Arriving in Cuba

After driving from Point Arena to San Francisco, flying from the San Francisco airport to Miami, flying from Miami to Cuba, and taking a taxi to our apartment in Havana, the Capital of Cuba, my parents, brother and I could all feel what a long journey we embarked on. We left Point Arena around noon on Saturday, and arrived in Havana at around noon on Sunday, a full day-long journey. The first thing I did once we checked into our apartment was take a four hour nap, followed by waking up around six and going to eat the most common food in Cuba, PIZZA. Yes, I wasn't expecting pizza to be the most common food either, but it seems you can find it anywhere...restaurants, cafeterias, street-side stands. Our neighbors even sell pizza from the back of their driveway, operating businesses from their house is a common occurrence. After our extravagant dinner we went home, several hours later it started to rain, and we noticed the wind was picking up. We couldn't latch our window shut, then the power went out, and our floor got flooded by rain water... We decided to watch a movie, maybe to distract us from the flooded floor, but the window kept swinging open, so my dad and I decided something must be done!!! My dad grabbed a water bottle, while I held the window making sure it wouldn't swing back and hit anything. He proceeded to "hammer" the latch shut, and we were content. My mom said "I wonder what it would be like if this was a hurricane or tornado?"

After that night's storm, we did some homework and then went "shopping." We walked to the Super Mercado that is right next to the ocean, it made me think of a parking garage with tiled floors. Once inside we looked at the shelves - we could pick from an assortment of tomato sauces and ketchup, sodas and juice, alcoholic beverages, two big crates of laundry detergent, water, toilet paper and a very small meat department with several dozen people in line. Later that night we walked several miles to a bakery, that had a very long line, so we decided my mom would wait in line while the rest of us went to get dinner. We went to a small restaurant. My brother and I got similar chicken and rice dishes, while my dad ordered fish and my mom got a stew. Once we got home and got online, a whole process in itself that I'll talk about later, we got several messages from friends and family asking "Are you guys okay?" This is when we realized that there had been a category 3 tornado that ripped through Havana the night before, and touched down in a neighborhood south of where we are staying. At least the desserts were worth the wait. Whelp, that's the summary of our arrival in Cuba, stay tuned for more exciting stuff.

Nuestro apartemento en Havana, Cuba