Main menu

Home Image Galleries Vantage Point Contact / Bio Sign in
PORTRAITS OF CUBA
Return to Galleries
<div> Rachel works hard and is studying to be an OBGYN- a doctor earns around $40 a month. The average income for a Cuban is $12 a month. </div> <div class="rtejustify"> This beautiful young woman was a prostitute in a popular part of Havana. With a suffocating government, the average Cuban waits in long lines for food rations and makes less in a month than the cost of three Starbucks latte's. </div> <div class="rtejustify"> I met this striking boy running and boisterously playing around the streets of Old Havana. If he lived in a free country, he may have a modeling career. But there are no such opportunites in Cuba. </div> <div class="rtejustify">   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> We made friends with a Cuban waitor who told us the story of his father escaping Cuba, swimming an exhaustive distance to the Florida shore from a boat. Though already married in Cuba, in Florida he had an arranged marriage. In his dreams, he hoped to get his family to the U.S. for a new life with opportunity. </div> <div class="rtejustify">   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> He ultimately got deported to Cuba within three years. Now the communist government keeps close watch on him. </div> <div class="rtejustify"> Julio is a man with a smile always on his face. His bedroom here is a tiny attic that you climb up to from a broken ladder.  He lives with his kind parents at the top floor of a building where the parts of the walls are eroded. Holes in his floor show the kitchen underneath. In the mornings at the beach he works out. Citizens are unable to advance with career in Cuba, so alternatively men find pride in keeping their physiques strong.  His Nike shoes are his prized possession. </div> <div>   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> This woman approached me, asking me to buy milk for her baby. In Cuba, it is very difficult get enough funds to supply for normal needs for a family. People must wait in long lines for some basic food rations. </div> <div class="rtejustify"> It is very difficult for people to be motivated, since no matter how hard they work, they will still remain impoverished. A Cuban friend I met a long the way said " In Cuba people pretend to work, and the government pretends to pay them." </div> <div class="rtejustify"> Viñales is considered a fancy desirable town in western Cuba. Its main street is lined with colorful colonial-era wooden houses, a sharp contrast to run-down Old Havana. </div> <div class="rtejustify">   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> This sweet woman invited me into her home, which was tidy and well kept. </div> <div>   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> A typical street in Old Havana. A young mother is carrying her infant; graffiti "Trust your struggle" in the foreground. </div> <div class="rtejustify">   </div> <div class="rtejustify"> Nearly all Cubans will never leave the island and will live off bland food rations for the rest of their lives. Deodorant, butter, or salad dressing is not affordable for Cubans; only tourists can afford those luxuries. Average Cuban income is $12 a month, with no hope of upward mobility. </div> <div class="rtejustify"> <br /> Havana, for all its smells, sweat, crumbling walls, isolation, and difficult history, is the most romantic city in the world.<br /> - Mark Kurlansky  </div>