My Cuban Trip, Part 8

Part 6, with links to parts 1-5
Part 7

So, that evening we rode back to our hotel in a coconut, which I could describe, but I'll just show you a picture:

We went to a children's rally at the church that night. Again, it was supposed to start at 6:30, it actually started about 7:30. It was so much fun to watch the kids singing and doing little skits and stuff. I was understanding more and more of the Spanish I heard, but not enough that I could translate for anyone else.

The next day we had a guided tour of the city on a tour bus with a Cuban guide. First we went to a fort which was across the water from our hotel, sitting out on a peninsula. It was pretty much what you'd expect from an old fort. There were marvelous views of the city, though.

We got to walk around the old part of the city and see a lot of the original buildings. They were built of coral, I guess because that was a readily available building material. You can see the pattern of the coral on the walls and pillars of each building.
We went back past the hotel where Hemingway lived. This time, Harold, our resident Papa look-alike, was wearing a Hemingway t-shirt he'd picked up. You should've seen the people in that hotel staring at him! And everywhere we went in the city, people were yelling out, "Mr. Hemingway!" I could just imagine these people going home to their families and swearing up and down that they'd seen Hemingway in the city. So if you start hearing rumors that he faked his death so he could go back to Cuba to live, you'll know where that started!

We also saw Castro's office building and the square from which he makes all his speeches. Across from that was a building with a giant metal sculpture of Che Guevara on it. The guide told us the average salary in Cuba is $7 a month. The people who work for the government tend to get more than that.

That night, we flew from Havana to Santiago de Cuba, taking with us some of the materials we'd brought. The plane we flew on was an old Russian plane with barely enough room between rows for my knees. It vibrated like crazy the whole way there. It was late when we got in, but many of us went to a little restaurant next to the hotel for a midnight snack. That was the first and last place I saw Coca-Cola on the whole trip. It was $2 a can.

More to come!