My first night in Havanna is over. And who would have thought? I was freezing!!!!! I know that there are some people that say, that I'm even freezing, when it has 20°C outside, but I'm sure it was even colder. Anyways, I will have to see that I'm getting an extra blanket tonight.
Yesterday I was picked up by Josè at the airport. He is a friend of a friend of my mothers cousin.....or something like that. I was just glad that I didn't have to deal with finding a cheap taxi after the flight. Or so I thought.....cause cheap he was not! Normaly the taxidrive would have been max 20$, but he wanted 25$! Well, I only had 20Bills and he didn't have change. Sorry, guess he will need to be happy with 20$. I did promise him to give him the rest the next time I'm going to see him, which actually never happened.
After he droped me off at my hotel, I went to see if I can find Peters Hotel. Peter is a friend from the United States, who happened to be on an exchange Visa in Havanna during spring. Well, the problem was, that I knew which street it would be at (the Malecón, for ppl who know Havanna), but that I didn't bother to check the map for it's exact position. Since I was on the one end of it, I wouldn't run the risk of missing it, so I just started walking. After 45min I did decide to check and found out that it would take me at least 15 more minutes, but since I already started, I wasn't going to go back now. Also the temptation was there, since all the boys of cuba seemed to be sitting at the bay on that street on that day, and let me tell you, there are very persitent in letting you know, that they might be interested in you. It was actually that bad, that I decided to take a taxi on the way back. Even the taxi driver was coming on to me, which ended me giving him way to much money, just so I could get out of the taxi. Well, I'll be smarter next time.
Besides that, life in Havanna is like living in a movie from the 60's. You can see those Chevroletts everywhere! I knew that, but seeing it is still overwhelming. Even the houses look old, since there hasn't been any constructions (except some houses in Havanna vieja) made since Fidel came. You can see wholes in all the walls, some houses are half collapsed, others look like the will any minute. Most of them lack color and numbers, and in 80of the cases, you can't tell if people still live in there or not. Also I found out, that in almost all the buildings there are people living. My neighbor here even has his chickens and a rooster (damn this rooster at 5am!) on his roof.
Today I'll going to see what my parents are doing, since they will be in Havanna for this day. They called me last night around midnight, but I wasn't realy able to understand what they wanted since I was jet-lacked.