Slowing down to zero in Cuba
Russian joke about communism — Joseph (The Butcher) Stalin visits a Russian agriculture collective to inquire about the potato harvest. “We have potatoes that reach all the way to God,” replies the commune leader. “But you know there is no such thing as God,” retorts Stalin. “Exactly,” says the commune spokesperson, “and there are no potatoes either.”
The remote village of Guardalacava (Guarding the cows) in southern Cuba is located next to a lovely white sand beach where Canadians come in winter to bask in the sunshine and work on their melanomas. Arriving, I find several half empty resorts lining the beach. Tourism is down 50 percent due to the Canadian economy. About 99 percent of the tourists are Canadian. I saw one person reading a book in Russian.
Just across the highway — a paved road largely devoid of traffic except for horse and buggy conveyances that serve as taxis, plus sheep and cows and many Cuban hitchhikers — the aspiring explorer will find the “real Cuba” that may provide some answers to Canadians horrified about what may happen to their own country when Donald (the Psychopath) Trump proceeds with his plans to destroy the Canadian economy for rich Americans to benefit.
My “casa particulaire” (bed and breakfast) where I stay in a big family home lies just across the highway in front of a little village comprised of old wooden shacks that would be condemned in Canada as cruel and inhumane housing, many built long ago and somehow still standing despite frequent hurricanes and lack of any money for any upkeep. I leave my casa and wander up the hill. Immediately I am greeted by villagers, all of whom emerge from descript homes that have not been painted since they were constructed a century ago. “Hola” (hello) comes the shout. “Come in for a visit.” I am accompanied by my new friend and guide Thomas, a fellow Canadian who has spent 30 winters in Cuba and speaks Spanish.
My small backpack betrays my real reason for my explorations. In it I have carefully placed small individual bags of medicine, reading glasses, toilet paper, light weight t-shirts and baseball caps, tiny toys for the boys and girls. Also, bags of pasta purchased at the only store hidden far away near the resorts, and some eggs also purchased at that same store (which is largely devoid of any other food) that occasionally appear for sale, eggs being largely unavailable for sale unless some rich person somehow has some pesos to buy one.
Unlike Canada, where living in a hovel suitable only to house dogs or pigs is embarrassing, the villagers seem proud of the fact that they have any place of their own to live. They have never known any different, since American oppression against Cubans reaches back into history even before the “revolution” in 1959 to overthrow the robber barons of that time, swine like the United Fruit Company, the source of the phrase “banana republic” that treated Cubans at that time as farm animals.
The interior if the houses must be seen to be believed. In Canada they would be condemned immediately as unfit for human beings. Strangely enough the Cubans are not ashamed by the decrepitude. They are pleased as punch to have a visitor, because any visitor must be a tourist and all tourists are Canadian because Americans by law are refused entry to the country. Whatever visitors to the village may occasionally appear, like me, may have brought products unavailable to locals. Canadian flags are everywhere. Cubans and Canadians are friends, now new partners in opposition to ongoing oppression that Canadians have suddenly discovered under the realm of psychopath US President Trump, who has suddenly announced his plans to destroy the Canadian economy.
If “necessity is the mother of invention,” the Cubans are experts to this reality, adapting to the hatred that the far right in North America expresses itself in the form of greed and self-interest. The American philosophy of “dog eat dog” does not exist among people in Cuba. Collective existence is a necessity. We all need to eat and sleep, although eating is an exception to that rule if there is no food to share.
Day after day I wander the village and each and every time I am greeted by villagers to come and see their homes. Every single person I meet on my wanderings greets me with a hola and big smile. Everyone everywhere in Guadalavaca says hola and sports a big smile all the time, including the villagers who see each other every day, often including a bear hug and sometimes a kiss on the cheek. I smile at every one I meet myself, equipped with pieces of gum to offer passersby. As a greeting for the children I offer tiny pieces of chocolate, carefully wrapped in foil in the form of silver dollars. They gratefully the accept the chocolate like Christmas presents.
Om my first day of wandering the village I observe a sign scrawled on a falling down wooden picket fence in a state of advanced decrepitude. Thomas interprets the words. “My house is not very nice,” it reads, “but I am.” The inhabitant of this shack is a very thin and elderly woman who invites me in to sit on her bed. The shack is about 8 feet square and has no other furniture except for a fridge that has not worked in years. It has electricity but blackouts these days due to a lack of oil are so frequent the shack is dark. I see no sign of running water or of a banos (toilet).
We sit and chat. My interpreter reports this lady has no food or family. Her children have all died. She also has no teeth and looks to be nearly blind. She is astonished by my gift of a pair of reading glasses, Advil, toilet paper, pasta, and some pesos. She will buy some rice with my money at the government rations store hidden away out of the sight of tourists. I believe she has subsisted for years on the bananas growing on a tree in her backyard. We part company so I can meet other villagers. I promise to myself to come again with more food, which I do several times.
Across the path is a family of five. They invite me in. They are raising a chicken to have some chicks so that one day they may have eggs. I give them a gift package, including a Canadian baseball cap for the Dad. And so it goes, day after day meeting warm, friendly and happy people. Everyone is clean, even if the clothes are well worn. Clean laundry hangs from trees and lines. Cubans have a passion for cleanliness. Little girls wear spotless school uniforms.
I cannot understand how people who have no money can be so happy. It reminds me of my trip to Nepal, where I had lunch with a psychologist. “We have nothing, but we have each other, family and friends. That is worth more than money, I think. Westerners seem to have different values. They come to conquer Mt. Everest. Perhaps they should learn to conquer their egos”.
Tom and I sit on his second-floor balcony and watch the world slowly go by, horse and cart carriages and broken-down bicycles, sheep and goats. Everyone knows him and they all give us a wave. At the corner under a telephone pole they stop to sit on a rock and try to get a wifi signal on old donated cellphones. I call it the Talking Rock, situated next to two other rocks outside our casa I regard as the local community centre because there are always people sitting there and talking. Most Cubans, I learn, dislike communism. They long for a change. The military, under 94-year-old Raul Castro, control the country for their own benefit. They own most of the resorts. Cuban money being nearly worthless, access to outside dollars in important.
Day after day I sit and watch and wander and then wonder. Tom and I talk. Time slows down. I bask in a warm glow, not from the sunshine on the beach but in the reality that I am in the midst of a revolution of my own. Finally I come to a complete stop. I have no schedule, no plans, no urgency of any sort. I simply “am,” like the lesson I learned in an interview years ago with famed philosopher Baba Ram Dass, the author of the bestselling book Be Here Now. “Wherever you are, be there. Sink as deep as you can into your existence. You only pass this way once.”
I have slowed down to nothing. All stress and any tension have faded away. I sit and memorize this amazing feeling in order to bring it back to the modern world where I live, a lesson the likes of which I have never learned before in my many trips around the world. How can people with so little money because of US oppression be so happy? How can I apply this learning in my own life when I climb into a seat on a plane and jet back to the stress of the modern world where political psychos and powermongers inflict hate towards all and imply that greed will make you happy?
The sun sets in a pale blue sky and the cows slowly make their way back to their home and little children play in the dusty lanes and old people sit on their porches and chat. There may be eggs tomorrow at the store I can buy and share. Sharing? The Cuban people have taught me a valuable lesson and that value has nothing to do with money. I want to share this learning with my fellow Canadians so I will write a book about my incredible experience. If you go to Cuba, google “what to bring and how to help.” The person that will benefit the most is you, just as happened to me. To quote my favourite writer Mark Twain. “The best way to make yourself happy is to try to make someone else happy.” So it is.
