Sanyu's World

Maria la Gorda

Back in Havana by early morning bus. I caught a cab to downtown with two French girls leaving that day. Cary and her husband welcomed me with open arms. She had warned me not to come back to Havana until Saturday or Sunday and now I see why. There was  big international meeting here and lots of places were forced to close for security reasons and there are police everywhere patrolling the streets making sure no one steps even a toe out of line. Even the Prado, the big main street from the waterfront to downtown Capitol was closed. I headed out to run errands and also picked up a ticket to the ballet performance that night at the Gran Teatro. I got cleaned up and headed to the theatre. i was quite early so I hung out by the bar where i watched the bartender gracefully make a mojito. i just knew I had to have one so I watched him make it and it was in fact the best mojito I´ve had in all of Cuba thus far! I struck up a conversation with him and his daughter and almost didn´t realize that it was last call for seating. The first session was a new work based on the life of Freida Kahlo. It was more flamenco than classical ballet but he two principal ballerinas were up to the task. The second was based on the work of famous Cuban painter and was performed mostly by Ballet school students who were all terrific. I was on cloud nine when I left.

I had to drag myself out of bed the next day though. My back is still sore from horse back riding and I was just beat. I got a late start but I was still able to hit everything I wanted to. I walked to Vedado to the University of Havana which I can only assume is not in session as it was a perfect ghost town. I passed by the famous ice creamery Coppelia and  was shocked to find hardly anyone in line.  I found out who was last and claimed my spot and was seated in under 10 minutes. I had to ask the girl seated beside me to make sue that the prices really were in Cuban pesos and not Tourist dollars because the prices just seemed too cheap for such a treat. I ordered what everyone else ordered which was the ensalada, mine with vanilla ice cream. They were all shocked that I only ordered one. While I was expecting fruit of some kind, what I got was some chocolate sauce, 3 little cookies and a large scoop of some of the best vanilla ice cream I´ve ever had. The older couple at my table had ordered 2 each and the normal sized young  girl beside me had ordered 3 and they all put their heads down and happily gobbled them down at record speeds.

Off to Maria la Gorda on Tuesday after a quick stop at a nearby bank to pick up the cash my mother sent. Ka-ching! Time to go diving! I had to make an overnight stopover in either Vinales or Pinar del Rio in order to catch an early morning bus connection so I chose Pinar as I´d already been to Vinales. While not even a large town, Pinar certainly feels big city like, dirty, bustling and unfriendly. Found a great casa though where I brokered a nice deal for a room, dinner and an early morning breakfast. I usually don´t eat at the casas because they charge a lot of money and give you 3 times as much food as you could possible put away which just seems ridiculous to me. Dinner was no exception, rice beans, fried sweet potato, avocado, salad, fish, fruit for dessert, on and on. I settled into a chair on the patio after dinner and chatted with two Spanish girls while enjoying some of my stash of rum. Jeez I love the rum here. It´s cheap ($5 for a liter) and you never get a hangover, I should know as I´ve had lots of practice;)

We arrived in beautiful Maria la Gorda at 10:30am and I was ready to hit the water. Low season has just begun for them so I got a great deal on a room including breakfast. That plus the stash of groceries I picked up in Havana (think cans with pop tops, cereal, juice and lots of cola for the rum) I was set for a somewhat economical splurge. I dropped my bags in my room and headed straight down to the on site dive center to sign up. So began four beautiful days for scuba diving on some of the most varied and colorful coral reefs I´ve ever seen. Absolute heaven. And to top it off, we even spotted a whale shark! Other than that I pretty much laid on a beach lounger reading On the Road by Jack Kerouac or relaxed in my little cabin enjoying the blissful air-conditioning and watching videos on VH1. The sand flies were killer though and by the first night I was covered in bites from head to toe. There was a harem of cats that hang around this little isolated point of the island and they each seem to pick a different cabin of tourists to suck up to. My cat was a little bit of a masochist and enjoyed slamming his head into my legs or the furniture or anything available really. Day after day of blissful weather and on the last night, a gorgeous sunset.

