Good morning Minnesota! No way to kick me out of the country like some beautiful snow. And shoveling. The snow began to fall the night before I left for Havana and apparently didn't stop until we were in the air from Miami, but I got to shovel plenty the night before, and then later in the night, a.k.a. 4 am, to be able to get to the airport by 5 am. A good time to get somewhere warm. I was actually waiting for the weather to get worse so I would want to escape more, but the snow was just simply beautiful, which did not exactly make me hate the weather so much. But I was going to Cuba. Cuba!
Security in the Minneapolis airport went smoothly other than the confiscation of my greek yogurt (but it's so delicious and creamy, it's a liquid?), and the plane was basically trying to get us climate-adjusted already. Most of us passengers were sweating, and not just from struggling to squeeze our bags into the overhead compartments. But off to Miami we went!
First order of business in Miami: checking the flight status of our group Miami to Havana flight. Since I did not check any bags and therefore did not need to leave D-20 for baggage claim, I double- and triple-checked the departures board and rejoiced that the next leg of our journey would fly out of the same D-20! There were no airline representatives present at that time, so I figured I could wander off to grab a quick lunch before they would take passengers at the counter to print tickets and whatnot. (I realized on the plane that the apple slices and celery I had run out
the door with were perhaps the two most annoying foods to sit next to on
an airplane, so I saved them and ran up an appetite...).
It appeared that all I had to do was wait and send final messages to family and friends before disappearing into a new land with slim-to-no internet access. However, when American Airlines staff arrived at the gate desk, a few people who also appeared to be relaxing at D-20 went up and asked their questions, only to be sent away to presumably check in somewhere else. Elise, Witness Regional Organizer and my supervisor/mentor, had sounded surprised when I had said it seemed like I could just stay at the gate once my plane had landed, and here's why. Because only certain charter companies can run flights from the U.S. to Miami, even though the flight was in conjunction with American Airlines, all passengers were supposed to go downstairs to a special set of desks in ticketing for paperwork approval and luggage matters with the charter company itself.
So the gate desk sent me in the direction of baggage claim and ticketing, and I asked the sweet official at the mouth of the escalator if I was going in the right direction for the charter company. He seemed to be clueless but said he thought I was on the right path. Somehow I ended up in baggage claim, which was decidedly not where I wanted to be, and eventually I found ticketing and check-in desks, only to be told by one American Airlines official that I just had to hop in the international flight line. Nobody really knew about the whole charter situation, so I got on the phone with Elise again, who directed me to come down all the way to the end (the other end from where I had been) to ABC Charters, down in a corner with windows and apparently our whole delegation group waiting for me! I had definitely gotten a good workout in, and met Elise, Bob, Nino, Judy, and Kera (Tineke would meet us in Havana) with smiles and a little sweat. They had been waiting in the baggage line for an hour, while Elise waited in the paperwork line to get approval for all of our documents. There were no signs anywhere telling people who showed up at D-20 to check in first with the charter company, where that was, or what to do once you got there. But people helped each other figure things out, and everyone I asked was so kind to try to help me in my bewilderment even if they couldn't actually help.
I saw a couple other instances of human kindness that were encouraging. One man almost forgot his wallet in the x-ray and someone ran after him to give it back. A woman's scrunchie fell on the floor, and she was overjoyed when I scooped it off the floor and handed it to her. And another woman lost an article of clothing out of her bag perched on top of her suitcase as she strode down a wide passageway looking for her gate, only to be tapped on the arm and given her pants back by the man walking three feet behind her. It was a pleasant surprise how people were sticking together through the confusion of the whole situation, actually. Airports can be high-stress environments, but there seemed to be a sentiment that we were all in this crazy mess together. Perhaps in U.S. culture we have higher expectations that in theory we are a more developed society and therefore everything should run smoothly and orderly, and when situations do not meet those expectations, we get frustrated and take it out on our fellow human beings. But this is one of the first times I think I have felt like perhaps there is something to to the feeling of solidarity when nobody knows quite what is going on, and more forgiving spirits abound. In our situation, literally all we needed were a couple of signs because the path to Cuba is a little more complex in the U.S. than to other destinations, but our little family started the bonding process through this experience, and continue getting to know each other over snacks in D-20 once we all made it, relieved.
Boarding to Havana was when it finally hit me and I could finally be excited that we were going to Cuba - it was finally happening, and it was real. My curls had already begun to gobble up the excess moisture in the tropical air. And to generalize, the Cubans and Cuban-Americans on our plane were distinguishable by their style - they are the ones who can afford to come to the U.S. and go back. I woke up to the safety and security message over the intercom and the beverage cart just two rows away, and I thought, "I know this is a short flight (just 45 minutes), but they are serving while we're still on the ground?" Then I realized I had fallen asleep before we took off, still amazing to me despite my one hour of sleep overnight. José Martí, Cuba's international airport, greeted us with the saying, "Patria es humanidad," "Country is humanity," and passengers clapped when we touched down, a Latin American custom to thank the pilot and thank God that we landed safely!
We're here! We all descended down the steps and took in the expanse of landing strips drawing nationals and internationals alike into the brightly painted airport complex.
A few of our delegates emerge from the stairway tunnel: Bob, Judy, and Nino (from front to back).
We were officially in Cuba. Salsa music welcomed us through immigration, and we noticed it was interesting what aspects of security were official and what really was not. For example, our entry documents were thoroughly inspected and our photos taken right there for the record, but security itself with haggard x-rays and more relaxed personnel was less concerned with our admittance to the country.
