Out in the fields and into the kitchen

Last week saw the rotation continue. I was lucky enough to coincide with a 3 day course given by the organopónico trying to teach 20 Mexican agriculturalists the merits of going organic (many left convinced of both the need and the possibilities, if unconvinced Mexico that was ready for it) and I also spent some time with ornamental plants team, discovering amongst other things the joys of the ins and outs of the plants-as-a-luxury part of the business. Hopefully I’ll be able to explain some more about both in time, but right now though to the two most memorable days.

Firstly, to the men’s work - at least it is men’s work here: working in the fields. On Friday morning we spent 4 hours pulling up peanuts in 30-35 degree heat. It was hard work but I loved it. That might have been in part because of the company: I was joined by 2 Mexican lads who were here for the course and had stayed on in Cuba and fancied getting their hands dirty. This livened things up but it was also very satisfying work: peanuts grow from the root of the plant and can be pulled up quite easily out of the damp red earth before being laid out in the sun to dry out. After a few days drying out they’ll be sent to the agro-production area for roasting and shelling. It being an organic plantation we also found all sorts of wildlife, including thousands of woodlice skulking amidst the humidity and darkness of the peanut roots. Being stung continuously by ants wasn’t so pleasant (there are small red ants here that secrete a painful solution when they walk you’re your skin which hurts for about 20 mins before going away), but if I was in any pain I wasn’t going to let on – I felt like I needed to prove that girls can do some hunting and gathering too.

Up till now it’s been no use explaining that despite being no super woman I have spent a fair amount of my (short) working life doing physical work – mostly shovelling shit on various different farms in the UK and abroad. “In Cuba it’s different though”, they say: “we look after our women”. By this they don’t really mean we don’t in the UK – indeed many people have no way of knowing the actual state of sexual equality or inequality in many other countries - instead, I think it has more to do with the immense heat and the nature of manual labour here. With very little heavy machinery or mechanical aid of any sort it really is a case of elbow grease and sweat, and many women either cannot or do not want to do it. Up to this point I’d been limited to the female tasks or to watching the men work, and had been reprimanded three times for carrying too heavy a load, because  “even if it I can manage now my arms will ache in the morning”.

Despite being fairly stubborn and taking enjoyment out of such physical work, I have to conclude that this attitude toward the division of labour isn’t a wholly bad thing. I have no first had experience of the situation in other ‘developing’ countries but we know that women are often relied upon greatly to do a vast range of manual chores that cannot be belittled. In Africa for example between 70 and 90 per cent of the work of transporting crops is done by women and children, who also do almost all of the carrying of water and firewood. Cuban women, by developing world standards, are highly liberated; they have access to the training and education they desire as well as the access to a wealth of jobs; such that now Cuban women make up 66% of the workforce. But as well as not making it to the fields they don’t reach hard politics either. Meanwhile they remain completely indispensible in the home, where life is reminiscent of the experience of many women worldwide juggling a career and a family.

This glimpse of the hard hard work (preparing the land, working the oxen, planting out, weeding, harvesting etc) was very brief, for the next day I was out of the sun and into the kitchen: where breakfast, lunch and visitor’s meals all come together. Fortunately I’d picked a good day to join the team: 2 groups of North Americans were arriving for a tour, making 65 in total. Add those to the 100 odd workers that need to be fed as well and you’ve got a mini operation. Again, just like wanting to work out the fields the team thought I was pretty crazy, but I was delighted to be able to help.

I’ve seen a few tours come and go here – in any one week there can be anywhere between 3 and 7 visits, many from North American’s coming to Cuba on an organised visit, some also coming as a bunch from further afield, and some individuals who’ve contacted Salcines independently. They have one thing in common though – they all say the meal they eat at the organopónico is the best they’ve had during their stay in the country. This has a large amount to do with the ingredients which, bar the rice and meat, are pretty much 100% organic and have travelled at most over 6 hectares to the kitchen. For $10CUC, most enjoy a buffet of the following:

Pork steaks / fish fillets (shallow fried in soya oil, which is how most meat comes)

Green bean salad (cooked  French beans are eaten a lot here)

Beetroot (by itself)

Avocado (we’re just coming into the season, hence it being on the menu. Eating here continues to be almost 100% seasonal)

Tomato, cucumber and lettuce salad (all from the organopónico)

Black beans (either served by themselves or with rice to make the traditional dish Congri)

Cassava (cooked until tender and then finished off with a tasty garlicky sauce)

Fried plantain (self-explanatory)

Vegetable soup (with squash, sweet potato, carrots, onions etc, and despite often being prepared for vegetarian groups, it is always made with a meat stock. Needless to say vegetarianism in Cuba isn’t yet much understood or possible to accomplish!)

