Hola from Veradero

---

Hi everyone,

I spent yesterday in Santa Clara visited the Che memorial which is actually where he is buried and also visited the site of a train derailment which he instigiated during the revolution to capture ammunition and a few hundred of the enemy. Its funny you know everywhere you go there are so many photos of the various aspects of the revolution. There were before and after shots of the train wreck. They used a bulldozer to move the tracks and had photos of this they were very clever in the way they captured history and I am sure this was all about marketing the whole revolution thing as well.

Laura the girl I met from the UK and I travelled from Trinidad to Santa Clara and we shared a hotel room. Our hotel had a beautiful pool and they did fantastic pina coladas so we got into a few by the poolside and had a can of crysal (local beer) whilst we were swimming. I don't usually drink beer however I don't mind this drop.

When we were having a swim a lady came up to us and asked us if we were on a tour group, she was English and turns out she is am MP on a bit of a delegates trip (junket I think) to Cuba.

She asked us what we had heard about how people feel about living here. The people who I had spoken to were keen to get out and experience things outside Cuba some actually feel trapped and its really hard for them to make a living. I told her that I had only spoken to young people about it. She then said oh I just recognised your accent and became very defensive...clearly me being an Australian who spoke directly was a little too much for her to handle... my thoughts are...well if you don't want to hear the answer baby why ask the bloody question! I got the feeling that she was going to paint a picture of things being very positive here and that is not really a balanced view from what I can see. There are of course positive aspects to the setup here in terms of free education including university and free health care. She said all the people she had spoken to (which were only those escorting them here and there and interpreting for them) were really positive. I said to her well do you really think they are likely to say anything else given the situation that you are a visiting MP from another country and besides they would have been hand picked so they are hardly likely to put anyone with controversial views in the support team I would think. I didn't take any crap from her and found her to be quite arrogant acutally...She said if it was me living in a third world country I would much rather live here than in Iraq or Cambodia...bloody rediculous comment and anyway its not about what she thinks its about what the people of Cuba think and different communities and generations in Cuba will have different views I am sure...however she wasn't interested in hearing any real stories that didn't fit within her paradigm. I didn't realise how much she annoyed me until I was actually typing this and she made sure that we knew that she bought pressies from England for the ballet school!! Its all about her brand!!! Anyway Laura is going to ask for a copy of her report back and is going to send me a copy I bet it won't be a balanced view we will have to wait and see.

I am in Veradero now and have spent the morning most of the day on the beach. Just lovely and so are the life guards I must say helping me to practise my spanish and very cute too.

I plan to hit Bar Benny tonight which is a jazz spot dedicated to a famous jazz musician Benny More...cocktails are supposed to be good here as well so bring on the Pina Coladas I say. Will have to do a big detox when I get home before getting into the Champers at Spring Carnival. Will have a nice tan for the races too!!

Head back to Havana tomorrow for 3 more days and then off to Mexico. I am pretty keen to get home now, whilst I am still enjoying myself 8 weeks is a bloody long time to be travelling. Can't wait to get my legs waxed and have a pedicure and manicure too!!

Hope you are all well

Ciao for now

Sim xxx

---