Our little research delegation had made it through all the hoops, so we wove our way out of customs and into the crowds of Cubans eagerly awaiting their relatives returning from who-knows-where. There we met Tineke, our final delegate who is a U.S. resident but a Dutch citizen who was able to pop over to Havana from her travels in Europe to join the delegation, and our delegation leaders: Diego, a writer and our Witness for Peace International Team member in Cuba; Ariel, our other coordinator through the Martin Luther King Center; Betsy, our translator; and José Luís, otherwise known as "Chino" (Latin Americans tend to not be so politically correct as they call him "Chinese" for his slightly Asian-appearing eyes), our bus driver. This spectacular crew of four took care of us splendidly for the entirety of our delegation.
Outside the airport we already encountered the omnipresence of Che: "We see you every day... pure like a child or like a pure man. Comandante (Commander) Che, friend."
The bus from the Martin Luther King Center (MLKC) that would be ours for the 11 days: "End the embargo against Cuba" on one side, and "US-Cuba Friendshipment" on the other!
Almost all of our crew before we took our first hop onto the 1980's U.S. schoolbus.
First order of business was to throw all of our belongings on the bus except for our passports and cash so that we could go exchange US dollars for CUC, Cuban convertible pesos. With the fee tacked on, we were returned roughly 87 CUC for $100 USD (I will explain the Cuban currency situation in a following post - it gets a little messy!).
Second: Tineke's bag had not made it here from the Netherlands yet, so we drove to the other side of the airport for Diego to check on the situation. Palm trees and 1950's American cars abounded just stepping outside of the airport, just like the stereotypical image of Cuba. And hello humidity! I believe it was Kera who remarked, "It was also 30 degrees when I left, but it was a different 30!"
We camped on the bus for a good while so Diego and Tineke could see about her luggage. It eventually showed up about two days later, and she was such a good sport about not really having her clothing and necessities for those few days!
Judy and Betsy get to know each other in our first bus ride. For me as a twenty-something still getting a sense of the world, I have been so fortunate to have had some great travel experiences already, but it was also amazing to hear people like Bob and Elise especially swapping stories about their global adventures and getting a sense of what kinds of opportunities and programs I should keep my eyes peeled and bank accounts primed for. I am just excited to soak everything in, from the experience of Cuba itself to the wealth of knowledge that abounded in the cohort of delegates with whom I was to experience Cuba.
I may have kept silent on many a bus ride during the delegation, but especially this first one as I kept my camera at the ready and all of my senses attuned to the flavor of Cuba. A few things I noticed on this route to the MLKC:
- A billboard that read, "La Habana: donde conviven el pasado y el presente." "Havana, where the past and present live together." Given the unmistakable ratio of American-made vehicles dating pre-Revolution to anything current, the past is Cuban daily reality, but there are many ways in which this society has advanced as well with a different approach to development than most nations.
- An additional commentary to past transportation methods: horse and buggy is also a legitimate way to move humans and other things to where they need to go.
- People out playing futbol on random patches of semi-inhabited dirt and grass at dusk.
- A purple-streaked sunset. Spectacular.
- Buildings that were all worn down but you could still tell that they were beautiful.
And there we were at the Martin Luther King Center! I was to room with Kera across the hall with Elise in dorm-style accommodations for us all provided at the center. Kera and I chose our respective bunk sets and got settled in, and then we all reconvened for dinner downstairs in the comedor, the dining room. Here is what the MLKC looked like on our first night:
Caribbean staples of rice and beans filled our plates to be complemented by a type of squash in addition to a cabbage-tomato salad. We rounded out our meal with individual bowls of jell-o, exclaiming, "Why is this so good?!" Sugar. Real, homegrown, sugar.
Bellies full, we shuffled our way across the courtyard and up the stairs to a classroom where we would have the majority of our meetings with various Cuban experts in their fields. We first needed orientation, though, to get a sense of what our coming days would look like. Our leaders told us a little bit more about themselves, with Ariel joking that he had to explain to his son why Disney named a mermaid after him. Betsy just graduated (like me!) from a six year program as an interpreter in English in French, so she is pretty darn talented as well. And Diego has served in Africa in the Peace Corps as well as in Colombia for several years on the Witness for Peace International Team there.
His goal tonight was to educate us on the workings of a Witness delegation, such as the social justice mandate to take what we have learned here and return to the U.S. with knowledge and drive to educate our communities and work for more just U.S. policies towards Latin America. Other things of note:
- Be respectful of the interpreting process, as well as mindful of Latin American culture. If you ask a speaker a question and get a story in response, there's the answer in that response and in that story.
- Food at the MLKC is safe and the staff has been trained well, and the water is purified at an amazingly high level with reverse osmosis.
- Cuba in general and Havana in comparison with other cities in Latin America and the world is extraordinarily safe. A good indicator is that women can walk alone at night, but everyone should use common sense to not walk alone and especially not to dark places or into weird situations - "If it looks weird, it's weird," said Ariel.
- Public restrooms will have a person sitting outside. They are the attendant, and their job is to keep the place clean. There will typically be a plate for tips, which is their salary.
- We all went through the Witness mission statement and covenant together (pictured below): "Witness for Peace (WFP) is a politically independent, nationwide grassroots organization of people committed to nonviolence and led by faith and conscience. WFP's mission is to support peace, justice, and sustainable economies in the Americas by changing U.S. policies that contribute to poverty and oppression in Latin America and the Caribbean," and see our guiding document here.
Diego unveils our principles to adhere to.
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