Day 1.
Visit to Fernando Ortiz Foundation
Presentation on the Debate surrounding “Socialism in the 21^st Century” with Dr. Jorge Luis Santana Perez

We start our trip with a look towards the future of socialism. The overall theme of Santana’s talk is how Cubans believe they can learn from the mistakes of the socialist experiment and take the successes into the future, and that a world without socialism as an alternative to capitalism is in danger. Fidel and Raul Castro have both said that young people must take what they have learned and adapt it for use it in the next century.

Santana discusses the blockade in interesting terms, saying that if Obama were to reverse the blockade, the governments of Latin America would believe that Obama was serious about changing the US attitude and involvement throughout the entire Latin American region. Now all they see is business as usual.

When the blockade ends, will the socialist project be able to flourish? Santana thinks yes… but our group is not so sure. We have seen worldwide lust for Starbucks and Wal-mart… are the Cuban people so disciplined that they will reject consumerism? Will they survive the onslaught of “stuff”

Ed Casey, a philosopher in our group remarks at the Fernando Ortiz Foundation that there would never be a house dedicated to a famous cultural anthropologist in the United States. I suppose we have Elvis.

Day 2
Visit to Institute of Cuban Anthropology
Visit to San Geronimo de la Habana College (The University of Restoration of the City Historian’s Office)

Our visit at the Anthropology Museum is extremely detailed. We get an overview of each of their displays by different experts in their respective fields. They are doing a wide breadth of work including marine tidal research, flora and fauna mapping projects, and excavations of anthropological sites. The island has an intricate indigenous history that they are just beginning to piece together.

The historian who shows us around San Geronimo is tall and dogmatic. We learn that this school they provide theoretical education for current restoration and preservation professionals. The university is housed in a former monastery that also held the first university in Cuba. He tells us that several years ago the Cuba government decided to give Old Havana autonomy and allow the historian’s office to use the money brought in by local tourism towards restoration. This is one of the only cases of restoration in the world where inhabitants remained in their homes and retained continuous rights to them.

There was a major problem of overcrowding in Old Havana (that continues today in other parts of the city) with as many as 20 times the number of residents considered safe to live in the buildings. When the restoration began they allowed residents who held deeds to the houses (which were given to them after the revolution) to remain in the buildings and relocated others to furnished houses in other areas of the city. Although you can’t compensate for community, I think it’s the most polite gentrification I have ever heard of.

Day 3
Visit to the Center for Psychology and Sociological Studies
Visit to Casa de Africa (Africa art museum)

The Center is working in several lines of investigation including inter-familial violence, social transformation, sports in neighborhoods, and how families survived the special period.

We ask how the investigators go about gathering their data and they reply that it is mostly in the form of informal interviews and surveys. “Do the Cubans mind talking about such intimate details?” We ask. “If there is one thing that Cubans like to do it’s talk”, is the reply.

They have an interesting case in Cuba with families that are multi-generational living in the same houses. It creates an extremely nuanced social fabric of generation value clashes, multi-layered family support and dependency and, at times, violence.

I ask about race. Our hoste tells me it’s not a social problem it’s a historical and economic one. It’s interesting that the majority of academics we meet are light skinned, and the people working as guards, reception, and cleaners are darker, yet families and couples are a rainbow of the colors of Cuba.

At the Casa de Africa we get a tour from a very passionate tour guide who is obviously enamored with her work. It’s lovely to speak with her and she shows us pieces of Africa art from all over the continent and also a display of different religious icons used in the African religions of Cuba. She admits that they really have too many pieces for their space and are planning to expand. We learn that every time an ambassador from an African country comes and sees the display of his or her particular country they return with new pieces for the Museum to add to their collection.

Our guide explains to Christina, a landscape artist in our group, that the African print on her shirt means: “an extended family is a force” and “unity in diversity”.

Day 4
Visit to the Institute for Linguistics and Literature
Talk with Ernesto Molina Molina, a Cuban Economist

At the Institute for Linguistics and Literature we are met by the director and led into their grand reception room surrounded on every side by portraits of the founders of the literary society in Cuba and the founders of this institute. They have many important documents including original copies of Jose Marti’s Magazine, Cuba’s most famous writer, poet and revolutionary, that was published in New York around the turn of the century. The library encompasses nine floors and is open to the public.

The librarians discuss the lovely relationship they used to have with the US Library of Congress and with a sigh of remorse recount the collections shared, the conferences held, and the friendships that once flourished between these two countries. We receive copies of the History of Literature in Cuba and Fernando Ortiz’s work “Witches and Inquisitors”. The names Ortiz and Marti followed us everywhere we go in Cuba.

Day 5
Visit to the Center for Local Development Studies (CEDEL)
Visit to master plan of the Historic Center of the Capital

CEDEL is a local development center that works to foster relationships between local government and grassroots communities. They explain to us that the government of Cuban has an historically paternalistic culture of doling out money for projects without much community diagnostics or involvement and they are striving to change this pattern. This center’s function is to create a dialogue between local governments and local communities about community needs and how they might best solve them together.

They are a young group, obviously passionate about their work. They show us a catalog of alternative technologies that they have been compiling for use in community projects. Our group is impressed by the participatory nature of this visit, this is the first time that an organization has really asked us our purpose in coming to Cuba and wanted to know about the personal experience we have had working in these areas. Christina told about starting community gardens, Mary about teaching liberation psychology in a community oriented way. We determine their manner in engaging us is probably due to the manner of their work, creating dialogue and building linkages.

