RELATIONSHIP AND ARTHROPOD ADVICE IN TULUM

Today I moved down the Mexican coast to Tulum, the site of some ancient Mayan ruins. I got talking to a german/greek girl as we got off the bus from Playa Del Carmen, and ended up spending the day together, in the ruins and then on the beach. The beautiful and witty Nadine turned out to be an excellent relationship breakup adviser, photograph taker and also an expert on scorpions, and specifically, the fact one might sneak into my shoe as I sleep in the beachside cabaña I will be bedding down in tonight.

Tomorrow I head inland to Chichén Itzá to see more Mayan ruins, assuming I am able to get to some scorpion poison antidote in time.

AN UPSET STOMACH IN PLAYA DEL CARMEN

I´ve been travelling for almost a month now, and had hardly any side-effects from eating uncooked hamburgers and cold hot dogs from Cuban street vendors, and all manner of tacos and tortas filled with all manner of meats such as chicken, pork, chorizo and whatever the meat was on the rotating elephant leg that I ate in a kebab shop near my hotel in Playa Del Carmen.

Tonight whilst out walking Avenida Quinta, I had a sudden queasy stomach and hot cold sweats in the street, followed by an immediate urge to get to a toilet, followed by an immediate panic that I was nowhere near a toilet.

As I sat down at a bus stop bench to wipe my brow, cross my legs and start to give myself the Last Rites, I suddenly realised all I had eaten all afternoon was a packet of Habanero flavoured crisps. I should have known that the picture of a boiling cauldron on the front of the packet was a warning sign. Next time, I stick with Monster Munches.

Ross´s Travel Tip

If you buy a red Che Guevara t-shirt in Cuba, remember to tell the Mexican launderette woman to wash it seperately from the rest of your clothes if you don´t want all your clothes to be pink.

DIVING IN PLAYA DEL CARMEN

I haven´t done much for the last few days, other than lie on the beach, watch football on the telly and do some scuba diving in the cenotes and sea reefs around Playa Del Carmen.

Here are some pictures of me cave/cavern diving in various cenotes (Ponderosa (Eden), Dos Ojos (Two Eyes) and Bat Cave). I didn´t get any pictures of my sea diving,but then again, when you have seen one coral reef destroyed by too many scuba divers, you have seen them all, and fishwise, all we saw were lionfish, stingrays, eels, lobsters and a couple of large barracuda that looked about 4 feet long in the water, but would almost certainly have been closer to 8 feet if I had caught them on the end of a fishing hook.

MEXICAN TELENOVELAS

I’ve been glued to telenovelas (Mexican soap operas) since I arrived in Cancún. They are full of glamorous women with big hair and bigger earrings, men with big moustaches and bigger eyebrows and high drama of the highest order. They have names like HERIDAS DE AMOR (love injuries) and LAZOS DE AMOR (love knots), and someone seems to die in every episode because of love, revenge or a combination of the two.

Loud music cuts in at every moment of drama, such as when somebody announces that they love somebody, or alternatively that they are going to kill them. These dramatic pauses, which are normally accompanied by the television camera zooming in on the actor/actress´s face at high speed, are great for improving my mediocre Spanish, as they give me time to catch up on what has just been said, and better understand the extremely thread-bare plot.

I have noticed that there is a lot more evil laughing, thinking out aloud and standing behind doors listening to other people’s conversations than there is in Emmerdale. In the episode I just watched, a man’s mistress caught him kissing another woman. A car chase ensued, as the mistress drove a Ferrari at high speed to tell the man’s wife that he was cheating on her, and the man (who rather surprisingly had neither a moustache or bushy eyebrows) chased her in a stretch limo to try and stop her, presumably by killing her.

I say presumably, as the end credits started to roll at this point, and so now I will have to amend my travel plans tomorrow to Playa Del Carmen so I can watch the next episode to see what happens.

FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF CANCUN

Everywhere I look there are reminders of America. McDonalds. Starbucks. Gatorade. All of which you can purchase in dollars if you don’t want to concern yourself with the Mexican Peso whilst you are in Mexico. Of course, the things that reminds me of America the most in Cancun is the annoying Americans talking loudly. I overheard one earlier telling his friend that he always comes to Cancun because it is clean and like America. Apparently the only other place he goes on vacation is Disney World.

