I went to Cuba over Spring Break for class

Going into this new environment I had an open mind because 1.) I’ve never been out of the country or on a plane at this point in my life 2.) I only know what I’ve read on newspapers on read on blogs about the country and 3) you’re less likely to enjoy or fully immerse yourself in a different culture if you cling onto your own for reference. The goal of our travel through the course, Comm 498A: International Telecom for those interested, was to learn how Cubans are living without the internet, and to learn more about why their technology is so far behind the rest of the world’s.

I wasn’t sure how I would get around because I only took two Spanish classes and that was during my freshman year (I’m a senior now). Luckily we had some native Spanish speakers in the class who I had become acquainted with through group projects. We arrived at JFK around 8am and landed in Cuba around 4-5pm. We went out to dinner and it was very interesting to say the least. Let’s just say I probably won’t be eating meat for a while. We went back to the hotel, but most of us were restless so we found the hotel bar and got some Mojitos, which ended up being the drink of choice the whole break.

We arrived in Havana and the first thing I embraced was the weather – it was a warm sunny 80 degrees. When we left State College it was 27 and snowing so there were regrets there. I found myself scanning the streets and the people as we took a tour bus to our hotel. A lot of run down buildings and tons of people everywhere it seemed.Everyone was out walking around with friends, on there way somewhere.

A concern many of us had was that we were not going to have cell reception there since American businesses are not allowed to operate in Cuba. I was able to roam and receive text but it cost money to respond. The only way to connect was through WiFi cards. I was surprised to see teens with cell phones since Cuba’s cell network is really restricted for residents. For tourists who want to hop on a WiFi network you can browse most of your normal sites except Google. Apparently Google has a problem with Cuba’s censorship. It costs a lot of money to even use one of the hot spots in Cuba. At our hotel the price was 2 Cucs, Cuban currency,  an hour and that might seem cheap, but when the average monthly wage for a Cuban resident is $20 priorities start to weigh in.

The first two days we explored around Habana Vieja, which was very touristy. The cars were definitely one of the highlights. Many Cuban taxi drivers own those 1950’s cars that you always see when you google Cuba. Being that I was born in the 90’s I had never seen cars from old movies besides in the movies or photographs. To see one in person was like a Jurassic Park experience.

The beach was beautiful it’s clearest water I had ever seen having never been to the islands. Being from Philly the closest beach is New Jersey… yeah no comment. They had a beach bar and they served food there’s literally nothing else you could ask for.

Halfway through our beach day we got some somewhat odd but exciting news. We were being kicked out of our hotel by the Rolling Stones because they booked the whole thing. We ended getting into an even better hotel that was closer to La Rampa, which is one of the most popular streets in Havana and right off of the Malecon.

Getting back into the course we visited the Jose Marti center, which acted as our classroom. This was also home to Jose Marti’s son and by the looks he lived very comfortably in Cuba. We were given a lecture about colonialism in Cuba, racial tensions as well as the history and life of Jose Marti. Then we ventured over to the Jose Marti memorial statue that looks like a huge tower that faces two Cuban revolutionary heroes Che Guevara and Camilo Cienfuegos. 

We also came across this place called “Super Burger” and the logo resembled Burger King’s and because we hadn’t had any familiar meals since we got there we allowed ourselves one. It was funny because they advertised the same pictures show in McDonalds menu, but the milkshakes, pizza, burger, and fries were good. I think I needed just a little bit of ‘normalcy’ after having so many unfamiliar dishes.

We visited the “Museo De La Revolucion” which featured a lot of the historical, replicas, artifacts from the Cuban revolutionary period from 1953 -1959. After that we visited Cuba’s chinatown where we went into the telecommunications museum and got to learn and use old phone systems, undersea cables, manual switching systems etc.

The next thing we did was go to a Jazz club, which was more for older tourists but the music was good nonetheless. We also went to club/restaurant 1830 or as Cubans call it “one thousand eight-hundred thirty” a mouthful I know. This club is  known for Hemingway having partied there and it was very lively. The dance moves were fast – everyone looked like they were training for Dancing with the Stars. 

Next we visited the University of Havana, which is free for Havana residents. The books, meals and dorms (for those who commute) is all free. Our Tour guide was a Masters student studying psychology and he explained to us the history of the university and how each individual major works. Fun fact: University of Havana students start taking their major courses their freshman year along with their gen eds. A lot of the programs are five years and you can go as high in the educational field as you desire. And with only a quarter of the population of Cuban having access to the internet many ways that we do research are totally different. Imagine what you would do without Google. You would have to actually research through library books and find it manually.

A lot of the Cuban infrastructure is really bad. I believe the statistic was a building falls every day in Havana due to not having maintenance done on the homes there. There’s a large vibrant creative community full of musicians, poets, filmmakers, and a lot of other creative outlets in Cuba. It makes me wonder how much it’s going to change as the U.S continues to work on making the relationship between the two stronger. Will it be positive or negative is the big question?

Cubans have close knit communities because they have not been given the opportunity to really rely on technology because it isn’t available to them. As more tourist come through and the economy starts to improve I can only wonder if it will make Cubans more individualistic or will if they’ll be able to hold on to their culture without allowing other countries to influence them to conform.

Cubans were very, very excited to hear that the president of the United States would be visiting their country. Many stores were repainting, roads were being repaved or paved for the first time, and I ran into a few Cubans who were really stoked because they really want to have access to the rest of the world and they think having a positive relationship with the U.S. will grant them that. On the other side it was kind of disappointing to see that they were willing to repair their city for the presidents visit but not for their own country. Philadelphia saw the same thing happen when the pope visited last year. I’m hoping in the near future everyone will have a chance to visit Cuba it looks like a blast from 1950 but the atmosphere and people are very upbeat and hopeful of their futures.