The bus transferred me back to Havana after another overnighter, in Vinales this time. I was really glad to be back in Havana, no matter how many times I come though here I always feel like there is more to do. I wandered to some of my old haunts and found my favorite roast pork sandwich street stall for a quick lunch before heading back to Cary´s house. She was booked solid so she found me a spot at a nearby place for the same price. Three Spanish guys were also staying there and they invited me to join them  for a night on the town with the Cuban night manager at the casa. We headed out at about 11pm and 3 Cuban girls immediately made a play for the Spanish guys. They work fast here, what can I tell you. We weren´t allowed into the first club because they said our Cuban friend was too drunk, great. We walked a bit to another place called Las Vegas a few blocks away and the girls followed. We were allowed in to see the end of the cabaret show and then immediately everyone got up to dance. I do love to see those Cubans dance! Apparently the girls asked for money, the Spanish guys said no and the girls were gone in a hot second. We danced and enjoyed the music and finally headed out of the club about 3am to find a cab home. I love it here!

Two more days in Havana revisiting some of my favorite spots and pehaps a few new ones and then off to Panama. Central America, here I come.

Pssst Pssst!

Breezed into Santa Clara early Monday morning thrilled that I hadn´t missed my stop. Most travelers I´ve spoken to recommend skipping Santa Clara except for checking out the Ernesto ´Che´Guevara Memorial so I stretched my legs, bought a ticket for Cienfuegos leaving in 3 hours and headed out the door. The taxi drivers all pestered me as to why  I would want to walk the seven odd blocks to the memorial. Go figure. The statue of Che at the memorial is bigger than life and I could see the top of it practically as soon as I left the bus station. Like the Jose Marti Memorial in Havana, there is a huge open square in front of the looming life-like statue. The museum wasn´t open but just seeing the memorial was enough for me. I love Che!

On my way back to the bus station i found a food stall with lots of people milling around it. There I picked up an amazing ´special´omelette sandwich with cheese and a delicious lemon drink for about 50 cents. The bus to Cienfuegos was not the usual tourist fare. It was a local non air conditioned bus and I think I passed out a few times because of the heat. Th town is tiny so it was easy to walk from the station to look for  a place to stay before heading out to find a place to dump all the pictures from my camera´s memory stick. The photo service was crazy full and I was told to come back at 8pm that night. Great. I walked up and down all on the waterfront and back to the main plaza with its ritzy hotels and beautiful architecture. I freed up as much space as I could from my camera and took as many shots as I could. When I returned to the photo service place at 8pm I was told that he was busy doing something else and I should come back the next day. I haven´t seriously had to beg much on this trip but I sure did prostrate myself that night. I battered him down until he finally did it I´m sure just to get rid of me.

I wanted to head to Playa Giron the next day but there were no buses and none in the foreseeable future from what I could tell so I purchased a ticket for Trinidad, the town everyone always raves about when that talk about Cuba. Had a little mix up at the station so I had to find a different place to stay than the place I´d booked. No worries, it was low season and pretty much every house in Trinidad is a casa particular. I headed out to check out the small cobblestoned town and quickly found myself lost. the streets all spiral outward in a sort of spiderweb design which is a bit confusing. I found my way down to a less touristy area when the drinks were cheap and there was a line of houses selling ham and cheese sandwiches and fruit milk shakes (I think it was milk) out of their windows. They were to become my close close friends over the next four days as the food in Trinidad is ridiculously overpriced. The sky clouded over and I ducked in to a nearby bar to escape out of the rain and into my book. This is the best part of Cuba for me, just taking it easy and relaxing in cafes. It´s a bit like Morocco for me that way except that instead of drinking mint tea, people drink beer all day.