Earlier, a Mexican shopkeeper actually thanked me for talking to him in Spanish, and I think he genuinely meant it. When another tried to sell me Cuban cigars and I explained why I would not be buying them, he smiled broadly when I told him I had enjoyed Cuba and there were no estadounidense (Americans) there.

I hope the rest of Mexico is not going to be like Cancun. If it is, I may head South a lot sooner than I’d originally intended.

 

PVC LYCRA IN CANCUN

Cancun has already confirmed itself as a party town. The music from the 'nightclub' that was blaring down the road from my hostal when I arrived at 3PM is still blaring at 3AM as I try to sleep. Inverted commas are used around the word nightclub, as there seemed to be an inordinate number of girls in bikinis and PVC lycra outfits hanging around the front door when I walked past earlier. A shop across the street called Erectus would also suggest downtown Cancun might be fairly salubrious.

On a positive note, I have not heard any gunshots yet.

10 WINKS AT HABANA AIRPORT

Sleeping at an airport is often a test of stamina and endurance. Sleeping at Habana airport has certainly been enduring. On the positive side, its a large modern airport with enough throughput of flights and passengers to there not be any risk of being kicked out late at night and have to sleep on the street. On the negative side, there are no quiet corners in the airport terminal where hombres escoces y tacano (mean scotsmen) that dont want to pay for another nights accomodation in a Casa de Particular in central Habana can bed down for the night.

The quiet spot I thought I had recced out for a good nights sleep turned out to be the meeting point for airport employees to gather and smoke and gossip loudly. The second quiet spot I found turned out to be better, except for a steady stream of habaneros that walked past it remarking 'mirale extranjero' loud enough to wake me at regular intervals.

I've been at Jose Marti international airport for almost 17 hours now. Some of the airport staff have just started their second shift since I arrived yesterday, and recognise me with surprise as I trudge the path from my sleeping spot to the gents toilets every few hours, rucksack on my back.

I arrived in Cuba tired after a night of broken sleep at Gatwick airport two weeks ago, and I will leave Cuba tired after a night of broken sleep on the cold tiles of its capital's international airport. I've had no more than 10 of my normally allocated 40 winks of sleep overnight, and look forward to falling into the warm embrace of a Cancun hostal bed recently made up with soft silk sheets, softer duck down pillows and a lumpless, stainless mattress. A Swiss chocolate on the pillow will be a welcomed final touch. A half eaten taco or the remains of a recently smoked cigarillo will not.

REFLECTIONS OF CUBA

News of the Revolution is thin on the ground in today’s Granma, with the official newspaper of the socialist party noticeably less in pages than previous editions I have bought.

Today, it feels like time to move on. I have almost ran out of streets to walk down in Habana, and there is only so many times I can stop to talk to people on their doorsteps that want to know where I am from. Also, I cannot linger any longer beside games of baseball in the street in the hope that the ball will come to me again, so I can check if I really do have a good baseball arm like a man told me a few days ago, and that the throw that left my arm with pinpoint accuracy a few days ago was not just beginners luck.

Perhaps indeed I have already outstayed my welcome in Cuba, with all my rejections of the offers of cheap cigars, cheaper rum and even cheaper women, from men that want their girlfriend to be my girlfriend for the duration of my stay in Cuba. I was warned before I came that some of the local Cubanas wanted to be the girlfriend of extranjeros as their route out of the country, but not that some of them would have slight moustaches. They walk away with a flick of their hips, still single.

The walking in Habana has been hard, but worth it. I have visited places I wouldn’t otherwise have seen, and spoken to people I wouldn’t otherwise have met. I have had conversations with engineers and painters, students and the unemployed, and a man who manages to makes a comfortable living from having his photo taken by tourists whilst he pretends to smoke a cigar.

Cuba is how I imagine Spain was 30-40 years ago. Life is hard and the people are poor but friendly. If they ask you for money or a regalo for their children and you tell them ‘no tengo’, almost all of them are still poor and still friendly. Never did they smile more than when they asked where I was staying ('hotel o casa'), and I told them 'casa como siempre'.Interestingly, nobody I spoke to knew where Fidel and his brother live in Cuba.

