... as Cuba might be the most thrilling country regarding social and political changes right now - 57 years after Fidel's revolution and at a time where the US embargo untightens a little more every day.
It's been raining for days now. Actually it's pouring like hell! Even the Cubans peer into the sky in disbelive while water streams in the streets of Habana Vieja take them off their feet. It feels like Havana is holding its breath, calming down to the absolute necessary. The only current question left is how to get from A to B without beeing flushed away. This is the hour of the capital's public transport and the moment where umbrellas glory their invaluableness beneath the Caribbean sun.
When you visit Cuba, you can't miss a walk through Old Town Havana where life takes place in the shadows of old, morbid colonial buildings, between fruit, veg and sandwich stands, aside workshops, stores and barber huts. Whew diving into the hurly-burly of the quarter be advised to watch out for baseballs flying ;-)
As I am learning in Cuba, "Revolution" is not only when a population rises up in revolt for a short period of time, it can also refer to a permanent condition which in Cuba is lasting for 57 years now - creating a collective state of mind and a strange reality where you can find "Revolution" anywhere, anytime - 365 days, 24/7.
There is a huge road like an "autopista" with six lanes along the coastline in Havana that separats the city from the Gulf of Mexico. This seawall is called "Malecón" and this is where the fresh fine smell of the ocean meets the exhaust gases of old chevrolets and chinese made busses and lorries that populate the city. But for the kids of Havana's Old Town the Malecón is just a place where you can really have fun.
Actually I wanted to stay clear of cigar and tobacco photographs, of those overspontaneous cuban salsa dancing in the streets with tourists applauding and the romantic chevrolets cruises that are promised in the travel brochures. But when I cycled from Trinidad down to the chilly beaches of Ancón, I suddenly recognized some quite busy activites in a building nearby. I peered through the fly screens and there it was: a very lovely and inviting cigar manufacture.
When I headed from Cienfuegos down to the Gulf of Mexico, suddenly a building that looked like "Taj Mahal" appeared on the horizon of the Cuban lowland. The impressive cupola formed the top of a russian atomic power plant that had been constructed in the late 80ies although it never had been finished. Some kilometers further down I entered a small settlement which had been built for the workers of the plant. The project also had not been finished although some hundred Cuban families moved into the buildings. The settlement still does exist today - in the middle of nowhere. It's called "Nuclear City" - "Ciudad Nuclear".