Spent the next day out exploring the touristy area which really is as beautiful as everyone says. The houses are all beautiful pastels and no one has glass window. They open up their wooden shutter and doors to let the cool air in the morning and evening and hide inside during the day. All the Cubans for the most part think I´m a tourist and I get pestered all day long with ´Pssst, Pssst´. Drives me absolutely crazy and not in the good way!More ham and cheese sandwiches for lunch but I actually found someone selling real ham as opposed to the processed stuff that is so common here so I´ve found a new best friend. In the afternoon I headed to the historical museum in the Plaza Mayor where I climbed a tour which is the highest point in Trinidad for the beautiful views of the town. What til you see the pictures!

That night i decide to check out the nightlife. Most live music didn´t start until 10pm but all the clubs are so close to each other it was easy to check each one out. I stayed for a while at one club that had African singing and drums. The music was a bit chaotic for my taste but really interesting to watch. There was a group of tourists from one of the ritzy hotels with their African dance teacher. It was pretty amusing watching them get up to dance but their teacher got up afterwords and put on a little show. His legs were moving so fast and so gracefully I couldn´t take my eyes off of him. When the band packed up to go I headed next door and up the large stone steps to the Casa de la Musica, tourist central. There was some sort of live extravaganza going on but I couldn´t figure it out for the life of me. Lots of whistle and fire and dancing and drums. Once they left the salsa dancing started. It was mostly Cubans trying to pick up tourists but salsa is always beautiful to watch.   

I got up early the next day to try and catch the tourist train down to see some of the sites outside of the city but I ended up arriving 10 minutes too late. I found out later that the time on my alarm clock was set incorrectly. Change of plans, I found a place to rent a bicycle and headed to the beach. Cuba is a great place to bike around because most of the roads are dead flat. It took about 20 minutes to reach the shore at a town called La Boca and then another 20 minutes to make it down to Playa Ancon where all the package tourist hide out in style. Luckily its low season so the beach was pretty empty. The water was warmer than most baths I take. Nice for wading around and relaxing. I found a small converted bus selling beer and dove into my book for the better part of the afternoon. On the way back I stopped at a small restaurant on the water for a delicious seafood dinner before the last push home. The sun had sapped my energy and I felt almost ready to collapse by the time I made it back to Trinidad after peddling though a mild rain storm. Thank God for naps.

Back out on the town in the evening. The rain had caused havoc with performances because most of the bars have outdoor music venues. Casa de la Trouva had a great band that night that they moved inside and I hung out there for as long as I could until the band finally went off. I went back to check out Casa de la Musica and was befriended by two crazy Cuban girls. We laughed and danced and were all ready to head in to the after hours club but it was postponed/canceled because the DJ hadn´t shown up. That´s Cuba I suppose.

My last day in Trinidad was a horseback riding expedition to the Valle de los Ingenieros. The countryside was stunning and it was my first time on a horse while it was actually galloping. I´m not sure my back will ever be the same. We rode for a little over an hour to a small waterfall and swimming hole and then headed to a small sugar cane farm where they made ups fresh sugar cane juice and the owner´s crazy older brother even performed a few tunes for us on the guitar. Back in town I had to catch a taxi to see the one site in the Valle de los Ingenieros that we´d missed that  I had really wanted to see. It´s an old slave watch tower that you can climb. It was very tall and thin like a lighthouse and I was amazed at just how far you could see from the top. There were women at the bottom making lace and embroidering white tablecloths that you see sold all over Trinidad. They told me a bit about the history of the area before it was time to head off back to Trinidad. No partying for me tonight. It´s back to Havana and then hopefully either north or east for a little diving. Ciao

Santiago de Cuba

I'm feeling so popular! when I arrived in Santiago de Cuba there again was a little placard with my name on it. I pushed through the throngs of hustlers outside the station and furiously bargained down the price of a ride to my casa. The place was absolutely lovely. I would recommend to all travelers who are thinking about going to Cuba: stay in a casa particular and not a hotel. They are amazingly clean, friendly and best of all cheap! I cleaned myself up and flipped though my lonely plant guide and found out about a small club a little outside the main town that plays great trova music on Fridays. Just as I walked out the door I heard drumming and peeked inside a nearby house where Cuban men and women were dancing what looked almost like a slow waltz but to the beat of drums so their hips were shaking ever so slightly. So suave.

