Down the way, where the nights are gay…

After 47 years of the US-backed trade embargo, lovely Havana moves from despair to hope like the tide on its untouched beach

Sanjay Kapoor  Havana

Just opposite the United States of America's 'Interest Section' - they have no embassy in Cuba — there is a plot of land where there are scores of high flagpoles,  some as high as 50 feet, flying the Cuban flags. The Interest Section is located opposite the Malecon, Havana's famous sea front where thousands of Cubans converge every evening to sing, dance and ruminate about their future.

In January this year, these flagpoles were erected by the Cuban government to block the US interest section's electronic message board giving out news about human rights violations in the country and teachings of Martin Luther King and Mahatma Gandhi. If anyone has to see absolute defiance of the world's sole super power, this was it. To show its ire at how the US has been supporting terror acts against the socialist island, two large hoardings have been placed on the Malecon facing the Interest Section showing US President George W Bush as a terrorist.   

For 47 years now, Cuba has been defying the US in every which way it can. Living legend and revolutionary, President Fidel Castro, 80, has faced innumerable CIA-inspired assassination attempts. His people have suffered silently from long years of US economic blockade. The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 exacerbated the toil and misery of the people in the Caribbean Sea's biggest island. But they soldiered on.

Stared by disaster, the government allowed tourism to attract hard currency and even allowed some private enterprise, but the country remains mired in problems that would not go away till the US lifts its blockade and allows Cubans to carry on with the ordinary business of life. Many of them live in the belief that the embargo would lift and the ships would begin to flock the empty Havana harbour. And life would change. But it has been a long wait.

The difficult question: will things change after Fidel dies? Contrary to the expectations of many wealthy Cuban Americans in Miami who are waiting to reclaim their old properties, their wait, too, could be unending. People may be poor, but their pride would not permit them to allow their country to become a colony of the US all over again. 

Cuban economy has been in a relatively better shape in recent times due to the cheap oil Venezuela has been

providing to it. Its membership to Mercosur — the Latin American alliance — would also make a difference to its fortunes. Economy Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez claims that Cuba's growth rate has been 12 per cent, but little evidence is available on the streets.

The life of an average Cuban is trapped in suffering, perennial shortages and deprivation. He may have free education and health care, but he just does not have money to buy the basics of life. This is taking a heavy toll of family life and the moral fibre of the society. Cubans may be standing up to the Americans, but at what a terrible cost!

Most goods can only be purchased by hard currency called Convertible Currency (CUCs). Each CUC is slightly more than a US dollar and less than a Euro. Average income of a Cuban is about 10 CUCs in where a new shirt costs about 4-5 CUCs and a bottle of Havana Club Rum between 8-9 CUCs. Cuba is one of those countries where seemingly everyone is economically depressed. The fancy Spanish villas near the fifth avenue of Miramar, many of them occupied by the embassies, can create an illusion of a prosperous upper class. The truth is, most of these villas are inhabited by poor Cuban families. Three to four families stay in each of these villas; many of them are in a miserable shape inside.