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Amy O' Connor <AmyOConnorAU>



	The Western Mystique meets the Cuban Reality	395 days ago

	Think of Cuba and you think of Fidel Castro, Revolution, Communism, Missile Crisis, US Embargo… No commercialism, no luxury products, no broadband internet – all in support of a sustainable, moneyless system. However, there seems to be one fatal flaw in Fidels great vision. Greed - the basic human instinct to want more and to want what one does not have. As tourists fly in by the handful, with their designer clothes and bursting wallets, the Cuban people want a slice of the cake, making the pursuit of Materialism more desperate and damaging than in the Democratic world. On an average wage of 12 cuc per month, people are forced to cheat the system to survive and with the hotel bag boy making 4 times the amount of a Doctor, the tourist is the obvious target to cheat. Every hour you are tricked, cheated, ripped off. I do not blame the people, I blame the system – but the ability to rely on the kindness of strangers is noticeably absent and sorely missed. One must question – does Fidel realize the reality. Has he been sheltered by surrounding himself with Yes men? Is he so caught up in his perfect vision that the line between the dream and the reality has become distorted, even invisible? All questions with an unattainable answer. It seems that even love is lost in the system. I met a woman - a Doctor who fell in love with and married an American man in Cuba. Work as an Engineer dried up for her husband and they were left with no choice but for him to move back to the United States to financially support them - without her. As a Doctor, she is legally required to stay in Cuba for 5 years post graduation. The system has punished her for going into a noble profession, for abiding by the system. Out of protest she now refuses to work. The result - both her knowledge and her love have gone to waste. I met a man - young, good looking but on an almost impossible plight to find love. He explained that in a society where 70% of the women are protitutes, relationships are driven by the pocket rather than the heart. To him the love that we share freely in the western world is an urban myth. Despite the tales of woe, the way continues to be the way as a product of fear. Out of the 2 million people that live in Havana, 500,000 are Police – Police that will lock you away for so much as speaking out against the government, against the regime, the regime that feeds off the fear of the people. So the absence of independence and freedom continues to stifle free will. Its worth noting that the world on the surface is far less grim. Classic 1950 American cars, mustachioed cigar smokers, horse and carriages and incredible colonial architecture – a run down empire of its previous Spanish Rule. Cuba is certainly not without its many charms. And there appears to be some small signs of change. 1 year prior, Cubans could not stay in hotels, bathe in foreigner designated beaches, access internet outside of educational or professional purposes or even have a mobile phone contract in their own name (some cheating the system by get foreigners to sign up for them). These restrictions have now been lifted. Today the gentleman with whom I am doing my home stay was able to get a mobile phone contract for the first time in his long life. However, I am convinced that this freedom gained represents nothing more than a token gesture to appease the people. Cuba has inspired me to write again. The culture shock, a different place, a different world. Not a place that I would like to live in, but there is something magnetic about Cuba, perhaps it is its mystique, the plethora of questions left unanswered. It has been the perfect travelers final destination.

	posted by Amy O' Connor

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