Walking through town to the club I immediately decided that I love Santiago. I was somewhat not looking forward to a big city like Havana but this has such a small town feel and the downtown historic area is stunning, even at night. I arrived at the club, called Casa Traditiones, which was full of mostly locals with a few tourists thrown into the mix. My kinda crowd! Within five minutes I was introduced to the owner and seated beside a guy who owns a dance school listed in the lonely planet. He gave me a quick one song lesson and I was hooked and agreed to meet him the next day for a real lesson. On the way home I decided to check out another club but it was tourist central with lots of Cuban hustlers (jinteros) outside so I took a pass.

Spent the next morning running around town looking for a place to move all my pictures from my camera to a CD. A surprisingly difficult task for a big city like Santiago. After walking a few kilometers out of the city center only to be turned down again I gave up in defeat. Luckily my guide book showed that there were a few interesting museums nearby so I headed to check it out. First was a small obscure museum of images that has one of the most extensive collections of cameras, tv tubes and movie cameras in the world and its walls are lined with phenomenal photos of Fidel and historical figures in Cuba. Next was a museum devoted to Santeria which is the African religion here in Cuba. It was only a small display but in the back there was a patio bar and a few men milling around, one of whom recognized me from Casa Traditiones from the night. He was sitting at a small desk rolling cigars and showed me how to do it. I ended up with the sorriest looking thing you've ever seen, more broom than cigar.

I had to quickly head back to my casa to take a quick shower before my salsa lesson. Cuban salsa is so different from the salsa I've learned previously. Instead of the guy keeping step and spinning the girl around to make her look good, in Cuban salsa its the guy who is the more flamboyant one. There's still lots of spinning but in the meanwhile the guys is shaking and preening like a peacock. Very entertaining. On my way home I decided to check to see if the crazy long line at the Cadeca (money changer) had grown any shorter as it was almost closing time. To my surprise, there was no line. Cubans are so used to lining up for everything that they would never fathom showing up at a place 10 minutes before closing time! Casa Traditiones was closed for the night so I checked out a different small bar which unfortunately had been taken over buy a bus load of tourists. I stayed for a while because the performers were a female trova group which is quite rare.

Early morning salsa lesson and then on my way to find a bite to eat and ran into Janelle, an Australian girl I'd met at the bus station. We found a cheap restaurant and then met up with her friend and we all agreed to rent a taxi for the day to check out a few sites a bit outside of Santiago. The first was El Cobre, a beautiful church with a nearby mirador. Back in the car the taxi driver  next stopped at an old cemetery where Joe Marti is buried and we were just in time to see the changing of the guard in from of his giant mausoleum.

Last but not least we headed to see the castle fort Castillo de la Morro. It was a gorgeous structure and one of the most well preserved in all of Latin America. We walked around and around passing old cannons and lookouts and found the secret path down almost to the water. Back into town where I barely had enough time to get some greasy fried chicken from a street vendor before I had to head to the bus station. Luckily I left early because getting a taxi was more complicated than I had imagined. The grandmother in my house went outside and asked people on the street if someone had a car who could take me. Then that didn't work she started trying to thumb me a ride. Finally a random guy stopped and took me all the way to the station in time to catch my late night bus to Trinidad. Gotta love Cuba.

