“Things won’t get any worse than here, other parts of Cuba will be much more enjoyable.”
“Don’t say that, you’ll jinx it”
Jinx it we did. That night we discovered Gregory. Gregory was our add-on traveller. A frighteningly lumpy-lump where a lump should not be. With a very risky family history of cancer and one family member currently undergoing chemo, it was the kind of scary lumpy thing that required a prompt visit to a doctor to do their doctory stuff and say comforting things before any more travels through Cuba could be endured. (I mean enjoyed, sorry, enjoyed…)
The next morning the first step was to try to get in touch with the insurance company to find out where best to go to a doctor.
In many countries this would be an easy task. In Cuba, not so much.
First up, visit the bank as we really were out of money now. This time it was several hours before closing, so the bank was still open. There was of course a long queue.
Queueing in Cuba is an interesting experience. You simply arrive at a large throng of people standing outside a door. What is required of you at this point is to call ‘Ultimo?’ to the group. The last person in the waiting throng will raise their hand and possibly call ‘Ultimo’ back. Now you know where you are in the queue, when the next person turns up and asks ‘Ultimo?’ You let them know it is you.
What we haven’t figured out, is what you do when your Spanish is lacking and the person in front of you then leaves the queue, how do you know the ultimo before the ultimo before you were ultimo? But apart from that, this system works well.
This is the queue outside the phone card shop in Havana, since we failed to take one in Viñales. After an hour or so in the queue, we got to the front and were allowed to enter the bank. Well, again it is Cuba, so only one of us is allowed to enter the bank. The other has to wait outside, just in case we are some sort of Bonnie and Clyde duo out to rob the hapless cashier.
It turned out that the bank is not the place to exchange currency, you can only withdraw it from a teller there and even then, only if you have the right kind of bank card.
We found another small building that offered to exchange money down the other end of the main street. So after queuing a bit longer we got in there and got our hands on some more Cuban Pesos.
Next step was to use that money to get a phone card. In order to phone internationally, you have to buy a phone card and use it in one of the public phone booths located around town.
Outside the phone card retailer? Another queue.
‘Ultimo?’
After that queue was navigated, the next step was to find a phone. The phone card lady had told us that there were several on the main street. The other lady had started to tell us about another one a couple of streets back, but the first lady stopped her, possibly believing the directions to be a bit complicated for our meagre grasp of Spanish. Fair call.
The downside about all the phones on the main street was that the fair was in full force. Loud music, screaming children, screeching home-made fairground rides. The chances of hearing anyone on the other end of the line was slim.
Here’s some of the speakers being set up to blast music at the small town fair. Main street—not very quiet.
After a bit of wandering, we found the other phones on the back road. Still pretty noisy, it would have to do.
After attempting to follow the instructions we had been given, we were rescued by a gentleman in a nearby shop who explained there were a few more stages in the phone menu than we’d been told about and that you had to allow for the ‘machines to talk to each other’ in between key presses. Thanks to this incredibly helpful gentleman, we were connected.
Briefly.
The $10 phone card was the biggest they had. It gave us approximately three or four minutes on the phone to our Australian-based insurance provider. Really only two, if you don’t count navigating the phone menus. We got as far as, yes, we should go back to Havana if we wanted to see a doctor and there were two providers there. “I’ll just list them, do you have a pen there…”
That was it. The time was expired.
Not fancying another wait in the phone card queue, we decided to just head back to Havana and figure it out from there.
Possible transport option for a return to Havana?
We went to change our bus tickets.
Nope, we can’t give you all the money back on your Cienfuegos tickets, but we can give you some back towards the price of your Havana tickets. OK, that will have to do. He tapped away on his calculator and demanded some money, we paid the requested sum, he confiscated our old tickets, tore them up and handed us our new ones. We probably should have paid more attention, but we both feeling pretty out of sorts, so we just took his word for it. Until we got outside.
Hold on, we would have paid the same if we had bought new tickets outright, then we could have sold these other ones to other tourists to get some money back.
What a scumbag.
We’d had enough of jerks and DOG-THROWERS, after a bit of general cursing of his name (not that we knew it, so we just called him ‘scammy bus guy’) we went back in to retrieve the money he had procured from us. As soon as we started pointing and explaining in our broken Spanish, he knew he was caught out and sheepishly returned the funds. (Enough for several terrible meals at Tamara’s)
The next morning, after a very bleak breakfast in Tamara’s kitchen as she glared sullenly at us from the next room. Clearly angry at us for not buying any further tours, we were on the bus back to Havana.