Yellow, white or black and white rice (the yellow variety is cooked with vegetables and I suspect a lot of meat stock and fat, the white plain and the black and white is the congri)

A variety of fruit to be eaten with the savoury main meal, including mango, papaya, guava, pineapple

Mango juice (freshly pressed mango, sometimes with extra sugar for good measure)

It really is a feast, and I’m still not quite sure how they pull it off – both with the difficulty in finding those things they can’t grow here and the simplicity of the kitchen. For example, although the organopónico does rear cattle it can only do so from their manure since they’re on loan from the government who takes them back after a certain number of months to slaughter. (Incidentally, not only is it illegal to slaughter cattle but it carries a sentence 6 times lengthier than that of killing a fellow human being. Crazy.)

Indispensible to the operation though are the people. There is one male chef who deals with the ginormous pots of soup and beans, and behind him a team of not two but five fat and cheery (but somewhat formidable) ladies who charge themselves with the meat cooking, preparation and waiter service. The washing up duty is shared evenly and the female workers wash up on a rota the lunch plates.

Despite the challenge the feeding of the 66 everything was accomplished surprisingly smoothly. I played a small part as lettuce washer, potato peeler and mango chopper, as well as having some fun as bilingual waiter and washer-upper. Having experienced the kitchen on one of its busiest days I’d have to conclude it was just as hard work as working in the fields, except you get far more compensated for your work – in my case with lots of mango off-cuts! This may explain the correlation of skinny male farm workers and rather plump female cooks. I had fun but given the chance I’d be outside and back into the field like a shot!

Trust me, I’m a priest

Nope, trust me; I’ve had it all before. A priest wanting to show me churches that didn’t exist, a baker insisting to show me around La Havana, and a Mexican coming out of nowhere to take a close up of my eyes. If only I could get hold of some brown ones whilst I’m here – that way I just be able to experience walking down the street without every second man, woman and child stopping in interest or to mutter something under their breath. Never is it particularly threatening, and I appreciate in many ways I’ve asked for it – I’m white, western and have blue eyes for starters, and secondly I’m staying in the least
touristy suburb of Havana - the only way you’d run into a foreigner here is if their tour bus got lost en route to a beach on the East coast. But it can be tiresome and uncomfortable regardless, and hiding behind a pair of sunglasses or looking like a drowned rat in a waterproof forms very little in the way of camouflage.

Having said that, however, if for me it’s tiresome it’s still nothing to what Cuban’s have to go through each day to appease myself and the other Canadians, English and Europeans in their country. The state of tourist apartheid penetrates every aspect of daily Cuban lives and fills me with a mixture of embarrassment and shame whenever I come up against it. It’s time to talk about the bad stuff.

Most uncomfortable is the way a Cuban will be treated when walking around with a tourist. Take the baker wanting to show me around Havana. I can’t say I was super keen to oblige at first – I’d escaped Alamar for the afternoon and was looking forward to mooching around town, possibly checking out a few galleries and having a coffee or mojito in the afternoon sun. I should have realised I was stuck when he squeezed me onto the overcrowded bus and stopped me from getting squished every time the door opened. When I got off the bus we started to chat a little and I discovered he’d lived in this part of town for 10 years before – a bit of local insight seemed like a small price to pay for some lost peace and quiet.

And it was insightful – we wandered the streets, him pointing out things every so often, stopped briefly for an espresso which I was treated to (Cuban’s drink strong incredibly sweet espressos on the go) and then again for a beer which was 24 times more expensive (at $1USD) and I paid for. But, during the 2.5 hours we spent together we were stopped no less than three times by the police wanting to know what he was doing with a foreigner. To them Deni (24, dark and handsome) was either my boyfriend, prostitute or uninvited and unwelcome tag along. Each time they asked to see his ID card and on the third attempt they
detained us for a half hour whilst they recorded his card number and began the Spanish inquisition. In the end they reluctantly let him go with a simple warning; should happen to me (they’d also asked for my passport details), it would be his fault.

When I questioned him about this technique of policing the streets he simply denounced, “This country is a shit”. What happened to us is common and whilst it might be helpful in instances when tourists are being scammed by locals or have unwelcome foreigners, this lack of respect for a Cuban’s rights seems unpardonable. And a similar thing happens when I walk around with Isis in town. The other day she was about to buy an apple when the grocer looked through her and asked me what I wanted. I was standing well behind Isis and had not made a peep. “It’s the same in the hotels, in restaurants and pretty much anywhere”, she exclaimed, “It doesn’t matter if we are spending the same amount or not…it’s the same.”

If you grew up in the 60s to 90s, you feel it hardest, but many Cuban’s don’t know it any other way. In 1959 Castro spoke to the American Society of Travel Agents of the “sea, bays, beautiful beaches, mountains, fish, game and sun” the country had, but Cuba went
almost thirty years without tourism. Today numbers are recovering – some 2.43 million arrived in 2009 and contributed $2.4bn to the economy the year before – but the figures have since fallen and they remain a long way off Castro’s target of five million visitors by
2010.