Cuban Money Crisis

Spent a lazy Saturday re-exploring Havana. After a leisurely coffee at a local joint I headed to a nearby park where there were street performers on stilts entertaining some children. I followed them for a while as they went around the old quarter stopping to dance to the music of live ban ds filtering into the streets before heading to check out a few museums. First the beautifully complex Museum of Arts and then the Museum de la Revolution which is pretty self-explanatory. I really wanted to go ´out out´ but the big clubs in Havana are really just for tourists and with a $20 entrance fee I can see why. From the live music I´ve seen, I know I really want to see Cubans dance, not tourists. Mengshao and I checked out our favorite live music spot and were happy enough. Saturday was the last day I was willing to wait for a money transfer from my mother to come through. I have a lot of American money on my person but the exchange rate is horrid and I was worried I just didn´t have enough. Things take forever in cuba so I decide to head out on a little excursion for a few days while I waited.

I was going to head to Veradero which is a posh beach resort a few hours from Havana (where luckily I have the address of a cheap somewhat illegal casa particular) but the bus schedule I had was out of date and I just missed it. I decided on the cuff to head to Vinales with Mengshao. Because travellers stay in casa particulars which only have one or maybe two rooms its quite hard to hook up. I found the answer at the tourist bus station. It seems to be where we all congregate and exchange information. We talked to a few couples before we boarded our three hour bus to Vinales. There were only about 15 tourists on the bus but we were greeted at the station with over 50 casa particular owners all waving signs to entice us to stay with them. Luckily we recognized the name on one of the signs as the one Cary (from our casa in Havana) had recommended. We bargained for a cheap rate and headed over. The town is only about 6 blocks by 10 blocks so everything is quite close. We found a cheap local place for lunch and I got a peek at the prices they were charging Cubans as opposed to us tourists. We pay about twice as much but its still ridiculously cheap. It started to spit rain so we headed back to the casa to wait it out but it didn´t let up til dark so we hung out on the porch rocking chairs and dove into our books.

Up early the next day. Mengshao had arranged for a guided horse tour around the area but I really just wanted to have a walk around so I headed out 4 kms west through beautiful lush green scenery to the Mural de la Prehistorica painted on the side of a tall rock face. I had wanted to cut through the trails above Vinales to head over to the north but a local advised me against it so I grudgingly headed back to Vinales along the same path. I took a small detour to a tobacco finca (farm) for a quick drink and a look at their cigars before crossing through town on my way to the Cueva del Indio. I made a quick pitstop at a local woman´s house when she had cultivated an amazing garden of fruit and flowers in her backyard. She offered me some freshly picked fruit in exchange for a small donation and then I was on my way again. The 5km walk north of town passed many tall craggly cave openings in the surrounding mountains. Very few cars passed me by but at almost the same time that I arrived, 2 more taxis showed up. One carrying 3 Swedish tourists and one carrying a German tourist. They sent us all into the 500m of cave together where we stumbled around before finding the landing for the underground river. A boatman took us on a short ride though the cave before dropping us off on the otherside. The German guy, Peter, offered me a ride back into town. I accepted but talked him into stopping at another cave called San Miguel about 1km down the road that I´d spied on the way up. They had a full blown bar nestled into the large cave entrance and we enjoyed a few drinks as we watched the rain start. By the time we got back into town the rain was a full blown storm so we took cover in a small bar where some locals befriended us and gave us cigars to enjoy. When the rain finally stopped we headed back to our respective casas for dinner, agreeing to meet up later to listen to the advertised live music. Dinner at the casa was an amazing mountain of food cooked by the senora and I ate a ridiculous amount before rolling away from the table. Mengshao and I headed back to the bar to meeet up with Peter but the promised live band was pretty bad. We decided to head down the street to a new bar with much better music for a small cover charge. One of the singers looked just like Uncle Junior from the Sopranos and was a crazy dancing fool. A really great day and night!

