Words by Julie Schwietert Collazo

Photos by Brayan Collazo

The luggage was not in the cargo hold, but was stacked in the seats from rows 1-12. I was in row 13. Some of the seatbelts worked; most didn’t. There was no air circulating. I was sitting next to an overweight man from the Bahamas who travels to Cuba monthly to buy Cohibas. I had the window; he had the aisle, and he’d filled his seat pocket with six beers, which he popped open and drank in quick succession. I understood why when the old Russian model plane dropped what seemed like several hundred feet. And then, it was over. We bounced onto the tarmac, brakes grinding. “We’re here?” I asked my Bahamian seat mate, who was barely conscious, as I peered out the window, looking for houses, the skyline, any sign of life. An apagon had darkened La Habana; the lights were out across Cuba’s capital city, and we landed without realizing we’d even arrived. Bienvenido a Cuba. My love of travel knows no bounds, but I’d never actively thought of Cuba as a destination until I married a Cuban and began making twice-yearly trips to Havana to visit his family, until much of my life became deeply connected to all things Cuban: food, music, language, notions of family, and more. Like most Americans, I believed Cuba was off-limits, and my mind was cluttered with the detritus of propaganda and diametrically opposed arguments between pro- and anti-Cuba hardliners in the United States. My friend Anne explained that the mechanics of a trip were relatively simple: slip $20 in your passport on your way back into Mexico and everything would be fine. I was doubtful, but I trusted her; she’d been back and forth several times. 

Since then, when friends or acquaintances learn that I’ve been to Cuba, they often sigh and say, “I wish I could go to Cuba. I’ve always wanted to go.” Some are old enough to remember when wealthy Americans made weekend jaunts from Miami or New York to Havana for the casinos, the music and dancing, the cigars, the rum, the sun, or the prospect of an exotic sexual experience. Some know nothing about Cuba, the Cuban Revolution, or the US embargo against Cuba—they even think Che Guevara was Cuban—but they’re drawn to Cuba because of what they believe to be the forbidden travel experience. In almost all cases though, they have dismissed the possibility of traveling to Cuba “before the transition,” meaning, before Castro dies. But the truth is there’s no better time than now to travel to Cuba. The particularities of Cuba in the Castro era is what makes travelers who have been to Cuba look at one another knowingly, share stories about their trips, and then conclude that there’s something about Cuba that’s different from everywhere else in the world. After five trips to Cuba—and not as a tourist, but as someone who lives as close to a Cuban as a non-Cuban can get—I've begun to be able to give words to that something-ness. Without romanticizing the poverty in which many Cubans live, what world travelers love about Cuba is a spirit that Cubans refer to as resolviendo, which English-speakers may think of as “making do.” Because Cuba experiences severe shortages in almost all kinds of materials and resources, due, in large part, to US sanctions, resolviendo is a way of life. Everything is reduced, reused, and recycled—again and again—because for most people there’s no other choice. The life of an object is extended beyond what anyone could reasonably expect, as parts are replaced with makeshift pieces. Sharing with a neighbor or a friend is as second-nature as sharing with one’s own family—no one has enough of anything, but together, they just might get by.   Read More...