What adds insult to injury is that the majority of maltreated nationals will not be able to experience it any differently, because they simply won’t be able to travel. A Spanish programme ‘Caballeros Viajeros’ is very popular here – it televises Spaniards travels to
major towns and countries around the world from every large to every small detail. Many people here are fascinated by it, but not Isis. “It depresses me, seeing all these places that I’m unable to visit”. Perhaps because she has been one of the lucky ones to experienced life in another country she finds it more painful than those who are (not quite) blissfully ignorant. There is a chance she might be able to go to the Slow Food reunion in Italy again next year, but when I asked if we might be able to work out a way for her to visit me in London, she simply raised her eyebrow and sighed. “This county would have to
change for me to be able to visit you in the UK. For starters they’d have to pay me a real salary for what I do.” Her lack of rights and possibilities mock her again.

Some people talk of change on the horizon. It is possible that both the USA and Cuba will relax travel restrictions, but who knows when or if that will happen. And until it does the country cannot (afford to) start to get its infrastructure up and running to cope with any influx – in high season its 47 000 hotel rooms don’t meet demand and many tourists continue to be put off by the poor food, outrageous prices and lousy service.

If Alamar is a microcosm of the less touristy areas in the country it will be interesting to see what happens when Helen arrives and we set off to explore. I already anticipate that any comfort her arrival will bring in numerical reinforcement will be lost by her blond hair and pair of bright blue eyes!

It might be world renowned but I’m still not sure I’d want to get ill….

In a diversion from today’s planned ramble I wanted to take a quick detour to talk about one of (two of) Cuba’s famous victories of the Cuban revolution: the health service. 

I feel somewhat inspired to do so after spending the afternoon in hospital. Just to confirm it wasn’t me that was being seen and neither thankfully/hopefully are either of the concerns serious ones. However, since I got to spend 4 hours waiting in a paediatric hospital and another couple in a gynaecological one, I feel moderately qualified to write on this experience, with the help of some information taken from some books I have here.

Just as famous as its reputation for bad food, good cigars and energetic ballet is Cuba’s magnificent record for healthcare. Once upon a time Castro had a dream that the country would become “the greatest medical power in the world”. He might not have been able to make the economy work but he sure did get somewhere with healthcare. Today Cuba’s welfare state is the envy of many countries in the developed world, let along the so called third one.

The state spends about 12% of its budget on healthcare – serving the people directly and training up doctor’s enmass: 70,000 to date in 20 medical schools worldwide (The whole of the African content has only 50,000). That’s about one doctor for every 170 residents. Plenty to keep on top of health in Cuba - immunization is currently 100%, every community has a family doctor and every town a hospital, and the life expectancy is 78.3 years – just behind only Chile, Costa Rica and Puerto Rica in Latin America and ahead of (you guessed it), the USA. The country also boasts state of the art technology, world leading research centres and is particularly famous for its treatment of patients with Parkinson’s disease and those needing eye operations.

But there is also enough to give them wings and send them to health-poor countries in the global south. Cuba’s willingness to share such progress puts many developed countries to shame; it currently has on-going medical programmes with 58 developed countries in the global south. 

This I knew before my visits and it had built my expectations up high. However under resourced the schools, shops and small businesses were I was sure that the hospitals would be the exception. Nope. I was quite shocked. 

Firstly, they were both hastily constructed and poorly maintained buildings run without air conditioning or functioning lifts – at least the lifts didn’t work when we were there. Isis friend who we visited is heavily pregnant but needs to be in hospital for the remaining 6 weeks because of possible complications. She shares a room with one other lady, two stationary fans, one bed side table and an army style mattress and pillow. There is one tele in the corridor, though it’s hard to tell exactly how this is used. Some people had brought in laptops but only since 2008 have people been able to own them so they’re not yet within everyone’s reach.  She was not complaining at all though. Indeed her only distress was that her 8 year old son was only able to visit on Sundays and even then he couldn’t come up to the 4^th floor to see her; she needed to be taken down on the mechanical chair because she isn’t allowed to be moving around. The one problem: the chair is out of order.

The situation in the paediatric hospital was similarly eye opening. Isis was meant to be seeing a consultant about some tests they did on Miguel Eduardo (her 5 year old). The consulting hours were 1 till 3, more or less. We arrived at 2 and the doctor had gone into surgery. There was no way of telling how long he would be but because he only sees people on a Tuesday, and there doesn’t seem to be an alternative phone/email/internet service to get hold of him, there was nothing to do but wait. Fortunately we both had some reading to do, but I was rather distracted by the kids being wheeled out of surgery on what looked like converted shopping trolleys without any electrical equipment hooked up to them and minimal bandaging. This was no ER. After 4 hours I went to look for some food in the ‘cafeteria’ – but it was empty and there was none. When our consultant (a tall, skinny man with a funny sense of humour – dad?) came out of surgery he saw us straight away.

