They say that "He who gets up early, God helps him". Welcome to Havana. Welcome to San Leopoldo, one of the
most humble neighborhoods in the city. Today we are going to see what a Cuban has to do to
be able to eat, and walk a little through Old Havana so that they know a little more about life in Cuba.
It's early, everything is closed, the butcher's is closed, the bakery won't open
for a few hours. And now we are going to manage a document so vital that without
it, Cubans starve. The procedure that we are going to do is so important that we have to go
to the property and who knows how many more good things. I'll tell you about that but let's not
delay any longer, let's go because the earlier we arrive, the earlier we will finish.
It seems that people are partying very early. It's 4:31 in the morning.
This is what the streets of Havana look like at this hour, nothing dangerous if you know how to drive. This one is
more crowded because we go for a queue. Without giving the matter any more thought, we are going to look for our
supply book, although it really should be called a ration book.
Who is the last for the oficoda? *Oficoda: Food control and distribution office
Here you also stand in line to buy bread. - He asked the man for the last one, but for bread.
The booklet only guarantees that people can buy certain products, a few: 7 pounds of
rice in the month, for example, a package of coffee mixed with peas, a piece
of poor quality mortadella, half a pound of soybean oil and other products. more than they do not last even
for seven days. It is not used to buy spices, or vegetables, or fruits. As you can see, people
sleep here and they do it to be able to buy bread. I had never come at this time, but
as the minutes go by the block will fill up and the moment will come when it will seem like
a demonstration. At the moment, you begin to feel a smell of gas, quite penetrating.
I brought a bottle of water, because it can make us thirsty. This is arriving at 4:30 am and leaving here
possibly at 9, because this place for sure opens at 8:30.
You've seen that people sleep here, here's a colleague who seems to have stayed up all night.
The smell of gas is quite strong, it felt quite strong, it seemed like there was a gas leak,
well, another gas leak. What is needed to carry out the procedure is the
previous supply book, the identity card and the property, as they saw in the house.
More and more people are coming to the bakery because
many families depend on the bread they sell
here, which, although it is also rationed, is a little better than the basic basket . And since we're here, obviously we're also going to buy bread.
This wait of several hours would give us time to see two episodes of the House of the Dragon.
*It's time to organize the queue. It's 6:30 in the morning, it's time to organize the queue, the chaos begins, the commotion.
How can so many people have arrived in just an hour and a half? What happens
is that a person dials for two, for three, and thus the queue grows.
Corn flour bread is a highly valued product in Cuba, which is why there
are so many obesity problems, with the consequences that it carries. Currently there are
problems with flour in the country, only bread from the
basic basket is guaranteed: one loaf per person daily, as small as a woman's closed hand.
Hey hey hey hey
Here is the most vulnerable sector of the population: the elderly.
I don't think anyone wants to score for a bread queue, starting at 4 in the morning, especially
after working a lifetime, but it's the only way to get this
staple. Many private bakers are practically doing it in secret, and they sell
the bag for 200 Cuban pesos; 11% of a retiree's pension in exchange for a bag of bread.
They give from 25 to 50 shifts. I think I won't eat bread today either.
These types of situations are what a Cuban faces daily. Something similar happened with
the supply book. You saw how many people there
were when we arrived, and it turns out that now we are 25. We are going to take a walk so that you can get
to know a little more about the city and by the way, we are going to enter a shopping center.
* Medicines and vitamins The truth is that before I started I wanted to take some vitamin C to a friend who is sick,
has health problems and you know how difficult it is to get medicines
here, that there are no medicines in pharmacies, that you go to the doctor and the doctor clearly tells
you that he is going to prescribe something for you, to see where you can get it if you go to a pharmacy,
because mostly everything is missing. From this little bottle that is here, I separated
a few that I have here. I take them in a piece of paper. I suppose he has a
container, I told him, in fact, I told him to find a container because I have nowhere to put them.
So, there you have it for a few days. They are 500 milligrams. This comes to Cuba thanks
to the mules, those mules who have wanted to bring down the business so much on different occasions,
but as you know, you can now enter Cuba with everything you want to bring from medicine,
personal hygiene and food. . You can already pass all this through the airport from July
11, coincidentally, from July 11. With the lack of food here, what does not enter
through food has to enter in pills. But somehow it has to enter the body.
