Cuba Trip Pictures are up!

My thoughts on Cuba:

There are two Cubas - the CUC (Cuban Convertible Peso) Cuba supported by Dollars and other hard currencies derived from tourism and relatives in Florida, and the local currency (Peso) Cuba, which is used to pay salaries and buy goods in local stores.

The lens through which these Cubas are viewed provides two very different perspectives.

Through my lens I see a country that is doing very well, given that the most powerful nation in the world has being trying to bankrupt it for the last several decades. Its people are less poor than its neighbors, education and medical care are available to all, not just the privileged, few if any are starving. The CUC Cuba is relatively prosperous, the local currency Cuba survives, which is wonderful in the context of third world countries.

Others in our group see through their lens a downtrodden, impoverished people yearning to be free. They see the CUC Cubans as potential upper middle class, with no prospects of making it there. They see the Cuban exiles, the people who thrived under Batista, as the wronged class. They see the local currency Cubans getting what they deserve, the damn Communists who did not leave the country when they had a chance!

Through both lenses we see a country whose potential is not being achieved because of the lack of incentives in the centrally planned Communist economy.

The pictures through my lens (mostly a Leica 35mm f/1.4 Summilux) can be found at:

http://clive.smugmug.com/Travel/834331