Some of this concurs with the more painful side of healthcare here and outside Havana many reports are far worse. As in many other areas, resources are being shifted so that foreigners can be prioritised above national citizens in their own country. This is being reported particularly in surgical and advanced medicine fields. It’s also tough luck if you’re a Cuban needing pharmaceuticals. The country makes them but, de-ja-vous, they’re exported to earn some cash, and Castro refuses to permit imports for his people. I’m talking everything from Omega 3 capsules to life saving cancer drugs. Castro even rejected a large package of medical assistance from the USA in 1999 that was desperately needed.

Partly because of the unreliable nature of pharmeceuticals, partly because of a strong culture of inter-generational knowledge transfer, Cuban people are very into their medicinal plants. There is a section of the Organopónico dedicated to selling shoots, fruits, leaves and roots to numerous customers that arrive each day. When Ramón (an elderly gentlemen who plies me with fresh coconut water at every opportunity) was kind enough to show me some of what the allotment had to offer, I found the quantity, quality and promise of these plants fascinating. Some are specific to the Caribbean, some we know and use also (Aloe Vera and Mint are I’m ashamed to say the only two I recognised), and those I’d never seen I’m hoping to discover some more about - another culture that sprung up out of necessity has planted some very intriguing roots. 

Though glad to have been able to see the doctor this time Isis left the consultation weary and troubled. Her son needs an operation which, though small, requires a general anaesthetic – which obviously always carries an element of risk. Neither can she be sure when they’ll be able to operate. Next week marks the beginning of the summer holidays and getting anything done in the next two months is apparently 99% impossible. Though most people cannot and do not take themselves off to a beach resort somewhere it’s very difficult to pin people down, and with her studies at the university, job and family to think about, it’s another trial she needs to grin and bear.

From Propogation to Products

For the last week or so I’ve been alternating between two key areas of the organopónico: the propagation house and the agro-industrial business. It’s the journey from seed to supper really, only I’ve cut out a few steps in the middle (hopefully to be filled in later if/when I’m flight my way into the fields - the realm of what is strictly considered men’s work!)

I started the week where it all begins; sowing seeds. This might not be agri-business of the scale we’re used to but it sure is a business operation - when it comes to lettuce and spinach, it seems we couldn’t have sewed enough. In the summer when vegetables are difficult to grow, these still survive well and are subsequently in hot demand, but we were also working with peppers, mint and brassicas. Almost without exception the seeds are sewed directly into large polystyrene trays filled with a mixture of 45% vermicompost, 25% compost, 25% risk husk and 5% or less of home cultivated microrizas. This mixture thus comes with a high quantity of minerals, nutrients and microorganisms already in the soil and the fungal element increases the potential of the seedlings to further extract minerals and water. And boy do the seeds grow. 

Once we’d finished sewing one variety (anything from 5000-10000 seedlings within the team of 4 to 5) the trays are passed through a mesh grate into the large propagation house and lined up on the long tables within. There each tray is marked with their name and the date and either given a protective lid – another tray with small holes – to prevent the seeds from being washed away, or are left as sewn. And there they remain quietly growing away until they’re called up to be planted in the fields or sold to customers, at which point they’ll come out of there again – through the grate- where the same team will loosen the seedlings (pushing a pencil style stick through a hole in the bottom of each pod in the tray) to make it easier for the planting team to extract them in the fields.

The beauty of the propagation house is that between sewing and extracting, the process is fairly low maintenance. They do spray the seedlings with biological pesticides but by and large the space provides protection and the perfect germination area for the plants. Thus the largest human expense in germination is watering; to keep thousands of seedlings from drying out requires three to four watering’s a day – all by hand. Whilst the majority of the raised beds outside are connected to an irrigation network the seeds in the house are still watered by hand to allow for a variation in watering patterns. 

Just as I’d got the hang of this routine, as well as made some friends and caught up on what was going on in the sensational radio novellas (low quality Archers, I guess) I was swapping departments and radio stations! I was off up the hill to the back of the allotment to the part I was most excited about – the creation of products from excess produce on site.

In what is called the ‘pequenoagroindustria’ a team of 4 women and 2 men create a range of goods to sell, including: pickled cucumber, beetroots and carrots, garlic paste, passata and small packets of dried herbs such as turmeric, mint and basil. Unfortunately, despite these possibilities I didn’t have the best luck when I visited this team – my days there seemed to coincide with a mass restocking of dried herbs – which meant filling and sealing thousands of small bags of turmeric. This couldn’t really be helped but was a shame I didn’t see the team in full operation. But then again, since this what the team does on a regular basis, I did get the genuine experience and was at least able to see the turmeric production line from root - which gets cut and left to dry in the sun - to powder as it gets ground up in a  machine.

