Americans in Cuba: 'Why Doesn't My Blackberry Work?' Cubans in Cuba: 'What Will I Find to Eat Today?'

Yoani Sanchez - Award-winning Cuban blogger

Americans in Cuba: 'Why Doesn't My Blackberry Work?' Cubans in Cuba:
'What Will I Find to Eat Today?'
Posted: 06/04/2012 10:56 pm

The cast bronze sculpture rests one arm on the bar. He looks ready to
order another daiquiri, but in reality he's observing, with his metal
eyes, everyone who comes and goes from El Floridita. Some flash their
cameras at that life-sized Hemingway statue, while others see it as
something from the past, from that long-ago era when there was nothing
unusual about finding an American drinking in some bar or walking along
the crowded streets of Havana, a time when 90 miles didn't seem a great
distance, and the language barrier was surmounted by dint of drinks,
music, hugs, and jokes.

Despite geographical proximity, for the vast majority of Americans
today, Cuba is unfamiliar territory, a region deep in mystery. It so
happens that many Americans can't even locate our country on a map or
imagine an island where one can see the entire periphery of its shores
from the height of a coconut tree (something like the space inhabited by
Robinson Crusoe, but in this case it is not occupied by one solitary man
but by 11 million people). In that vast country to the north, there are
still those who believe the story of the heroic David resisting the
onslaught of Goliath in order to establish a kingdom of social justice,
and others who see us more as a political monster where a people, deep
in material and moral poverty and turned into robots, threaten to invade
them, as soldiers as well as immigrants.

It's already been half a century that American citizens have been denied
the legal right to visit our country. While they have had to learn the
names of 11 different leaders who have passed through the White House in
those five decades, our Plaza of the Revolution has had only two
tenants, both with the same surname. In all that time most of America's
enemies have evolved into business partners, like Russia, China, or
Vietnam, or into NATO allies, like the various Eastern European nations.
On the other hand, former friends have become adversaries, like Iran or
Venezuela, but the name of Cuba (along with North Korea) remains on the
same list.

So from the other side of the Straits of Florida, the image of Cubans
has been shaped with a great deal of imagination, a lot of past
memories, and the stories of the exiles. As a result, it is not strange
to view us as if we were living in one of those old sepia postcards,
forever frozen in an image from the mid-20th century. A people who still
travel in old cars made by Cadillac, Chevrolet, and Plymouth, cars that
came off the assembly lines of American factories. An Island trapped
between the beauty of nature and the deterioration of its architecture,
with neighborhoods that at times seem to be located in New York or
Washington, D.C., while at others recalling Calcutta or Somalia.

To walk along the wide avenues of Havana is a trigger for nostalgia for
Americans over 60. A kind of déja-vu, bringing back memories from
childhood, sensations from their teenage years. We are something like a
museum of the early 20th century, but one where those in charge of the
"collection" haven't taken care of the pieces they display to the
public, an agglomeration of obsolete and patched objects that evoke a
glamor now extinct.

It's obvious that we are the only inhabitants of Latin America who do
not call these visitors in pink-flowered shirts by the derogatory name
"gringos." Here, no. Here we say "yumas," which has a laudatory and
admiring tone, even a certain fascination. Although the political
propaganda tries to get us to call them "yankees," that little word has
failed to permeate everyday language. And the same thing happens in the
other direction. Many Americans look on us with the affection they would
show to a younger and poorer cousin, one who still has a lot to learn.
At times, with a certain arrogance, they ask questions only they
understand: Why doesn't my Blackberry work here? Where's the machine to
pay for parking? Is there somewhere I can buy Kleenex? And each one of
these questions exudes an innocence that we find funny, that makes us
laugh. Perhaps that is the source of their image of us as a people who
are always smiling, which they then pass on to their friends in New
Orleans, Arkansas, and Texas.

Among the Americans who have been treading this earth in the last five
decades, there are many exceptional people, from academics to TV stars,
movie directors like Steven Spielberg (why not travel to a Jurassic
Park?), and ex-presidents like Jimmy Carter, all full of good will more
than ingenuousness. Thousands of others come each year, daring to
challenge the controls imposed by U.S. law, using the old trick of
traveling through a third country and taking advantage of the customs
authorities who do not stamp their passports so no one will find out
they entered this demonized territory.

Among these intrepid visitors was Jaime, a boy from New York; not
content with immersing himself in a passion for Cuban literature, he
fell helplessly in love with a young brunette with almond eyes and the
hands of a healer. One day, more than five years ago, someone asked him
how, exactly, he saw Cuba. "My experience is unique," he said, "so I
can't make generalizations. I am aware that I am on this Island when I
open my eyes in the morning and the first question that comes to mind
is: What will I find to eat today?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoani-sanchez/americans-in-cuba-why-doe_b_1569380.html