The family-orientated culture is also similar to Spain, with walks on the main squares and plazas on Sundays, and gossiping on the front door steps all week, including late at night when weary Scottish travelers are trying to sleep. A real community spirit exists within even the poorest of barrios, neighbours greeting each other with a kiss, and sharing each others home-made baking and a refresco on each others doorsteps. 

Basical foodstuffs seemed expensive throughout Cuba, some items similarly priced in Cuba’s mercadores as back in Britain, but with less choice and often entire shop shelves laid bare. I ate from the same street vendors and fast food joints as the local Cubanos, and never felt particularly unwell, even after one hamburger that looked pink and tasted cold in my mouth. The risk was worth it for the refreshing fruit batidors (shakes) that I enjoyed in the heat of the day.

When Franco died, things changed fairly quickly in Spain, and I wonder if the same will happen in Cuba with the passing of Fidel and his brother. As an outsider looking in briefly, it seems like ordinary Cubans do need a few political changes that could bring them new opportunities in their country, but not at the complete expense of the last 50+ years of socialism and the current way of life in the country. There is a lot that could be learnt from the revolution and the daily struggle by the people of Cuba and how they try to overcome it.

Hasta La Victoria, Siempre!

INTERNET VS CINEMA IN HABANA

The Cuban Revolution has not yet embraced the Internet Revolution, and as such it is possible to enjoy three films at the cinema for the price of one hour of snail-paced dial-up connection Internet.

I am off to the cinema tonight.




LATER EDIT:

I got my currency conversions wrong again. The price of a cinema ticket was 3 pesos and not 3 CUC, which means by my calculation, I could go to the cinema about 24 times for the same cost as 1 hour of 56K modem speed internet.

Viva La Revolucion!

BUYING A CIGAR IN HABANA

Today I went to buy a Cuban cigar. As I approached the Fabrica de Tabaco Partagas, a man stopped me in the street.

- Ven conmigo, he tells me. – Tengo precios muchas mas baratas que ali.

His name is Manuel, and naturally, he has a friend in Scotland. I follow him down a sidestreet and up a few flights of stairs to his house behind the Capitolio, to check out his lower prices. Seated in his living room, he brings out several boxes of cigars, with brands such as Montecristo, Romeo Y Juliet and Cohibas.

- Que tipo fumas? I asked him. Which ones did he smoke.

- Solo Cohiba, he informs me immediately – La gente cubano solo fuman Cohibos.

Naturally, Cohibos were the most expensive.

- No tienes algo en tubos? I asked him next. I am to travel several hundred miles befote I  enjoy my cigar in celebration of a major win on the Pai Gow table in Bills Gamblin’ Saloon, Las Vegas. I want my cigar in a tube.

He looks at me as if I had just urinated over his cigars. I listen as he explains that tubes were not good for protecting cigars and their flavour.

-  Cajas estan major, he tells me, showing me his boxes each filled with 20-30 cigars.

- Puedo comprar tres? I ask him. I am only wanting three cigars. One for me, and one for each of the amigos I will be meeting in Las Vegas.

Manual looks at me as if I have just urinated over his cigars and then insulted his mother, He hands me 10 cigars in a box – Cuarenta pesos, he tells me. About thirty pounds sterling.

- Necesito pensar, I tell him. I need to think about it.

- Treinta pesos, he tells me quickly.

- No tengo dinero ahora, I tell him just as quickly.

Manuel the cigar seller explains that there I a bank nearby, and that he will happily walk with me to it.

- Necesito ir al banco Y pienso, I tell him firmly, the emphasis on the thinking and not on the withdrawing money from the bank.

- Veinte pesos he lowers his price again. I can tell by the look on his face that this is probably his final offer.

- Regresare cuando he pensado I tell him, but I know by the look on his face that he doesn’t think I will return, probably because he has soon the look on my face.

After leaving him in his living room, I head for the Fabrica de Tabaco Partagas and buy my cigars. They cost me more than Manuel’s, but at least they come in a tube.

