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| photo:Alex Fattal '01 |
t was my fourth day in Havana when the soldier
took my visa and passport, asked me who was the woman with the empty
vodka bottle, and suggested that conducting a filmed interview right
across from a police station in a police state was perhaps not such
a good idea. For the record, I had no idea that I was anywhere near
a police station, and I had only noticed the vodka bottle about halfway
through the interview.
I had come to Cuba with Students of the World, a Duke
undergraduate organization founded in 1999 by then-sophomore Courtney
Spence. Spence thought undergraduates should leave college with a
more global perspective, and SOW was designed to allow students to
immerse themselves in cultures different from their own.
Each summer, ten undergrads travel to a different place
in the world, equipped with pens, paper, and lofty ambitions. Though
cultural immersion is a big part of SOW’s mission, it is equally
committed to encouraging students to bring something back to the larger
Duke community: Last year, after the group’s inaugural trip to
Russia, SOWers presented a slide show at Duke’s Center for Documentary
Studies and spoke about their experiences at area elementary schools.
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| photo: Karla Portocarrero
'03 |
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Armed with a digital video camera,
tripod, and microphone, I had come to make a documentary about some
aspect of Cuban life. My co-director was Mariana Carrera, a sophomore
of Peruvian descent whose translating skills made the project possible.
As Mariana and I would quickly discover, bandying about a video camera
in Castro’s Cuba would be more difficult than we had anticipated.
But our travels would also help show us the tremendous contradictions
that embody this mysterious island.
Neither the repressive Third World slum that the U.S.
government makes it out to be nor the peaceful and prosperous Communist
utopia that Castro’s propagandists suggest, Cuba is a land of
incongruities. It is a place where men and women enjoy free education
and health-care services that would make American proponents of a
Patients’ Bill of Rights jump for joy. It is also a police state,
offering its inhabitants no civil liberties, and held together by
a black-market economy based in U.S. dollars. It is an island populated
by people quietly critical of their government, yet proud of their
past—and of their common resiliency in the face of the longstanding,
U.S.-inspired, economic boycott.
It is this element of pride that we were introduced to
first, in a little taxicab in Central Havana with a driver named Fernando,
who just couldn’t seem to keep his hands on the wheel: “I
love YOU, I love ME, I love CUBA, I love AMERICA.”
I glared at Mariana. “He is going to KILL someone,”
I said.
We hadn’t been driving more than five minutes, but
already I could tell that in Fernando’s car, pedestrians didn’t
have right of way. In fact, in Fernando’s car, only one person
ever had right of way: Fernando.
We first met our eccentric driver friend outside the home
of a Jewish veteran of the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. The day before,
Mariana and I had decided to focus our documentary on Cuba’s
small Jewish community after passing by a synagogue next to the apartment
where we were staying. We spent our days in synagogues and cemeteries,
with people struggling to balance their allegiance to Communism with
their loyalty to God. The veteran had been the first to agree to an
interview. Afterward, he provided us with a list of people to contact
for our project. Mariana and I wanted to get back to make some phone
calls.
“I love AMERICANS, I love the LANGUAGE of ENGLISH.”
Fernando had taken to us as soon as he learned that we were Americans,
and he vowed to practice his English on us for “the WHOLE ride
home.” He had been trying to increase his vocabulary for months,
hoping to learn the language as a birthday present for his daughter,
an English teacher.
“He wants you to ask him a question,” Mariana
said, “so he can practice answering.”
I thought for a moment, my brain initially drawing a blank.
“Do you like Cuba?”
“Do I like Cuba? I LOVE CUBA!” He told us about
his home and family. “You can have dinner with me and my wife
if you’d like,” he said. Fernando was eager for us to question
him more. “Do you mind if we pick up my boss?” he asked
us. “No charge extra to you, of course.”
“I don’t get too many Americans in here,”
Fernando told us, “but I LOVE Americans. This is my lucky day!
I want to tell EVERYTHING.”
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above photo:Karla Portocarrero
'03
below photo:Alex Fattal '01 |
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We were staying in a modest casa particular
in Vedado, probably the most upscale-looking section of Havana. Legally,
visitors to Cuba are only allowed to stay in hotels or in private
homes that are registered with the Cuban government and whose owners
pay significant monthly taxes (regardless of whether they have found
occupants for the month). A fair number of Cubans rent out space in
their apartments illegally, pocketing the cash and running the risk
of getting arrested. Most “underground” proprietors seem
to agree that the practice is relatively safe, as long as both host
and guest are discreet about the arrangement. At our illegal casa
particular, for example, the owner, a corpulent, rather jovial woman,
Lidia, even had business cards advertising “a place with hot
water” and aire acondicionado. Lidia’s only request was
that we not congregate as a group outside the apartment, and that
we not bring unfamiliar Cubans back to the house.
Lidia claimed that most of her guests were tourists with
good intentions, but according to other owners I spoke with, prostitution
in Cuba is on the rise. (One woman described it as a burgeoning “Latin
American Bangkok.”) More and more European men are coming to
Cuba exclusively for sex, renting rooms in casas particulares to avoid
the expense of bringing Cuban prostitutes back to ritzy hotels. The
word on the street is that AIDS is on the rise in Cuba. But in a country
that has a history of homophobia and an aversion to self-criticism,
I’ve found it almost impossible to get accurate statistics on
the subject.
Lidia’s apartment turned out to be a prime location for our project,
because two of Havana’s three synagogues were within walking
distance. The house was also relatively close to the area supermarket,
where residents use their ration cards (or cash if they’ve got
it) to buy rice, beans, eggs, pork, and other Cuban staples. American
brand names are nowhere to be found in Cuban supermarkets (though
the ubiquitous Coca-Cola somehow manages to make its way onto store
shelves), and make-up, tampons, and over-the-counter drugs are virtually
nonexistent on the island. Still, the supermarket offers the essentials
for cheap: A 1.5-liter bottle of mineral water costs sixty cents,
they sell eggs by the dime, and imitation Cocoa Puffs go for two or
three dollars. Everything else—from pizza and ice cream to mangoes
and milkshakes—can be purchased from street vendors for pesos.
There is also no shortage of restaurants, though like
all other businesses on the island, a fair number of them are “underground,”
with many located inside people’s homes. Illegal restaurateurs
commission street hustlers to go out and bring back customers. At
one eatery in Trinidad, a colonial town five hours out of Havana,
we actually walked into a man’s house, through his living room,
past his mother watching cartoons, past his children playing games,
and onto a patio, where we were greeted by waiters and waitresses
with soft drinks, printed menus, and warm rolls.
• continues on page two.
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