Mengshao and I decided to catch the early morning bus back to Havana where he would connect onward to Verdadero and I would stay in Havana and connect with Cary to check on the money transfer. No money, of course, but lots of frantic email from my family to make sure I´m alright and that I´m not destitute. Jeez. Cary and I headed to the main office of Transcard to try and get some answers from a real live person. We took a cuban shared taxi which only cost us $1 each all the way to Miramar because I followed Cary´s instructions to keep my mouth shut as I can pass for Cuban until they hear my horrible Spanish. We were in line for three hours only to get ´I don´t know´ as our answer. I was so frustrated I just wanted to scream. Cary offered to help find a place for me to stay for the night as her two rooms were booked but I really just wanted to walk and think and also, get out of Havana! It took me two hours to walk to the main bus station but it helped my mood tremendously. I booked passage on the tourist bus to Santiago de Cuba leaving in just over an hour and checked out my food options. I was at the local bus station so the cheap food options were plentiful and I was starving as I hadn´t eaten all day. I chowed down on 4 small roast pork sandwiches for less than a $1 total. I was dead tired so I slept like a chamption on the 12 hour express bus to Santiago de Cuba where I connected to a 5 hour bus to Baracoa, the first Spanish settlement in Cuba.

We arrived about noon and was again accosted by lots of casa owners but there was a nice little sign with my name on it so I went with the guy to check out his offerings. Baracoa is another tiny place and the price was right so I dropped my bag off, cleaned up and headed out to check out the town. Baracoa sits on the northwestern tip of Cuba and is a small, quiet and gorgeous place. There are hardly any cars here and people get around by horse or bicycle taxi. I walked along the waterfront to the old fort and then through the small town before settling into a small outdoor cafe with my book. In the morning I stopped for one of their famous hot chocolates which was thick and rich even though it was made without milk and then headed toward the south of town to check out a small museum at another fort. Then it was off down the road out of the town towards the lush nearby farms and coconut plantations. It started to get riduculously hot so I stopped every 5 minutes or so on the way back to buy myself 4 cent ice creams cone to cool off. Hey, there´s no, milk or yogurt and hardly any cheese that you would really consider edible so I´m doing the best that I can! I met up with a small group of tourists at the bus station and we talked for most of the 5 hour ride back to Santiago. It´s good to be on the road again. I´m really feeling back in the traveller spirit and from what all the other travellers are telling me, the prices in the lonely planet are all wrong so accomadation should be much cheaper than I expected. So after all the stress, I´ll probably have enough money to get though just fine. So, thanks mom. If it comes though, it comes through. If not, I´ll survive!!!!

Viva Cuba

Ran in to Teresa, my Spanish friend from Taganga on the early morning streets of Cartegena. It was so good to see a friendly face a few hours before my flight to Cuba. We took a lovely stroll around the old quarter and then I packed up and headed out. The Copa Airlines line at the airport in Cartegena was, shockingly, a model of efficiency. In one line of perfect work-flow I had my entry visa checked, my bag searched, my exit fee processed (along with paying for my Cuban entry fee) and my boarding pass issued. A model of efficiency.

Stopped off in Panama, secretly praying my flight had been canceled due to Hurricane Ernesto so i´d have time to pick up more cash and change it into Euros but no luck for me. We arrived at midnight an my Cuban immigration ordeal began. I was questioned by 4 different official on why i had come to Cuba and if I was sure that I had been born in Kingston, Canada and not Kingston, Jamaica. I´ve watched enough Law & Order to know not to divulge any extra info (like the fact I´m part Jamaican and that one of my brothers actually was born in Kingston, Jamaica) so demurely answered their questioned and finally after about an hour was finally let in the country. I´m sure it didn´t help when I accidentally told one of the guys that I was married (The word for ´married´ and ´tired´ are extremely close in Spanish!)

A Taiwanese guy I´d seen on the plane all the way from Columbia had been given the same treatment so we were among the last left and we agreed to share a cab to the city. It was way past midnight but luckily we came across a guy from the Cayman Islands on our same flight and her hooked us up with a casa particular near the airport. Casa Particulars are basically an apartment or house where the owners rent out a room or two. they are much cheaper than hotels and depending on the owner can be quite lovely. The place we were brought to was really lovely with all the amenities you could possible want but the only bad part was that it was nowhere near the city center. MengShaou and I crashed and made plans to head to the city center the first thing the next day.