Indeed all was not lost: I made an ace friend in Koral (will share some info on her shortly) and was fortunate in the last few hours of my last day to be part of what seemed like an impromptu operation to pickle a small quantity of cucumbers and French beans. Given this was a enough to make 15 units it was not unlike the kind of conserving that could take place at one’s home, though perhaps not quite as fun as I’d imagine a pickling session to be – blame it on the midday heat, a stressed boss and being one man down!

The produce from each department (seedlings / bags, jars and bottles) are either used on site or sold to the public. The quantities are small but they are an important perennial revenue stream for the Organopónico. One problem with the summer, bar the intense heat obviously, is that income from such ventures generally drops. There is less produce to pickle or conserve in some way and less people are keen or able to grow vegetables from the seedlings created here. To the propagation team this is a blow indeed, since a percentage of their wage which they rely dearly upon to supplement their income (whose baseline sits around $17USD a month) doesn’t materialise. Work continues though, people remain mostly cheery and you get the impression they’re still happy to be a part of this fascinating cooperative.

Anywhere else would have put up the white flag by now...

The more I delve into and discover about Cuba, the further I realise I still have to go to understand. I’m making some gains (that I’m enjoying sharing) but I’m not pretending to be making revelatory progress. It’s particularly hard because there just doesn’t seem to be a precedent, a similarity or a point of reference between Cuba and the rest of the world:

Where else do you find this political situation, which, though pronounced to be an ‘independent socialist republic’, is really neither socialist, nor communist nor capitalist. Where else do you face this level of need, with 80% of the population living in poverty, alongside this wealth of educational opportunities? How can the population be 99.8% literate but without the opportunities to a free and unadulterated education? How can the streets be unlit and unmaintained but mostly safe?  How can people be working as doctors, nurses and teachers without the right to strike or voice any discontent? How can it be legal to drive an un-serviced falling apart Chevrolet but illegal to eat potatoes, beef and lobster? How can the only coffee you find be made by Nestle and more than $2USD in a country that produces excellent coffee and the monthly salary accounts to what most of us earn in a couple of hours? And how can a country tolerate such hardship with so little complaint and ill humour? Why in short have they not put up the white flag yet and surrendered like the rest to the West?

To answer all these questions you need a lot more time, knowledge and understanding than I can offer here. If you’re looking for an easy way out however you could blame the embargo. It’s not going to give you all the answers but it is a beginning, and perhaps more of a clue to the situation than first meets the eye…….

Since the 1960s Washington has clamped a strict, though contradictory, trade embargo on Cuba with the aim of creating such economic distress that Fidel would relent and magically welcome western style democracy to the county. “The fundamental goal of US policy toward Cuba”, writes the government as it enshrines the embargo in US law in 1962, “is to promote a peaceful transition to a stable, democratic form of government and respect for human rights. Our policy has two fundamental components: to maintain pressure on the Cuban government for change… and working to aid the development of civil society in the country.”

It might have sounded like a cleaver plan (to some) at the time but it must be clear 50 odd years later that it’s not working so well. In fact you could go as far to say that it has completely backfired. The government today is no closer to ‘democracy’ (Castro denounced Western democracy as “complete garbage”) than The DRC and Cuban society remains far from free. In fact, the bloqueo (as Castro calls it is demounced by many Americans and Cuban’s alike as a complete farce. Why?

a)     It’s far from a full embargo. Whilst Cuba cannot sell anything to the USA, Uncle Sam can still flood Cuba with its goods, last year to the sum of US$700 million.

b)     It’s played right into Fidel’s hands. First year students learning about the creation of nations know that the greatest unifying force for a nationalistic society is normally the presence of a powerful external force against which to rally. America has painted itself as the evil imperialist leaving Castro to pick up the mantel of idol and knight in shining armour. The embargo provides the perfect answer as much for the country’s economic woes as a rationale for the suppression of human rights of its citizens as they support a city under siege.

The effects of the bloqueo have been much debated, especially as it’s particularly hard to separate the effects of the embargo from any failings of Castro’s government. Facts and figures would go so far (Cuba’s annual GDP is US$110bn but it is currently facing a $19bn trade foreign debt) but if you want to get an idea of the impact you need to go down to the everyday – and this is where Koral is a source of illustration and inspiration.

Koral is a friend from the Organopónico whose conversation and good humour turned around three otherwise monotonous days in the agroindustrial area. A mother of one she lives with her husband, son and mother in a (very) small flat uptown in Alamar. She earns $350 a month (Moneda nacionale) - about $15 US. When I arrived at her house for dinner on Saturday with 6 beers I realised I’d spent one third of her salary on a few empty calories. And whilst you can’t make a direct comparison, not least because Cuban’s don’t pay rent or taxes on the whole, my heart dropped when she asked me about my wages.

