25/04/2019 – Travel day, Cuba to Colombia

We got up and packed our bags before a 0900 breakfast in our casa. At the table were an Italian couple on day 2 of their Cuba trip. We chatted to them over our boiled egg, scrambled eggs, fruit, bread, butter, juice and coffee before returning to our room to finish our bags. Honestly, Josh and I both swear by these packing cubes (Savisto, from Amazon) they make packing quick and finding things so much easier. Our host organised a taxi for 10:00 for us. We dragged our stuff into the front room to wait and there was a man called Paul, sat eating his breakfast. We got chatting, he was a music lecturer from the UK and had been sent last minute to do a pretty niche piece of research on the history of Cuban music. He was working in the music studio next to our casa with some local musicians. It sounded so interesting and we had a good old natter about Cuba before our taxi driver knocked on at 10:20 (that’s 10:00 Cuban time, suits me to a t!). We shoved our bags in the boot and hopped in to the very old soviet car, it was clear our host had called a mate with a car to drive us and not a taxi, read 35°C and no air con! Still, at least we were helping someone out who could do with that money! Taxi driving is a good wager here, our trip to the airport from where we were in old Havana costs about 25CUC (this is pretty much a flat rate I don’t think its negotiable). To put in perspective our host (the GP) in Trinidad had told us Doctors and teachers earn about 30CUC a month. He explained this is the reason he quit his job as a doctor and also the reason why there are no English teachers at the schools anymore, anyone with any amount of spoken English moves to work in tourism as there is so much more money in it, from tips. Our host in Varadero had a similar story, he was previously an English language lecturer at a university but quit to work in one of the big nearby hotels, as he can earn more money from it. It also further complicates things in that childrens aspirations are massively affected. Our host Leo spoke of his 15 year old son who didn’t like studying and when asked to study always said what is the point? He can earn more money from hustling tourists than from getting any qualifications and getting a job through the government. When I enquired about the services for people in care, or homeless people for exampl, Leo explained that there are services and there are nurses but the people providing the care earn so little that they also steal and take from this work, and have to put themselves first before the people they are caring for. His example was a nurse putting sheets on the bed for a patient, if these sheets are nice quality/clean, they will take them home for themselves, and then put the worse sheets with holes etc on the bed for the patient. Things are tough here and it does make you think of the excess and amount of waste we have at home.

We got dropped at the airport and were the first to check in for our flight, so we got given extra leg room (didn’t really affect midget me but maybe Josh enjoyed it!) Then we went through security. There was a man carrying a husky puppy in the queue behind us! We got through with no problem then bought a few postcards and half an hour of wifi in order to organise a transfer to our hostel in Bogota once at the other side. We spent our last few CUC on some awful food (cheese toastie, undercooked fries, water, tukola) in the one and only cafeteria in the airport and before long boarded our flight. We flew with Wingo, which is a budget airline, so there were no frills attached but also no complaints at all! We flew over the West coast of Cuba, the sea was an incredible turquoise colour and was so clear even from all the way up in the airplane. We finished the episode of Sabrina on Netflix, then I fell asleep to a podcast (honestly noise cancelling headphones are a dream!) whilst Josh continued with his book. I pretty much woke up on landing so it was a decent nap! We got off the plane into a brand new airport in Bogota (I think the airport is only 3 years old) excited about the free wifi so logged in straight away, and so refreshing that there was toilet paper and soap in the bathrooms and it was clean AND you didn’t have to pay someone to use them! We both found it refreshing to feel comfortable and clean. We got through passport control (this was actually quite a relief as we don’t have a ticket out of Colombia yet which is technicially illegal) picked up our luggage, and got some money out of the ATM (yas monzo!). We went through customs and got picked up by our driver Ricardo that our hostel had arranged for us, I was very excited he was holding up a bit of paper with our names on as we came through customs! I have always wanted to feel that fancy! We drove into Bogota. The contrast to Cuba was huge and we were wide eyed in awe of this massively diverse and developed city, with a backdrop of beautiful mountains. The cycle paths look absolutely incredible, completely separate to the road and a bit like Holland, so safe! The city buildings were built up and there were young hipsters and, wow supermarkets!shops!snacks!restaurants! We got dropped to the hostel (Sayta Hostal) and shown around the building and to our room. It is a beautiful little building with tons of character. Simple yet effective. Stone floors, high ceilings, huge wooden doors, a lounge area, a kitchen we are allowed to use with free coffee (omg absolutely delicious!) and windows with beautiful shutters. We nipped out to a local restaurant for an early dinner (chicken burgers, onion rings, croquettes) then passed a local shop on the way home and even though our bellies were full we were so excited at the prospect of being able to buy snacks that we stocked up and went back to the hostel. We went into our room and endulged in snacks and wifi. Downloading books on audible (Thanks Henna for the login!) I have Michelle Obamas audiobook to look forward to now! And getting stocked up on podcasts and tv, browsing social media, a little glimpse of normality! Don’t get me wrong it was so refreshing to not have all those things available on tap whilst we were in Cuba. It was a good challenge to not have phones, wifi, tv readily available and there are plenty of positives that come with this, such as early nights, less time wasted scrolling aimlessly through social media, Josh actually picked up a book as did I. At the same time it was so enjoyable to have all this available to us again when we arrived in Bogota, like Christmas come early! Hopefully we can find a happy balance now.

When our eyes became too heavy we got ourselves into bed, it was an earplugs night for me, you can tell we are in the hustle and bustle of a city.