THE TOILET IN CAPITOLIO

The woman in the toilets of the Capitolio in Habana has a terrible job. Of all the toilets I have visited in Cuba so far, it seems strange that the one in the National Capitol Building would be the worst by quite a distance.

The sweat is lashing off me before I’ve even crouched down precariously. Flies swarm around me like a plague of hungry locusts. I am thankful I have brought some papel hygenico in my rucksack, even if the lady does hand me a few paltry sheets under the door that doesn’t close as she realizes that mine is not flying visit. Then she continues her conversation with a woman two stalls down as I focus. Focus. Focus.

When I finish, 15 pence seems a fair price to pay the woman to hand-flush the toilet, particularly since I have eaten a hot dog, a pizza with onions, a beer and an ice-cream today. I don’t look her in the eye as I leave.

A CHEAP BUT STILL EXPENSIVE ICECREAM

Yesterday afternoon, nobody started a conversation with me, and I was starting to think that Havana was like any big city, with a lot of traffic and everyone in a hurry. Today however, everyone wanted to talk to me. A student wanted to tell me about his history studies. Two boys at the Malecon wanted to show me a bar where Hemingway drunk, but is cheaper and less "Americano" than Bodeguita Del Medio. A man wants to sell me cigars, women, anything, then another wants me to take a photo of him smoking a cigar, which I do.

They all want me to listen to the famous Buena Vista Social Club band, but seemingly all at different locations at the same time. They are also all pleased to hear I have been staying in Casa De Particulares and not hotels. Some of them think that that Scottish football is good, but I quickly set them straight.

A doff of my baseball cap leaves the two men trying to sell me a bottle of shampoo laughing long after I have continued down the street.

Later I get ripped of buying an icecream. I pay the equivalent of 70 pence before I realize it should have only cost 8 pence. There are two currencies in Cuba, and I have not yet mastered either.Feeling cheated, I buy the latest edition of Granma and head back to my Casa to catch up on the latest news of the Revolution.

A LONG SHOWER IN HABANA

Traveling is often about compromise and accepting unusual situations and surroundings. Today, I am about to accept that both the taps in my casa shower are for cold water, when the water eventually turns warm after ten minutes.
I ignore the hairs in the basin that are not mine, and the burn marks where it seems a previous guest has balanced their cigarette whilst having a shower, and enjoy the best 'ducho' in Cuba so far.

 

JEANS IN HABANA

I arrive at my case in Havana in the relative luxury of a taxi with 406,000 miles on the clock. It's the worst casa de particular that I have stayed at in Cuba so far, with no toilet seat, the remains of a cigarette in an ashtray on the bedside table, and an air conditioning system that seems to be no more than a metal box stuck on a window, with a vent on it that can be opened or closed. It seems natural then that this Casa is the most expensive.

I do not know whether to feel insulted or not when my host Miriam advises me that I can not have guests under the age of 18 in my room, and that my second name "es demasiado complicado".

After settling into my Casa De Particular that I don't particularly like, I decide to face the early afternoon Habana sun in my jeans. It's after 2 o'clock and the midday heat has already passed and I want to blend in with the locals and not look like a tourist, as every time I wear shorts and t-shirts I hear locals saying 'Mirale  extranjero' (look at the foreigner) when I walk past, and some of them even make hissing noises like I am a cat that has jumped on their table to steal their dinner. When I wear my bandana, I am thought to be an Italian. When I wear my baseball cap, Canadians greet me with a 'Yo Buddy'. When I don't wear any hat, everyone thinks I am German.

Within minutes of leaving my Casa, I am already starting to sweat and walk like John Wayne in my roasting-hot jeans, when I hear a young child in a school uniform say loudly to his mother: 'Mirale extranjero'.

Not long after this I arrive at the malecon (seafront promendade) and take a left towards Old Habana. After walking for forty-five minutes aimlessly, I discover I should have taken a right. What I see in that first three quarters of an hour of walking in the wrong direction is mostly poverty. An old women appears to be picking weevils out of a container of uncooked rice. Children play baseball with bottletops and sticks. Its sometimes difficult to tell the difference between historical points of interest and derelict buildings that the local Habano's live in.

