[Marxism] Cubans, used to getting by with so little, take Wilma in stride

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

What a lovely article which gives readers a very fine sense of
how Cuban deal with things like this. Readers who spend time in
Cuba outside of hotels, just walking the streets of this city
know that what this writer is telling you is how it is, though
it's never occurred to me to try to trade a warm beer in for a
cold one. I normally don't keep beer in the bottle long enough
for it to get warm! Here in Cuba you see people so widely doing
things like dropping a bag on a long piece of string or rope to
the ground floor from the second or third or fourth floor of a
building, to get food, or water or whatever up to the floor on
which they're standing, that you don't give it much thought as
Cubans simply deal with the frustrations of life. I lucked out
where I live and ONLY had sixteen hours of down time for power
during Hurricane Wilma. Lucky for me my battery on this laptop
kept it powered for close to three hours. The emergency radios
we had were battery powered, but our emergency flashlights did
not work when we needed them. When the lights went out, we just
used candles, or simply did nothing. No one I know complained
because these things simply occur here in a place like Cuba.

Yes, I surely miss my DSL and hot water at the tap, but life
and work go on here in the absence of these things anyway. In
this article you get a fine sense of how Cubans, who complain
often about life's challenges, just go forward with life when
it brings them new difficulties. I'm sure you'll enjoy this.


Walter Lippmann, CubaNews
http://www.walterlippmann.com
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CubaNews

===============================================================

http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/news/world/13031508.htm
KANSAS CITY STAR
Posted on Sat, Oct. 29, 2005

Cubans, used to getting by with so little, take Wilma in stride
BY RUTH MORRIS
South Florida Sun-Sentinel

HAVANA - No es facil, goes the Cuban refrain. It's not easy.

There are blackouts, overloaded buses and empty shelves, and now
after Hurricane Wilma, about 2,000 damaged homes, many flooded up to
their ceilings. Recovery comes slow. With average salaries at $12 a
month, and no insurance, a refrigerator often represents a life's
savings.

"I don't want to be rich," one woman told me as the storm surge
receded, "but to survive a little better."

Cubans have been coping with so little for so long that they have
developed mechanisms for survival that make them seem unconscious of
themselves. If you stop to ask someone for directions, be prepared
for that person to jump into the back of your car.

If your beer gets warm before you open it, you can exchange it for a
cold one when you walk past the next sidewalk cafe. You can buy
cigarettes one at a time, and you can have your disposable lighter
refilled on the corner.

But during Wilma, when the lights blinked out all over Havana, Cuban
ingenuity shone a little more brightly.

Within half an hour of coming into our blacked-out office Monday, our
office assistant had juiced up all the vital electronics - computers
and cellular phones - with a spaghetti pile of extension cords run
from who knew where. When I turned around she was kneeling on the
floor, using the last outlet on the power strip to steam
double-strength coffee.

"Don't worry about it, chica," she winked.

Residents who relied on electricity to pump water to upper-level
apartments dropped buckets over soap-dish balconies, and pulled the
water up by rope. Others crowded around corner stores, collecting
rations of gas for cooking. There was no rush to gas stations, mainly
because there are so few cars. The slap of dominos sounded
throughout.

Power outages are serious business in Cuba. When rolling blackouts
plagued the island this summer, discontent simmered so high it
sparked speculation of social upheaval. But in a country with little
to buy, and less to power, Wilma's passage was taken in stride. The
lights came back to most Havana barrios within a day or two.

Floridians, meanwhile, are looking at a longer wait. And we're not
used to things not working. We also have more stuff to plug in.

Few Cubans have cable television, but standing outside a tourist bar
this week, they might have seen reports on record profits for oil
companies, spliced with images of SUVs and Hummers splashing through
rain puddles in their quest for an open pump.

Or, just a few weeks ago, they might have glimpsed images of Houston
highways at a dead halt, as Texans fled Hurricane Rita. An excess of
big-ticket consumer items had trumped even the most thorough disaster
planning.

These are big problems that bring deep hardship. But sometimes the
solutions are simple.

Deprived of the Internet and "Desperate Housewives," a colleague in
Miami told me she'd been spending the evenings just talking with her
husband - by lantern light.



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