IDENTIDADES 1 ENGLISH IDENTIDADES 5 ENGLISH | Page 84

I can see Jorge is upset. We go through
the produce market. He is astonished by
the poor variety of fruit available: there
is only papaya. He is distressed by all
the flies that plague us when we get to
where the pork was. It was being sold
outdoors, in the heat. Out loud, he asks
how they can sell meat without refrigeration. This seems to bother an older
man who is waiting to make a purchase.
Annoyed, he says something defensive:
“it’s what we have.”

ty. All in one day, they start living in
one that is at the other extreme, developed, agile and abundant. This impact
shakes deeply the most recent visitor.
It is quite significant that the average
Cuban has the poorest purchasing power of anyone in the Americas, and the
situation is permanent and has persisted
for decades. This translates into unstable shortages and the absence of the
most basic elements for a Western
country.

I hastily take Jorge out of there, to avoid
a confrontation. Finally, we arrive at the
ice cream shop, and even though they
charge in CUCs, there is a line, of
course. We are told they have just made
chocolate ice cream available. Not too
many people are waiting, but Jorge
can’t take standing in line in the sun. He
remarks he is no longer used to it.

How many Cubans know how to drive a
vehicle? How many have bought or sold
properties? How many have had or expanded businesses? What is the rate of
per capita energy consumption? These
unknowns and numbers continue being
an inscrutable mystery. These and many
other standard of living measures are
basically unknown for the overwhelming majority; they are stuck living with
impoverished subsidies. They are controlled and exhausted by the impossibility of exercising a minimum right to
property or freedom. This is a case of
legally imposed poverty, for life, a situation that is unique in this hemisphere.

There is an abundant of filth and noise
from a nearby bakery where they’ve just
begun to sell bread, which creates a
crowd at the counter. I know why: they
will run out of bread too quickly. The
shouting, the impossibility of being able
to instantly enjoy an ice cream, the intense sun, with its unstoppable strength,
make Jorge abandon his memory. He no
longer asks any more questions. We
return, in silence, drinking a semi-cold
Bucanero beer. It was the only brand
the small café had, for convertible currency, of course.
Betrayals of memory

As a result, the average Cuban has developed a very narrow profile as a consumer of anything. His choices are very
limited, but he buys whatever is available. His mentality and habits are those
of a primitive hunter-gatherer. He lives
one day at a time. He has no time or
knowledge about how to think about the
future. There is a whole generation that
has been brought up this way, and it is
aging.

What happened to this visitor seems to
be a much more common phenomenon
than Cuban émigrés might imagine. It
clearly has a lot to do with their reactions to the changed environment. They
leave a poor and socially stagnant socie-

Does a radical and immediate change of
place like immigrating to the United

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