Our visit to the Plan Maestro (Master plan) is more of a walking tour of Old Havana. We are led by a sociologist and economist involved in the restoration and urban planning of this area of the city. Our group architect, Parvis is in heaven. He is impressed by the involvement of the youth alongside trained professionals in the restoration of the city.

We move throughout Old Havana and discuss the purposeful planning be undertaken here. We visit the Plaza Vieja where each building has a photo displayed, showing what it used to look like. After our talk we visit the model of Old Havana for a dollar and are treated to the light and sound show of dawn rising over this area of the city. The model is immense and detailed. Beautiful in it’s complexity, just like Havana.

Day 6
Visit to the Monte Barreto Ecological Park for a Cuban Feast
Visit to Cooperative Urban Garden

The Institute of Philosophy has offered us the experience of a typical Cuban Saturday in the park. Our host and coordinator Regina Agramonte, ever gracious and accommodating, has arranged for a roast pig that roasts over a spit for 5 hours! In the meantime we hang out in the park watching groups of kids and adults playing baseball, kids in a drawing class organized by a local school, and families picnicking and riding horses. It’s a beautiful day and nice to be “out of the city” for a little while.

In the midst of our day we take a side trip to a local cooperative urban garden. We were unable to arrange an official visit, but Regina’s friend who runs this garden is happy to chat with us for a few minutes about their operation. The greenhouses are beautiful and orderly and the vegetable stand where they are selling their lettuces on this Saturday morning has a steady stream of visitors. He tells us that the cooperative members make a significantly higher wage than the average Cuban and that their salaries are based on how much they sell but also a point system which determines how well they do their job. The criteria are things like cleanliness and order, bed production, etc. Almost all members make their 100 points each month.

They save a portion of their profits to reinvest in their cooperative and make most of their money from their vegetable stand open every day of the week. I notice that they are utilizing every inch of space: herbs on the roof and compost on the side of the building. It is amazing what has been done with so little. The coop worker we talk to is proud of his work and it smells delicious, you would never know it used to be a trash dump.

Day 7
Free time

We all go our separate ways in Havana today. I tour around the city on my own and the rest of our group visits an Eco-village outside of the city where they swear they encounter the best vegetarian restaurant they have ever eaten at and the best coffee in Cuba. The village used to be a coffee plantation and now is full of artists and ecologically minded folks who want to live in a sustainable community.

We meet back together for dinner and talk about our day…

Day 8
Talk with Felix Valdes Garcia, Philosopher of Carribean philosophy
Visit to the Community Center of the Conseujo Popular in Mariano

Our talk with Felix is a nice way to end the academic portion of this trip. We have a long discussion about Western philosophy and how it has recreated many of the colonial models of thought in places like the Caribbean. Felix talks about Caribbean philosophers and the unique particularities that have developed their intellectual community; living on islands and how that affects cultural identity, the question of race relations due to the trafficking of slaves, the dependency of Caribbean economies that lasted long after they became free nations.

He discussed the different systems of slavery practiced by the French, the English, and Spanish how they have in turn affected the cultural identity and race relations of the many different island nations of the Caribbean. We are struck by the information that Cuban students are only learning Marxist philosophy and not these great intellectual thinkers from their own communities.

Our visit to the Mariano Community Center is a precious memory for each member of our group. We arrived in the middle of a singing class being offered to the community members and during our discussion with the leaders of the center can hear folks singing solos to a korake machine.

We speak with the Vice president of the Municipal Assembly of Mariano about her experience at the community center and as a representative of her community. Delegates are chosen on a basic community level, then a larger neighborhood assembly, and then the municipality, and finally the national assembly. She was an economist before she became a representative and because she is the vice president of the Municipal Assembly receives a salary which is equivalent or exceeds her previous salary. The women are filled with energy and enthusiasm for the delegation process, which they are currently in the midst of, elections will be held a few weeks after we leave. They admit that the work is hard, and the problems they deal with are serious but talk about a commitment to their neighbors and neighborhoods that lights up their faces with pride.

They take us to visit a community project in their area. It was another trash dump reclaimed by community members, this time to serve as a learning center for school children on how to grow and care for plants. They are also raising fish and teaching the kids about how to recognize types of reptiles. The center is in an nondescript street in the neighborhood with a rusted metal door that opens to reveal a green oasis in the middle of the city.

When we return to the Community Center we are treated to a dance and song ritual from the Uribe religion that is practiced by many of the members of this community. They offer these services at the Center for the community and host a band and Mercedes Salinas, the “caller” or soloist of this group. Her voice reverberates through your chest and the tiny room is filled with a beat that leaves you helpless to do anything but move your feet. We are asked to join in the singing and dancing and it’s a beautiful experience for our group. We all leave a little different from the way we came.

This is my overall feeling about Cuba itself. I leave not just more informed and inspired by their progress, but also filled with questions for Cuba in the future. I am impressed by the priority that the Cuban government has placed on it’s people. Cubans have a level of education that is unmatched in any of my travels around the world and yet they live much poverty and without many things. The blockade has a large part to play in this situation, but Cuba is also an example of what a more sustainable future might look like for the whole world. I fear for Cuba as I fear for all peoples trying to stand in opposition to western interests and the forces of capitalism. Although Cubans will admit and I agree, their system is not a utopia, the real challenge of all revolutions is a willingness to look at its successes and failures and work to create unique solutions to the problems your people encounter, and Cuba is already meeting this challenge.