Later in Old Habana I have a mojito in Bodeguita Del Medio, where Hemingway used to drink. Unfortunately I don't find any inspiration, so instead I write this drivel, squeeze the sweat from my pocket and take pictures for tourists that think I am a local in my jeans.

BUS FROM CIENFUEGOS TO HABANA

The road to Habana is bumpy. I notice less reminders of the revolution than on other journeys, but perhaps this is because I now sit on the left (of the bus). Local hitchhikers stand in the shade under bridges with their hands out, men sell garlic and other vegetables by the roadside, and a young boy guards the bananas outside his house.

A DEATH IN CIENFUEGOS

This afternoon I saw a dead dog in the street. It lay in the gutter a couple of blocks from my Casa De Particular, flies swarming around it as it slowly decomposed in the early afternoon sun. Seeing it there made me wonder how it got there. Did it die right there in the gutter? Did it die somewhere else and its owner left it there in an open grave beside the pavement? Did someone else kill it and leave it there? Was it a family pet or just a stray?

Out of respect for the dead, I decide to have a hamburger instead of a perro caliente (hot dog) for my pre-theatre dinner this evening. I have noticed that Cubanos eat a lot of hamburguesas. There is a diner style café in Cienfuegos which has nothing on the menu except hamburgers and a few soft-drink refrescos. A steady stream of customers pass through the café whilst I am there. Some sit and eat three or four hamburgers. Others take away plastic carrier bags filled with them. I eat two and try not to think about the dead dog in the street.

A NIGHT ENJOYING THE ARTS

Last night and tonight, I stay with Miguel and Danielas and their dog Chori (short for Chorizo – there are a lot of sausage dogs in Cuba). I think Danielas thinks my Spanish is better than it actually is, and hope that I am nodding and smiling at the appropriate times.

Tonight I am seeing a £3.50 show at Teatro Toma Terry in the main square in Cienfuegos. I will be smartly dressed in trousers, so Danielas can wash my only pair of shorts. Carrying four pairs of trousers and one pair of shorts in my rucksack is already starting to feel like a bad luggage decision.

CIENFUEGOS, THE PEARL OF THE SOUTH

Today I searched for the beaches of Cienfuegos, the so-called La Perla Del Sur. First I found an area of broken rum bottles and what might have been an extra-large condom wrapper, and I knew that I had more walking to do.....

Then I reached the end of the Malecon and found just a concrete playa outside the only four-star hotel.....

I started to get nervous. Was the Pearl of the South really no more than a £ 9.99 pebble from the Elizabeth Duke jewelry section in Argos? I continued my search further under the hot midday sun and eventually did find the parasols and drilled-out coconuts of La Perla Del Sur....

Conclusion: Don’t come to Cienfuegos to build sandcastles.

NOT MUCH SLEEP IN TRINIDAD

I didn´t get much sleep last night. A cockerel somewhere nearby to El Fausto crowed continously from about 3AM until after I got up around eight, and some chickens in the neighbourhood were equally vocal. They spoiled a perfectly good dream I was having about winning big in Las Vegas. I will sleep on the bus to Cienfuegos this afternoon, and have pollo asado for dinner tonight in revenge.

RAIN IN TRINIDAD

The population of Trinidad is more Afro-Carribean than the Latin-American locals that I have seen so far in Cuba, and seem to be generally poorer. An amigo of Vilo that he had arranged to meet me at the bus station was not there when I arrived, so instead I stay at El Fausto with Manuel and Eneida. Again I take the opportunity to dine in the hostal, and again I am not dissapointed with the food, even if I do eat alone again.

It rains for the first time today, and heavily. I tell a few people that Trinidad is just like Scotland in this respect. A man selling cigars on a street corner tells me that vew Scottish people visit Trinidad, but he does know about ´gaitas´ and ´faldas escoces´ (bagpipes and kilts).

Manuels son later tells me that quite a few British tourists come to Trinidad, but that few of them speak Spanish and so find things a little difficult as a lot of Cubanos talk no English. Remembering my own travels in Spain a few years ago and my own ´no hablo Ingles´frustrations, I am already quietly pleased with my interaction I am having with the people of Cuba.