Yay! Back to Havana!
Hooray! No wait, we were EXCITED ABOUT LEAVING THERE A FEW DAYS AGO… well, at least they don’t throw dogs there I guess.
The Casa we had stayed at last time didn’t have an available rooms on our return. We found ourselves only a few blocks down the road from where we had stayed originally, in the welcoming home of Mercy and Laura.
These are two of the nicest people we have ever met. Laura didn’t really speak much. But Mercy patiently chatted to us in clear, simple Spanish. They both made us feel completely welcome at there gorgeous home. There was no pressure to organise tours or meals, although we did accept their offer of a delicious home cooked breakfast each morning we were there. There was no better way to start the day, it was accompanied by some industrial strength Cuban coffee, which always helps improve productivity for the day.
Check out that doorway. Love the buildings here in Havana.
Which was good, because we had a job to get done, we were trying to get Gregory to a doctor. We still had to find one of the hospitals that the insurance company suggested. Only we still didn’t know their names, just that there were two options in Havana.
Not wanting to wait for a million years in a queue for a phone card, only to be cut off again, we made our way to an upscale hotel who had internet access in the lobby. On ageing computers with big clacky keyboards and outdated installations of Internet Explorer. We bought a card to access the internet and found the location of the international clinic that would see travellers in Havana (We were told that foreigners aren’t welcome at Cuban hospitals). We also sent an email to the insurance company to see what their other recommendation had been.
We walked down to the international clinic. When we arrived it was very quiet. Too quiet. The entire hospital was shut.
The large, multi-story hospital. Shut on weekends. Better injure yourself Monday.
Not sure what you’d do in an emergency situation?
As we poked hopelessly at the entrance door an apologetic security guard opened the door and told us the hospital was closed for the weekend and we should come back on Monday morning.
In the intervening two days, we investigated changing the date of our flights back to Mexico. We had already used up a lot of our visit with our return to Havana and wouldn’t really have time to see many of the other places we intended to see, we also didn’t fancy waiting out the remaining days before our flights in Havana.
Initially it seemed that we would have to bus out to the airport to enquire, as the information online was vague. It implied we would have to pay for entirely new flights. The people behind the travel desks at the hotels were no help, suggesting a trip to the airport. Then, in a bookshop, we spotted an airline desk there was a lady behind the counter but with a closed sign up. She was surprisingly helpful for someone who wasn’t meant to be working. She told us they would be back in business at 10am Monday.
Well there was nothing for it, we were just going to have to tourist it up in Havana for the weekend.
We spent much of the time on the Malecón enjoying the big waves that had been bought in by the recent bad weather.
We also enjoyed a few nice meals out, because, well, it had been a frustrating few days all up cheering ourselves up with good food was the only proper thing to do.
Finally, Monday rolled around.
We walked down to the hospital bright and early and found the place already thronging with people. When we got to the door, a lady at a desk looked us up and down. “No shorts.” she said. Looking around the waiting room, I could see several locals in shorts.
“No shorts, go back and change. Long pants please.”
Too shocked and confused to respond, or even point out the local ladies in their super short, ‘I’m pretty sure they are swimming togs or undies’ shorts we stumbled back out the door.
We had waited two days for a hospital to open and had now been turned away for inappropriate clothing in a town where mesh shirts and terrifyingly short shorts were frighteningly common on most streets. Seriously, did this hospital turn people away with broken legs for having shorts on? Probably.
It was stupidly hot and we had travelled with carry on only, so we had packed exactly zero trousers. Great. Looks like we would have to go shopping.
We stuck our heads in the first clothing shop we passed, we didn’t go in, because we didn’t want to go through the bag check debacle. But we could see the price on a pair of trousers—$70. That meant they were either really expensive or really cheap. Who knew which currency they were in? Who cared? This was ridiculous.
We’re not buying trousers, we’d swim back to Mexico if we had to. Maybe Florida. We hear that’s closer…
Back in the lobby at the upmarket hotel we used their internet to check our email, we found that the other hospital was a health clinic that specialised in alternative medicine out at one of the resorts, a suitably long taxi ride from where we currently were. Sure, there was no shortage of taxis to take us there, but what clothing restrictions would there be? Would the clinic actually be open? Would the taxi ride cost more than flights back to Mexico?
At that point we made the decision that Cuba was a silly place, we were heading back to Mexico.