Cuba June 2015 - overall impressions...

Cuba in June 2015 - overall impressions.....

Cuba is a most interesting country well worth visiting. The countryside is mostly unspoilt and very scenic and beautiful. The Cuban people are very friendly and welcoming. It's easy to meet people and have a chat. Havana in particular is a vibrant and exciting place where the history of a grant past oozes out of many corners.

Yet, Cuba is also a run-down country. Most live in great poverty, the buildings are often delapidated, the roads and most of the entire infrastructure need urgent attention. The country's precarious economic situation, in particular since the disappearance of Soviet aid in the years after 1991, is well-known. Blaming the American trade embargo for all of the islands economic woes, as the government likes to do, is merely diverting attention from the home-made deficiencies of Cuba's  planned economy (like in the 'good old days' in the USSR and the Eastern European states). While the trade embargo has done serious harm to the Cuban economy, it ought not to be blamed for everything. Clearly, the introduction of unfettered market forces into Cuba would not be desirable either. But a continuation of the current course is all but impossible. A middle way between a purely capitalist and the current centrally planned economy, that leaves few niches for private enterprise, might be the right course, at least for a prolonged transitionary phase.

The Cuban system is faced with increasing pressure by the forces of modernization and globalization and demography. The young generation lacks a deep emotional attachment to the revolution of almost 60 years ago. It is rather sad that the myth of the 1959 revolution still seems to be needed to prop up the entire system. At college attendance at two hours teaching of Marxism-Leninism studies are required on each day of classes. As in East Germany before 1990 students endure it but they have very little understanding or sympathy for this outdated and irrelevant requirement.

Equally little understanding exists for the fact that foreign students have access to the internet, but Cuban students do not have internet access at the university. Internet access in the big hotels or at some of the few internet cafes is no problem and not limited. Yet it is very expensive (between 6 and 10 dollars an hour) and thus hardly affordable for the vast number of students and other ordinary Cubans.

On the whole we received the distinct impression that the island is faced with great modernization pressures and is on the brink of great changes, perhaps even collapse. The parallel with East Germany in the mid to late 1980s always comes to mind when traveling in Cuba, not least in Havana and other much smaller towns. The coming normalization of Cuban-American relations is bound to further add to these challenges and pressures. While the impending changes will have many positive aspects (not least with regard to Cuba's autocratic government and economic system), yet the romantic and old-fashioned diminension and the unspoilt countryside of the island undoubtedly will be greatly affected in perhaps less positive ways.

If you wish to marvel at the 1950s car models still to be seen on Cuba's roads in great numbers and enjoy Havana's wonderful and still relatively tourist-free old town, perhaps a journey to Cuba should be on your agenda for the next few months. Certainly don't wait too long. A civil engineer friend of mine, who spezializes on constructing roads and highways, recently told me that his large company hadn't had a chance to obtain a contract in Cuba. We haven't concreted over the island yet, he explained, but just you wait for a bit; we are certainly coming soon.