Hello From Cuba – Part four – Bureaucracy Galore –
Hello From Cuba – Part 4 – Bureaucracy Galore – The University Of Havana
Yesterday I had to sign up for my Spanish route at the University of Havana. The Campus of the University is an astoundingly pleasing series of classical homes and a Cuban tank graces the entrance to the library.
At 9 am the entire overseas pupils, approximately 40 of them, met in the Edificio Varona and we were shepherded with the aid of diverse professors into a really antiquated lecture hall. (By the manner, of the five or 6 washroom stalls inside the womens bog, handiest 1 or 2 have lavatories in them, no rest room seats, and no jogging water inside the sinks. Again a sign of fairly run-down infrastructure…)
There they informed us approximately the program, however solely in Spanish, which was once o.k. for me, given that I communicate Spanish, but about half the community become wholly lost. We then needed to do a short written placement attempt to evaluate our existing Spanish capabilities after which the forms started.
We found out out that we mandatory the following paperwork:
– a replica of our passports
– an respectable copy of the resort visitor card and/or a replica of the licence of the deepest Casa Particular
– 2 hundred CUC (Convertible Cuban Pesos) in cash for a 2-week route or greater for different courses
– forty CUC for exchanging our traveller visa to an academic visa (in monetary stamps which we needed to obtain abuot five km away)
– 2 passport photos
– 25 CUC in money to expedite our educational visa if we're on the town for best 2 weeks.
I related up with a host of overseas students and we headed off jointly on our quest to satisfy the Cuban wish for Burocratismo. We first bought earnings at financial institution at the Hotel Havana Libre, then were given the passport photos performed (to be well prepared for pickup 3 hours later), then looked for the opposite financial institution on Calle 23 that may grant us with the 40CUC stamps for the educational visa. With tremendously long lineups in every single place, this took us about 2 or 3 hours.
Then we received truely hungry and we had been approached with the aid of a native “Jinetero” (restaurant tout) who promised us a complete meal with essential dish, salad and facet dish for six or 7 CUC. We walked with him, simplest to find out that the wait on the Paladar (non-public restaurant) would be approximately forty five mins to even take a seat down, not along with delicacies preparation time.
So we walked up Calle 21 and a exclusive restaurant owner approached us for a meal and we gave in and got here inner. It turned into a alluring colonial villa, unless that the visitor room with is compulsory three tables and 12 seats became in a darkish small dingy room thoroughly devoid of windows.
However, we had a delicious house-cooked meal, I had roasted bird with rice & beans, salad and a lemon comfortable drink, curious about eight CUC (about 8 US$). 2 of my pupil colleagues have been from Germany and the opposite fellow is from Toronto as nicely, however at first from Poland. We had a few super conversations and it become appealing linking up with a group of Europeans in Havana.
After a transient relax inside the resort, my buddy Pedro returned picked me up in the nighttime and I couldnt support yet tell him approximately my trip with the Cocotaxi driving force the day before today, who had attempted to go with me up, notwithstanding my clarifications and statements that I turned into married and no longer keen on any amorous movements.
Pedro explained that sexual kinfolk in Cuba are a noticeably typical, basic-going aspect and that it's far very standard for humans to hyperlink up for swift “meaningful overnight relationships”. He talked about the Cuban humans as very “passionate and hot-blooded”, I bet that explains a couple of the advances that I had been receiving thus far, truly since there's additionally slightly a number of intercourse tourism wherein men (or even adult females) come to Cuba to interact in readily feasible erotic reviews.
Pedro and I walked thru the antique city and of course along the Malecon (the seafront street) and saw the alluring Plaza Vieja and the Plaza de los angeles Catedral the place a mass turned into being held for the passing of Pope John Paul II.
This became very thrilling, because Cuba is a Communist / official atheist country and there are a whole lot fewer Catholics nowadays than earlier the Revolution. Actually tons of Cubas religion is a combination of Catholicism and Santeria (spiritual practices of the African slaves). Regardless of religiousness, Cuba has declared a three-day “duelo nacional” (a national mourning era for the Pope) and the mass was attended via hundreds of thousands of humans.
Pedro and I then had a nice meal in the “Barrio Chino” (Havana’s Chinatown) for 5.60 CUC (less than US$6) for two human beings and a pair of vegetarian meals and cushy beverages. After a pleasant dinner he back flagged down a regional deepest vehicle driver and gave him approximately 1 CUC for determining us up and losing us off at my Hotel. At dead night I dropped into mattress, exhausted.
However, at four am this morning I aroused from sleep with principal intestinal disorders. Apparently my Chinese meal had now not change into me so effectively and I had severe digestive trouble emanating from either facets of my body. This morning I realy felt rotten and I ended up utilising my own scientific kit for the first time and took a few Immodium.
I become unable to devour breakfast, but I made my approach to the college wherein at nine am our instructions commenced. Surprisingly the situation experiment had placed me into the extent of “perfeccionamiento”, the best stage and the level of Spanish in my class turned into certainly very excessive. The class involves 7 college students, a younger girl from England, a young lady scientific pupil from Denmark, a middle-elderly lady medical professional from Finland, a younger male law scholar from Sweden, a young lady and man from Norway and myself from Austria/Canada.
Obviuosly there is an exceedingly heavy Scandinavian slant in my magnificence and it appears every person in the class is a activity sociologist, political scientist, environmentalist and historian. We requested a few pretty rough questions about Cuban life, the political formulation, the fiscal hardships, the double economic climate, the circumstance of women folk and blacks in Cuba, machismo and the challenge of the atmosphere.
Some of these questions made our lady professor suppose tremendously uncomfortable and it appeared like she become squirming beneath the barrage of probing political and sociological questions. She were given very protecting a number of times about the Cuban technique and only once we discussed the best and poor sides of European and Canadian societies did she loosen up just a little and come to be a section greater open and frank about the precise Cuban existence. It appears that to nowadays explore Cabo yacht rental options Cubans have to be very cautious approximately what they are saying in public.
For instance, she frankly admitted that racism still exists in Cuba and to at the present time it's far nevertheless a rustic with plenty of machismo. However, she did now not admit that Internet entry and get admission to to non-Communist media is forbidden for Cubans, she without problems defined it as an financial factor. (Several of my colleagues had heard in a different way of their travels in Cuba, effectively that a Cuban isn't really allowed to have get entry to to the Internet). She also admitted that it isn't very allowed for Cubans to talk over with the traveler parts of the Cayos (e.g. Cayo Coco) that's completely reserved for vacationers and Cubans don't have any access to that location in any way, a definite point of contention one of several locals.
Class ended approximately 1:20 and my disillusioned belly did not allow me to intake any cuisine. I headed lower back to my lodge, slept a bit of and were on the Internet for the previous 2 or so hours (racking up a invoice of approximately $US 20.00 or s0), documenting my vacation.
It’ll be a quiet nighttime this night on the grounds that I am seeking to calm down my belly. But I am bound the adventures and the discovering will proceed the next day.