Even accounting for the difference in cost of most products and services here for Cuban people, many things are beyond her reach and that of the majority.  She can’t buy toilet roll, soap or coffee and regularly has to choose between having a proper meal and buying new clothes for her son. She is currently studying at the university but these qualifications will neither guarantee her a more skilled job nor a better paid one. She’s unlikely to be able to travel around the island and even less so to be able to leave it. In short she lacks both the rights and possibilities that I have, and for no fair or justifiable reason.

Rights and possibilities are the most important and most commonly confused words in the Cuban language. When citizens talk about the opportunities to read a free press, to strike against poor pay and unfair treatment, to travel and to learn freely, they’re talking about rights. Cuba may be a signatory of the UN covenants on human rights but it’s just for show; in 2009 Amnesty International named it as the worst offender in Latin America. Whether you’re talking about access to facebook or rights to a fair judicial hearing, there is a painful absence of them in this country, linked both to the political system and the foreign embargo. And even if Raul were to suddenly legalise everything from travel to internet access, the situation would still not be resolved as many Cuban’s like to think. Why? Because rights and possibilities are not the same thing.

The continuance of the dual currency is perhaps the single most important reason for the lack of possibility here. “Whilst both exist”, she says, “things will never change.” Whilst neither currency is recognised beyond the country’s watery border, the Cuban convertible peso trumps the national one hands down. The simplest way to describe it would be one for tourists and one for nationals; one prized and one shunned. Only like most things it’s not so simple. As tourists the government does indeed want you to trade in CUC, but it’s not impossible to get hold of national pesos and they come in pretty handy to buy mangos, hop on and off the busses and go to the cinema. But whilst for tourists having moneda nacionale is novel – it saves you money and allows you to get a bit closer to Cuban life at minimal cost - for Cuban’s having access to CUC is a hundred times more important; it’s a question of living well.

Tobacco, clothes, alcohol, condiments, toiletries, cupboard essentials (and I could go on) are only accessible in CUC. Even then they’re hardly accessible in though, since many are hugely expensive because of the embargo and thus considered luxury items. A further complication is that Cuban’s are paid in moneda nacionale and whilst the government permits changing money to CUC it offers the service at an unfavourable rate. This dual system excludes almost all nationals from participating in everything from a night on the town in Havana to enjoying ketchup with their omelette. And of course it also means you’re about as likely to be able to afford a flight out of here as the government is likely to permit you the visa to travel. Both rights and possibilities are far away.

However frustrated you expect Cuban’s to be as a result of this situation and many other seeming absurdities, they face each battle with admirable resolve.  People are more likely to blame the embargo than they are to blame Castro, of whom it’s difficult to gauge how people really feel. Koral did open up slightly when I asked her: “Castro is a god, an idol. Do you understand? But he is crazy.” People can see that now, but there is nothing that they can do, and there is little hope for improvement. “Things are not going to improve under Raul either.”

So “it’s not easy”. That is a phrase I hear a lot. “You cannot mix politics and economics”, her husband said, “it just doesn’t work”. This concoction has created a situation where Cuban’s cannot live off their salaries and are forced to turn to break the law to survive – either turning to the black market or robbing directly from the state in the tourist and transport industries for example. As goes the joke here, if the punishment for robbing in Cuba was cutting off your hand, everyone would be wandering around single handed.

Again a joke to turn the situation around. Not for nothing was Cuba ranked seventh on the New Economics Foundation Happy Planet Index. A country with no access to the internet, next to no adverts (except for political propaganda), no pornography, slim opportunities for people to travel, lack of the kind of ‘choice’ as have come to know and expect, ‘disposable income’ as a concept has not really been invented, consumerism is not the be all and end all and notably they’re not dripping in the black stuff. But Cuban people are, by and large, pretty happy. Very happy when you compare the 7^th to the 114^th of the USA, and the 115^th of Nigeria. Spot the countries with the oil….

¨If you want to lose weight, go to Cuba¨

As writes a guide book written on Cuba in 1993 – perhaps the ‘most special’ of the years of the ‘special period’ - when hunger was prolific, BMI dropped 1.5 units, obesity fell from 14 to 7%, diabetes deaths fell by 51%, heart disease by 35%, stoke by 20% and waiting in a queue was all you could do to (attempt to) secure a meal. The year before the embargo had been intensified and almost overnight 750 million dollar’s worth of food and medical supplies to Cuba were halted.  The result? As well as having to walk and bike more they also had to eat less. More specifically: more vegetables and less fat. Vegetables ceased to become weeds as necessity forced people to broaden their horizons. By 1994 the average Cuban had lost 20 pounds.