If you are wondering what this is,
my Argentine friends who are watching me answer in the comments what this is.
Here it is, Argentines know well what this is. And look what I have here, little surprise.
Greetings to the people who are watching me in Argentina. They are very much loved on this channel.
Thanks to the mules we can have a little medicine here. If we had to buy
the medicines in the stores, firstly, they would sell them in the stores in MLC, let's start
with that, there are pharmacies here in MLC, the ones in the hotels for tourists and the medicines
are not cheap at all . So, again, thanks to the mules. Well, this is my table, where I
work, the lamp for when the power goes out, the notebook, this is where ideas are generated, where
notes are taken, where projects are born, from this trail that you see here, And although it may not seem like it,
those pieces of paper also have valuable information. And here, the battery that I use to charge everything
when the power goes out. You always have to be prepared because you don't know when it's your turn now,
in this time we are living, this convulsive historical moment we
are living. We are ready to go, so for the street.
What we are going to do now we will do it privately, not everyone
likes to appear in videos. This place that we have in front of us is very
interesting, we are going to cross the street to explain it to you when we are there.
Good bump took the taxi.
This site was going to be part of the hospital that we have next door, the Hermanos Amaijeiras.
Illegal people have always come to live here, they take them out, they come back, they
take them out again, they come back. This is the housing situation in Cuba and since Havana
is overcrowded because everyone comes to Havana, well,
they have a bed there, but anyway, everyone has the right to progress in life.
The truth is that it seems right to me that in the end they have given these things to
people. They already saw a sign there that it is private property and they are going to start building
there. It seems to me very very adequate due to the housing deficit that exists here.
And in the end that was for the hospital and they didn't do anything, they haven't done anything, there
are no resources and well, if people can build, then let them build.
This is one of the largest shopping centers in the city. Many wanted to see it and here it is.
At first impression it feels empty. The various reasons are the scarcity
of products, their quality and, above all, their prices. And this not
only goes for footwear, the panorama is also perceived on the upper floors.
The appliance section with prices at double or perhaps a little
more than what they would cost in any other country. * Sound bar at 339 USD, with a 6-month guarantee.
A product highly valued by Cubans that one fine day disappeared and reappeared,
but in dollars, is coffee. This pack costs 15 or 20, and it's not the best. The
same thing happens with perfumery and personal hygiene. To pay for these products you have to
do it based on remittances or those who have jobs related to tourism, a
minority. We are going to pick up the backpack because you cannot enter stores in Cuba with bags.
In the corner is the municipality of work. People come here not so much to look for work, but
rather to re-register as self-employed. To do this, they must fill out a
form that, as the entity does not have ink or paper, must be purchased from a private business.
The process will be ready in about 40 days.
Here, one of the most common small businesses in Cuba, and on the corner, more queues.
If you look closely, you will realize that there are many elderly people here, people who should
be retired by now, but with a minimum pension of 12 dollars a month, and rampant inflation
like we have here, the only way for an elderly person to survive is continue working.
Much of the day is spent on this, looking for food.
This is how many young people make a living. Let's walk a little through these streets.
Let's take a little virtual tour to where Old Havana begins.
In this place live people who are sheltered.
What you are seeing on the right is a butcher shop.
At this point, the contrast between what is invested in tourism and what is invested in
the construction and repair of housing is noted, for the population, a contrast that becomes dangerous,
because while the hotels have continuous maintenance, they spend years to
maintain a residential building.
The future of the country continues to be mortgaged and the new generations are not willing
to put up with what has to be done to be able to eat in Cuba, to get the most basic.
Today has been a long day. We start very early in the morning in the neighborhood of San Leopoldo, we pass
through Old Havana and we end here, in Maceo Park, right in front of the Havana Malecón,
in the middle of a somewhat cloudy sunset, cloudy as the emotions of
many should be. of the people who appeared in this video, a long day but it was worth it, not
only for having brought the vitamins to my friend, which he really needed, but also
for having shared with you a little more of what everyday life is in the life of us
Cubans, those of us who are inside the island. It only remains for me to invite you to let me know in the
comments what you think of what you saw in this video, thank you for having reached the end.
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