Havana - Part 2

My first full day in Cuba would put me in touch with many of the more frustrating elements of being both a local and a tourist here. Very few things are straightforward and many of the things you take for granted whilst traveling in other counties are either a pain to get hold of or simply don’t exist at all. You may also think that Cuba, being extremely poor and cut off from the world for so long, would be a cheap place to travel. Unfortunately, in many respects it’s absolutely not.

During breakfast with Ernesto, he explained that there was a currently an egg shortage in the country. Apparently the grain needed to feed chickens was in short supply and hungry chickens don’t do much laying. It was, as he called it, ‘un poquito crisis huevo.’

His girlfriend’s family owned a farm and he had arrived the day before with a fresh stock of eggs and some cheese made from their dairy cow. Good cheese that wasn’t the consistency of processed rubber was also something of a rarity here too. I never thought I’d be grateful to be eating eggs and cheese. But then again this is Cuba and it mad may more little surprises in store.

The first order of business was to change some pounds to the local currency Pesos Convertibles or CUC. This being Cuba there are actually two completely separate currencies. CUC is reserved exclusively for tourists. Locals deal in Pesos and it’s about 25 pesos to one CUC. The average government employee makes around 20 CUC a month. The Lonely Planet had the exchange rate pegged at 1.5 CUC to the Pound. Ernesto kindly offered to take me to a place I could change money and then drop me off in Old Havana. Unfortunately the current exchange rate was now more like 1.25. Thanks Brexit.

I hadn’t brought all that much cash as the guide book reassured me that European cards were all bueno here. What the buggers at Lonely Planet hadn’t mentioned was that the exchange rate at cash machines was 1 CUC to 1 Pound. Basically, I realised on my first day that this trip was going to be 30% more expensive thank I’d hoped for. Given that I’m a relatively frugal person, this had me in something of a bad mood. ‘Lonely Planet Wankers’ I muttered as I withdrew my CUC, hands trembling with rage.  

On a more positive note I was delighted to see that Cuba still maintained a rich fleet of pre-embargo American classics and Soviet gems, all in varying states of disrepair. There were definitely more modern vehicles around than there had been a few years ago but the majority were still overwhelmingly antique. Pretty much all cars in Cuba seem to be licensed taxis. With prices ranging based on distance, type of car, time of day, your bargaining skills, Spanish abilities and the general mood of the driver. Unfortunately the average price is incredibly expensive, especially in Havana. The journey from my place to Old Havana was no more than 15 minutes long and cost 10 CUC and more at night. About the same as an Uber in London.

Unlike pretty much any other country on earth, taxi drivers here are some of the highest paid people in the country, making more than most doctors, lawyers and bankers. Hence why everybody here seems to drive one. I spoke to one taxi driver called Yuri who drove and fabulous 1952 open top Cadillac (95% original apparently) and he said he made around 100 CUC a day. That’s five times the average monthly government salary or 365,000 pounds sterling a year, if you believe the cash machines. No wonder he had such a big smile on his face.

After I’d made my peace with the dreaded cash machine I decided to go for a wander around Old Havana and soak up the sights. The weather was just about as perfect as weather can be. The architecture, as expected, was gorgeous and replete with weathered, old colonial charm. Although if you’re coming from a place like New Orleans the place feels extremely familiar and doesn’t quite tug on the heartstrings the way it should do.

The streets were bulging with geriatric tourists and hustlers extracting CUCs from them with gay abandon. I even fell for a few myself. Paying half a CUC for a banana the size of my thumb and then 3 CUC to have a look at Fidel and Che’s old collection of guns and knives. The problem is that everyone is so warm and friendly that you end up delighting in their various hustles. I needed to watch out or I’d start bleeding funds faster than a drunken sailor on shore leave.

After a healthy dose of aimless wandering, I needed to get me some Wi-Fi real bad. Again, this is not particularly easy, cheap or straightforward. Just like everything else here. There are a few hot spots located in public squares in the city. It’s pretty easy to spot them. An entire square packed full of people sitting still as statues, transfixed to their phones and laptops in the manner of a heroin addict cooking up their fix is not hard to miss.

You can only get online by buying a scratch card which are sold from government cell shops (of which there are few) and street peddlers. The street price is around 2.5 CUC for an hour online and 1 CUC if you want to wait 40 minutes. A street Wi-Fi hustler saw me an recognized the crazed look of a person who had been offline for a few hours. I bought two hours’ worth and proceeded to join the huddled masses and bathe in our collective addiction to the internet.

My final ordeal for the day was to get hold of a sim card so I could make local calls. They don’t do sims with internet, of course. Even in Iran I was able to procure a fully functioning 4G sim card within 24 hours of landing. But as I repeat ad nauseum, this is Cuba and getting normal shit done here is a royal pain in the ass.  

The government internet card and sim buildings are relatively easy to spot as they have a large throng of disgruntled looking internet addicted tourists in front of them. After forty minutes waiting outside and sharing our collective Cuba frustrations a man stepped outside and bellowed ‘Internet card es finite per la dias…no more internet card today.’ This, as you would expect, was met with an enormous collective sigh of frustration, accompanied by much wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Thankfully they still had sim cards and after nearly an hour of patient waiting, I was at the front of the line. The lady at the booth stared at me with the blank expression of someone whose soul had long departed from their earthly being.

‘Passaporte?’

‘Erm, no. No one told me I needed a passport.’ My blood pressure swelling beyond measure.

‘No passport. No sim…. NEASTE.’

I didn’t have time to get a word in. I was glad for the desk between us because I have never been closer to strangling another human being to death as I was in that moment. 

Needless to say, my first day in Cuba had me somewhat frothy with its various frustrations. All of the stress I’d avoided on my journey had been meted out threefold by my first day here.

The small mercy to my day was befriending a charming French lady called Marie whilst sitting in Wi-Fi addict park. We made plans to meet later for dinner, which is tricky when you can neither call nor text and was reacquainting me with a level of organisation I’d not needed since the age of 10. I didn’t feel particularly up for barflying so a quiet dinner in town with good company was something of a relief.

Like just about every female in Cuba she had been privy to a severe amount of cat calling but confirmed that is was usually all fart and no poop. According to Marie my next destination, Vinales, was a welcome respite form Havana but still had quite a lot of tourists, which I wasn’t exactly buzzed about. Unfortunately in a place like Cuba, it’s relatively tricky to go off-piste, especially if your Spanish is as poor as mine. Hopefully there will be opportunities later. I still had nine or so spots on my rough itinerary and 18 days of travel to go. Plenty of opportunity to cock up.

After saying our goodbyes, I made my way home. I was jetlagged and a full day of pottering around and dealing with Cuban bureaucracy had taken its toll. A young chap called Miguel appeared out of the darkness offered me both cocaine and prostitutes, because you can’t seemingly find one without the other. His English was excellent and he seemed an interesting fellow so I politely declined and instead offered him a drink instead.

He had worked in a restaurant that had recently closed and apparently the coke and hookers game was pretty easy to dovetail into if you’re out of work. We discussed how both of these respective products, like everything in Cuba, had wildly different price points for tourists and locals. Everything does. Even drinks at a bar. A ruse which I quietly planned to exploit later in my journey.

We said our goodbyes and it was time for another eye wateringly expensive taxi with Raul, who rather disappointingly drove a newish KIA. He was as friendly and, like all other taxi drivers, had a Cheshire Cat grin that said ‘I got you by the balls now you stupid Gringo.’