Back to 2011 though and I’d say a modest majority – perhaps 75% of the woman and 50% of the men (completely unverified percentages of course) - are plump bordering on being safe to call overweight. Yet in a country where food is still rationed, staples continue to be difficult to find, salaries don’t go too far and tropical fruits and vegetables are produced in abundance – how exactly is this happening?

As always the answer isn’t simple. At first it’s easy to blame it on sugar but food is such a loaded socio-politico-environmental issue that often you can’t isolate one from the other. Perhaps sugar is to blame but why do people load up on sugar? Because they don’t necessarily have a choice. Some observations that could be to blame are:  

1.     History. Years of severe rationing and insecure food access induced the ‘eat it whilst you can’ mentality – a bit like living in a family of four and not wanting to miss out, though obviously a million times worse. The shock of the special period could explain the speed and functionality of meals: the average lunch at the organopónico is eaten in 3 and a half minutes (personal observation again) and dinner at home is served as and when, and if two people happen to sit together at the same time, bonus.

2.     A sweet tooth. Cuba is traditionally a sugar producing country (exporting at its peak in the 1980s over 7.5million tonnes), and even though it doesn’t produce sugar for export any more, this is another tradition they’ve acquired a taste for. Spoonful’s (at least three) go into a small espresso as standard, to otherwise fairly sweet fresh fruit juices a few more, and the same to milkshakes. Then for snacks, stick of rock are offered by wandering sellers on every corner, and sweet sickly ice creams, caramelos and fluffy sponge cake when available are the perfect treat. If you’re ploughing all day then these snacks come in handy. If you’re sitting down sowing seeds you’re probably ingesting a fair few more empty calories than you can use up.

3.     The notorious white carb. Only it’s not so notorious here. Carb phobes don’t exist in the way they do in the West – mostly I guess because there is no possibility of the opposite; a low carb diet. Diets such as the Atkins or Dukan diet that rely on an abundant supply of protein would sound absurd here, and would of course be impossible on even a high salary. Indeed it seems ridiculous to consider such self-indulgent diets here where the only colour that bread, pasta and rice comes in is white. And it’s not of a high quality: Che famously asked why the country can’t make good bread. Whether people like it though seems to be neither here nor there; it’s make do or go fend.

4.     The obligatory oil pan. Again, this practise will have arisen out of necessity; ovens seem to be rare and even if you’re lucky enough to have one you may not have the experience or desire to use it. Add to this the evaporation of much of their former food culture at the beginning of the revolution, the absence of a roaring trade in celebrity cookery books and the lack of internet to check the glycemic index of your average cassava for example, you can see the predicament - frying your plantain, chicken, pork, fish, potatoes, eggs etc becomes the default option.

5.     Quantity. This still various enormously so it’s difficult to call on this one. I was quite shocked when lunchtime came on the first day at the Organopónico – it consisted of an army style tin tray with 5 or so areas to stow food - a bit like the plastic ones we used to have at school – only it had about half the amount of food!  A cup full of yellow rice mixed with some grisly meat and a few pieces of shredded cabbage. How could this sustain a clan of farm labourers? Dinner, at least in this 3-boy household is another matter – plates of rice, plantain, beans, chicken and a little side plate of veg come later.  That and the variation of sugary snacks keeps one going I guess.

6.     Export. Tall palm trees, lush greeny-yellow mangos, fresh pink papaya – despite seeing them growing here and largely being able to lay your hands on them they’re not cheap or ubiquitous. Why? Because virtually all leaves the country to feed us either whole or in fruit juice. This drives the prices up and makes it harder to find. Mango’s are in season at the moment and I’m totally addicted. Interestingly though I keep being warned about how fat eating mangos can make you. I know they’re one of the more sugar laden fruits but they’re also rich in fibre and vitamins and minerals. It’s curious – no one’s mentioned anything about how sweets and ice cream go to your bum!

Whatever the cause, the result is familiar: high cholesterol and heart disease are beginning to claim lives here and it seems the return of oil has brought about the return of the flab - just as Ian Roberts hypothesises in The Energy Glut (which was a very good book to bring!)

What happens then? This is where it gets really interesting.

Remember la libretta? Well, if it transpires that you’ve eaten over your fair share of the libreta food – and then some – you’re given la dieta. No need to translate here. If your six monthly mandatory blood test shows high cholesterol or high percentage of triglycerides, the doctor will prescribe you a state approved diet. The two key changes here are the exchange of whole milk powder (if you were entitled to it) to skimmed and the chance to eat fish instead of chicken - as long as there is some obviously. And they also hand out some rules: only eat beans twice a week (since they’re usually cooked in oil), don’t eat too much sugar and stick to rice, root veg, fruit, and vegetables, which are in theory unlimited – if you can afford / find them at all that is.

