In my
sophomore year of college I studied abroad for a semester in La Habana, Cuba.
While I was there I experienced rarities that can only come with a country
plastered between a globalizing economy of capitalism and an idyllic past of
communism. I saw contraptions made from scrap, buildings transformed to accommodate
growing families or new businesses, people hustling to get by—the average monthly
salary for 2011 in Cuba was $19. Yikes. But they do get a ration card with
certain amounts of food, so hey, at least they’re getting something else. I met
amazing friends and went to incredible places and all in all I fell in love
with the place, aww shucks. I knew I wanted to study abroad as much as
possible, because why not? I was throwing around ideas in my head about
something extremely different like Tibet, or maybe something more similar to my
experiences like Brazil. But a new program was announced with SIT that was
going to be in Cuba. Mmm, I thought, I know the place, I know some people—why not
just go back in a legal way and do an amazing research project that is the main
component of SIT. I was set. I was ready to get back to my Cuban friends and
just get away again from school where every semester seems to get more and more
monotonous.
I
applied and was ready to be accepted. Duh, look at my experience. But really I
had to go through some interviews and change a bit of my application before I
was finally accepted into a group of 15 students from across the country. I was
proud. I was happy. I was going back to that crazy country only 90 geographic
miles from Florida, but 9 million miles away thanks to a rocky history and
insane politics. This is when I was considering doing a summer research project
to get me prepared for the fall. I applied through the Office of Undergraduate
Research and, thankfully, I was accepted into an awesome community full of
equally diverse and marvelous people and research projects.
What
was my project you ask? Oh, you didn’t ask?
Cuba is
a strange place, we’ve established this. Granted, however, it is strange when
juxtaposed with our society. It is so strange in that a pizza maker or a hotel
employee can earn more money than an engineer or a doctor. Imagine. It’s hard
to, when it’s been drilled into our heads how much money doctors and engineers
and specialists make—not the case in Cuba. Socialism and communism reign
supreme on paper in Cuba and therefore paychecks are dealt out in almost equal
amounts. This does not take into account money that is handled under the table,
outside of the formal economy, cash, etc. Not a lot of doctors and engineers
make tips or set their own prices, but those in the service industry do. It’s
my pizza shop, I pay a certain amount of money every month to the government, I’ll
just raise the price a little bit to give me a nice little cushion and the
government won’t be the wiser. And the government won’t because the Cuban
bureaucracy is notoriously known to work about as well as a DMV in slow-mo.
There’s even a movie about it.
So what
do you do when you don’t know how to make pizza or you can’t get the job in the
fancy hotel? What if you don’t want to or can’t be a doctor or an engineer?
What do you do if you have almost nothing? Well you can utilize the only
resource you have, and most times than not, that resource is one’s body.
Cuban
prostitution is a phenomenon unlike “hotspots” of prostitution, for lack of a
better word, such as Thailand or the Netherlands. In Cuba, there are no “pimps”
or organized prostitution—and it is definitely not legal. In the Netherlands
prostitution is nearly regulated and Thailand is self-regulated by those in
control of the industry. In Cuba, there is no regulation (ironic being a
communist country) and because of this lack of regulation, prices and issues of
safety are ever changing. Prices are set by the tourist most cases than not, therefore
Cuban prostitutes can be often left with little to sometimes no money.
However,
certain agency takes place from the side of the prostitute: they elaborate and
elevate the level of exoticism already preconceived by tourists of Cuba: a Caribbean
island, fascinating history, and of course ethnically diverse from a majority
white North America/Europe. From this perspective one could easily argue WHO
has the power in the situation? Who is manipulating and who is manipulated? How
much does exoticism and authenticity play into the tourist experience in Cuba?
What do new waves of capitalism mean for this communist island country? These
were a series of questions I set out to explore not only this past summer, but
this fall semester abroad.
However,
the news came 2 and a half weeks before my departure that the Cuban government
shut down our program. I was stunned and confused and lost and had no idea what
to do next. Those commie bastards! Well, what I really did next was get my
wisdom teeth removed—it was a good week… hah. I was waiting for something,
anything and finally I made the decision to do another SIT program in Peru
titled: Indigenous Peoples and Globalization. I looked at this program before
with interest; indigenous peoples and globalization are two social components
that fascinate me and go akin to my previous research on Cuba in terms of
agency, authenticity, the exotic, the ‘other’, etc etc.
I found
myself buying winter clothes for the city of Cusco and completely reorganizing
my mental state and erasing expectations: giving myself a tabula rasa. I fly
from Houston to Lima in a surreal haze of confusion and excitement. I spent the
night in a hotel and got ready to fly to 12,000 feet above sea level that is
Cusco, the ancient great city of the Incas.
I
arrive and see my crew waiting for me and other students and quickly hopped on
the bus and gulped down some coca tea waiting to alleviate the awkwardness that
always accompanies new groups of people. We travel 2 hours to Urubamba where we
would all stay for 5 days getting to know each other and the program and
basically making friends and getting adjusted (and to see who was going to go
crazy from altitude sickness).
During this
time we visited the ruins of Machu Picchu, a fascinating and humbling place
that will always be a place of controversy, mystery, and beauty. Maybe I’ll do
a post about the weirdness of Machu Picchu—but really I want to finish this
one, it’s about 2 months old. Check my flickr for pictures of Machu Picchu!
When we
got back to Cusco, my host family was out of town so I spent a few days in
another family’s house. My host mom arrived and took me to my new crib which is
a beautiful 3 bedroom apartment in the neighborhood of Magisterio.
I will
fill in later more about my school work, classes, other visits we have done and
weird things I have learned and appreciated about Peru.
Until then, listo pues
John but here I am known as Juan -__-
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