Well we got up quite late but the owner directed up to a friend of his in the city and hailed us a cab. What can I say about this place. the whole city is gorgeous! The buildings are wither old and crumbling or old and beautifully restored. We found out casa particular and after some quick showers, headed out to check out the city. There are two currencies used here, Convertible Pesos for tourists and Cubano Pesos for locals  (although they use the convertible ones as well). We changed some money into Cuban peso and immediately hit the local street stalls for an impromptu lunch. Forty cents gets you and greasy cheesy pizza or an oddly colored hamburger and for less than 5 cents you can pick up and nice little ice cream cone. We walked around taking pictures for a few hours before doubling back to try to find a small bar where we´d heard live music earlier. the music was infectious and we table danced for a while. We headed to another place for dinner when there was another live band. there´s nothing like dancing and eating. unfortunately its a bit of a tourist trick to overcharge on the bill and we pent about half an hour arguing  the charges. Luckily we´d met an Austrian could there so we had my tourist arguing power. A good lesson to learn, gotta be more careful in the future.

We decided the next day to hit the beaches of Playas del Este. Just getting there was a trip. the Lonely Plant was completely wrong (for the umpteenth time) as to where we had to catch the bus but after lots of questioning of locals we finally found our way. The bus stop was so crazy. There are two lines of people, those willing to stand and those that want a seat. It took us a while to figure the whole system out as everyone is huddled in as much shade as they can find and the line only forms when the bus finally shows up. the trick is to figure out who is last in line when you get there and remember their face so you can join up behind them when the bus comes.  With so much scarcity, lines are very important here. I lost the man that was in front of us and when i asked a woman for information she just told me to ask ´the last person in line´ I tried to explain but my Spanish was not up to the task and Meng shao speaks no Spanish. Luckily we were saved by a Cuban woman who was behind us in line and started arguing for us. God, I loved her.

After about 30 minutes for jammed packed bus travel,we arrived at our destination. We walked down a small hill to find a pristine powder soft beach with warm water and lots of revelers. We met some older Irish gentlemen who entertained us through lunch and took turns watching our bags while we took dips in the Caribbean waters.  After they left, Mengshao quizzed me on my Chinese characters, writing them in the sand and listening to me saying over and over, ´oooo, I know this one, hold on!´.We walked back and waited for the bus with the rest of the locals. Hard to complain on bus frequency when it only costs about a penny. Finally back in the city we headed to a small restaurant for dinner where I had a small seafood paella for about $6. Crazy. They put lobster in everything here!

Friday we headed to Vedado which is considered New Habana and is laid out on a grid system. we visited the Plaza de la Revolution and the Jose Marti Memorial before walking though the Necropolis, a big cemetery with monster mausoleums enough to give Buenos Aires´ Recoleta cemetery a run for its money. the sky turned threatening and we ducked into a restaurant just before it really started to pour down. Lucky for us they wouldn´t let us in because they Mengshao had on shorts. They were ridiculously overpriced and just next door we spied a Cuban restaurant with food for a fraction of the price. We walked along the waterfront, called the Malecon, back to the casa which was just the most beautiful walk passing by the crumbling remnants of the old fort that used to protect the city and kids laughing and playing in the water. We headed back to our favorite live music bar for dinner and ran in to the Austrian couple again. All the live bands ask you to buy CDs of their music but at $10 a pop, its pretty expensive. But this band is my favorite. It´s a typical son music sextet (like the Buena Vista Social Club) but one of the singers/flute players also sings and brings the house down on every song. I do love it here!

FYI. Pictures coming soon, at $6 and hour the Internet is terrible and they have no facilities for uploading pictures. you´ll just have to wait, sorry!