Ironically, as a sure fire way to get fish instead of chicken, this is the diet that everyone wants to be on. So much so that people will pay their doctors to skew their results and put them back on the diet after their six months is up. This might sound ridiculous but I’ve plenty more examples like this to share…

When ecology gives the economy a helping hand

The organoponico has 6 brick containers (2m wide, 15m long and 60cm deep) dedicated to transforming oxen, goat and rabit poo (plus kitchen scraps) in 2-3 months into high quality compost ready for applying to the soil or selling that would otherwise take years; all with the help of the humble earthworm.

The circle of life is quite simple: plants take energy from the sun and nutrients from the soil to form a biomass which can then be eaten by animals. In order for this cycle to continue, organic residues have to return to the soil in their simple forms – nitrogen, carbon, phosphorous – so that the plants can absorb them. Whilst this is simple enough (again you’ll have to forgive me for going back to basics), the process of decomposition is not so easy.  Of course, you can bypass this process by applying chemical fertilisers to the soil, but that’s not an option here.

Decomposition can be achieved either physically or biologically. To achieve the latter you need life; millions and millions of microorganisms all taking on a different job. Of all of these microorganisms, worms are the most prolific, making up about 70% of the invertebrate biomass in the soil, and in this case the most important because what they excrete is a special compost full of microorganisms which help plants to grow strong and tall.

Worms, unsurprisingly, come in all shapes and sizes and dedicate themselves to different jobs in different parts of the soil as well as different types of soil. I can’t/won’t go into these differences now but we happen to be working with the Californian Red variety – the best suited to this soil and location.     

Why use worms above a standard composting system?

They decompose organic matter using a very simple process (which also destroys dangerous residues) to produce humus with a higher proportion of macrobiotic organisms than normal compost which in turn improves the composition and structure of the soil.

Meanwhile they can reproduce and multiply within the soil, and if you have too many you can sell them on either to work as above or as a protein source.

Above all they’re happy to hang out in s**t all day without complaining one bit.

The worm life cycle (in brief/as I understand it)…

…starts with a capsule, which can hold between 2 and 9 eggs. They hatch after 14-21 days of incubation in the compost and within 45-90 days they pass through youth into adulthood and full sexual maturity. Curiously they’re incomplete hermaphrodites. This basically means they have both sexual organs but do still need two to tango. So, when worms want to reproduce, one lines up with the other (the lighter coloured ring close to their noses has to be touching), and produce sperm to help form the capsule in each worm. When that is released, the cycle starts again. Amazingly, adult worms can live up to a quarter of a century, working 24 hours a day 365 days a week.

More often than not worms are hardy and get on with the job. They live in an area set up permanently for their work; somewhere without any water contamination, with good drainage and easy access. The containers are also now fitted with roofs to maintain shade and temperature, and keep hungry birds from picking. Nonetheless, since the temperature, humidity, pH, light, air and food has to be maintained carefully each day to make a business out of them, you do need someone in the know, and some hard workers  to make up for the lack of mechanisation. The organoponico has one expert and 3 labourers who work in this area to:

-        apply new compost (i.e. food) daily to the containers,

-        water containers to maintain the necessary 80% humidity,

-        conduct tests to check the pH - put 50 worms in a box with new manure, wait one day, if there are less than 49 the next day, it’s not ready yet to go into the containers & other worms

-        extract the worms once the process is complete – to achieve this you need to apply a line of nets along the container, which has onto of that a new layer of food. Removing the worms means the vermicompost is now ready and the worms are hungry for something new, so they make their way to the top to start on the new layer. Leave the nets on for 2 days or so and when you come to lift them off, millions of worms will have made their way up through the nets and into the manure. Simple but very effective.

-        then extract the vermicompost – hand of course.

Producing compost like this is arguably the most important part of the work at the organopónico. Without high quality humus, the soil quality would be abysmal and they wouldn’t be able to grow even half the quantity of fruits and vegetables. Jodi Scheckter, founder of Laverstoke Park Farm, has a/the motto:

Healthy soil = healthy plants = healthy animals = healthy people.

(I hope that’s right – I can’t check the bloomin’ internet!)

And that formula lies at the heart of our very existence.

But in addition to the huge ecological benefits of working with worms lies the exciting business case that Salcines is keen to exploit. 1m² of worms produces 1 tonne of compost per year (the Organoponico produces over 300 tonnes) from natural waste. Compare this to the 250 tonnes of chemicals that are needed to produce 80 tonnes of artificial fertiliser, and it sounds like you’re onto a good thing. In time the plan is to double the area dedicated to producing vermicompost and start selling it a bit more seriously. Given that vermiculture is likely to be the fastest and most efficient means of recuperating soils in the future, hopefully they can’t go far wrong.