7 March 2010

Ten hour bus ride. Cuban country-side is still fascinating. Old cars zip by horses pulling buggies. Hitchhikers wave small bills as you pass. In the fields, campesinos overturn the dirt by hand and direct massive pairs of oxen to trudge through the red earth. Smokey air fills our nostrils when we pass one of several burning fields. Ribby horses on the side of the road munch on green grass under hulking palm trees. We bought some ‘maíz de maní’- a sweet peanut bar with milk and honey- and our driver bought a giant slab of cheese from street-side venders.

Pictures of Las Tunas and Camagüey

This is where you get everything fixed, from sole of your shoe to the tip of your umbrella.


Soon I will post a collection of billboards; in any case I like this picture for the car driving by and the frequency with which I see this scene.


This was the bus system not long before we got here- and clearly, in some places still today. Now we ride on crouded Chinese busses, but I have to say I'm glad I missed time of true Camelos. Check them out under google images.


And Lastly, the iconic Marti reading La Edad de Oro to a child.

March 4th, 2010

Yesterday we began another month of Spanish classes, this time much less frequent just to keep us in practice. Because there are only three of us, they could not provide us with our own teacher as expected so we began class with the Alabama kids who live in our hotel (by chance- what a small island huh?) and guess what!? It was too easy. Kind of nice to feel like I’ve improved even just a little. Hopefully we’ll figure out some better option. After class we went to a 24 hour sandwich stop, a busy pizza place, and a stand by the bus stop- none of which were open for lunch. Oh well. That morning we started the day with Third World Underdevelopment and Politics class near the hometel where we got into a heated argument about a recent news story about a political prisoner dying of a hunger strike in a Cuban prison. It was exhausting.

Then today we got up early and hoped on a bus to Camagüey for a program excursion. Parts of my credit hours include various visits and these trips to other parts of the island. I had a really great time on the last excursion to Santa Clara, and I promise to take some pictures while here as I’ve left the camera in its bag recently- my apologies.
I don’t know much about Camagüey or Las Tunas, but it is an inland area in the middle of the island. We spent pretty much the entire day on a long (seven hour) and extremely bouncy ride (no shocks on the bus and bad roads) through the country. Totally worth it; I really enjoy the country landscape, the horse carts and the giant oxen trudging through the red dirt.