super sketchy and took us to this super sketchy little alley way place to eat. Then sat down with us like he was about to eat with us. The prices were INSANELY high. So we said no, even though he protested, and left. Later we found a really adorable, lovely, romantic, delicious and super cheap place to eat. We ate there two days in a row it was so good!!
In the nice restaurant
That night we bought some beers and hung out on the malecon. We were drinking when we heard some music and went over to listen. We spent the whole night drinking and dancing and singing with these dudes. It was great. They were drinking ETHANOL out of a bottle. Crrraaazzzyyyy. When I had to pee and couldn't hold it any longer, we went back to our casa. We were both delighted to see that at 1am and drunk, it was perfectly safe to walk around. In San Jose I wouldn't walk anywhere after dark (which ya know, is 5:30pm or so)
The next day (Wednesday) we did one of those bus tours which was nice. I was stupid and didn't put any sunscreen on and was burned on my forehead and nose by the end of the day.
Thursday we went to the Museo de la Revolucion. Which was kind of strange for me at first. Outside, they have a whole bunch of planes and tanks that were used. The description would say things like "Tank used to shoot down the US boat Houston ..." or "US plane which was shot down ..." very much glorifying the deaths of US citizens. It made me feel very awkward.
With the shot down US plane
Inside was much better. There was just a huge amount of propaganda (which was every 100m on the streets as well!) and some pretty interesting relics.
List of the cretins. They all said things like "Thank you [George Bush] for making a stronger Socialism!"
The final day in Havana we went to Habana Vieja and thought we could spend our time going to all the little museums there. Our plan was the Simon Bolivar Museum, Chocolate Museum, Tobacco Museum, Automobile Museum, and possibly Firearm Museum. Well they all sucked. The chocolate museum wasn't even a museum! And the Simon Bolivar museum didn't have anything to do with Simon Bolivar, and we even went on Venezuela Independence Day! There was a better Automobile museum driving around on the streets than in the actual building.
At night one night (can't remember which) we went to see Buena Vista Social Club, the most famous Cuban salsa group ever. My SO almost peed himself he was so excited to see them. All the members are super old now, but boy could they still get it! My SO and I drank a ton and danced a lot. A group of Mexicans behind us complimented us on how well we dance and asked "why are you such good dancers?" to which my SO replied "We're from Costa Rica! That's how we dance!"
(side note- my SO and I have been really improving dancing. Well, my SO has always been amazing, it's me that's getting better. Now whenever we go out to dance people always come to compliment us. One time, a lady thought we were a professional team!
)
Buena Vista Social Club
Another night we went to a caberet which was over the top and a lot of fun. They had excellent singers and dancers and crazy costumes. The whole show was almost 2 hours, I can't even imagine how tiring that must be!
Caberet
The final night in Habana we went to a bar my Cuban friend recommended- El Gato Tuerto (the one-eyed cat). We were told that it was going to be Latin music (salsa, meregue, etc) and it ended up being WORLD music. Ugh.
Anyways, that was Habana! And some other tangents. Maybe one more blog and that'll be it!
Another blog never goes astray...
Don't feel bad. I hate beggars. I'm sorry if I offend anyone, but I just can't stand them. Begging is run as a business where I live and I have very little patience for it.
I want to see a video of you two dancing now!