Trinidad and the casa culture
Trip Start
Mar 25, 2007
1
73
Trip End
Aug 31, 2007
Trinidad, Cuba
Saturday, August 18, 2007
In Cuba, although illegal, you can take a cab almost anywhere and it's not much more expensive than a coach. We almost shared a cab to Trinidad with another female traveller, in the end though we bought tickets for the bus. The journey took 5 hrs and fortunately the bus was air conditioned. When we pulled into the bus station in Trinidad, we saw crowds of people standing at the exit, they were waving at us, trying to get our attention and holdings pictures of rooms in their homes. They were all 'casa pushers'
Due to the lack of hotels, there is a total of 3 in Trinidad, most people rent rooms in their homes (casas)to tourists. The government backs this scheme and homes that participate in this are called 'casa particulares' The homeowners have to pay a fixed comission to the government for each room they rent (only a maximum of 2 rooms can be rented) and being a Communist country, all profits made are capped. Because of this, it is important to always have your rooms rented, hence the desperation at the bus station of people trying to entice tourists to stay at their homes.
A young girl caught our attention and started showing us pictures of a nice double room. Tired and hot, we followed her to 'Casa Martha's' Martha, the woman of the house showed us our room. It was clean and comfortable so we took it.
Most casa owners also offer you meals as well and due to the distinct lack of restaurants, this is always a good option. Beef, lobster & prawns are banned in Cuba as they are seen as Caplitalist luxury foods. Unsuprisingly, there is a thriving black market. Martha asked us what we would like to eat for dinner. We asked for prawms, a dinner time was agreed and we went out for walk.
Although our casa was clean and comfortable, it was basic and we knew that the not-so-nice casa's tended to be near the bus station as these were close and convenient but that if we walked around, we would find some nicer ones. We did find one 'Casa Fernando' For the same price as Casa Martha's, the room was much bigger and modern plus we also had our own private eating area and a rooftop terrace. Fernando's young wife Mayan showed us around. She spoke English and was very welcoming and friendly. We reserved the room for the following 4 nights. Then back we went to Martha's.
Martha was not happy at all to learn that we would be leaving the following morning. We could not say we had found another casa so we lied and said we were moving to Playa Ancon, the nearby beach resort. I don't think Martha really believed us though and she kept quizzing us. The dinner was nice, black bean soup, fresh prawns rice & vegetables.
