Cienfuegos, Cuba


During my crew’s 21-day sailboat delivery from the British Virgin Islands to Galveston, Texas, we had the opportunity to spend two nights in the Cuba city of Cienfuegos. While there, I volunteered to take care of the provisioning for the second half of our trip. After my three other crewmembers departed to do their sightseeing, I arranged transportation to a money exchange to acquire pesos before heading to a food store to restock the galley. My driver’s name was Miguel and although we spoke no common words, I found him to be delightful and through sign language and a lot of finger-pointing found we could communicate surprisingly well.
Inside the money exchange, I threw down two-hundred U.S. Dollars and asked for small denomination bills. The teller punched the amount into the cash dispenser and out spit a two-inch stack of pesos. “Oh no, is that all mine?” I asked. No, they said, that’s just $100 dollars of it. Yikes, I’d never get that pile of money into my pockets. So, I exchanged the money for larger denominations … a one-inch high pile of 4,400 pesos.

Our grocery shopping was a hoot. If I couldn’t find an item–like apples–I acted out plucking apples from a tree and Miguel would scurry off returning with the desired fruit. What a good guy he was. At the cash register, with the cart piled high with provisions, we were shocked to discover this was one of those “Dollar Stores” and only U.S. Dollars were accepted. Oh no! Miguel slapped his forehead in embarrassment for not realizing this was a Dollar Store.

Fortunately, I had some additional money hidden in my wallet and was able to pay for our purchases. But we then hurried back to the money exchange to change my 4,400 pesos back into dollars. “So sorry. That is not possible. You are only able to change dollars into pesos in Cuba and not the other way around.” I see, so now I have a worthless paper souvenir from Cuba.
On the way back to the marina I acted out my wish to purchase postcards by pretending to write with my finger and licking an air stamp. Miguel immediately responded “Si, si.” When he took me to a post office I thought he had misunderstood but then discovered the post office sold a variety of post cards.

Back at the boat, guessing what to pay my new best friend cab driver, I peeled off 880 pesos, the equivalent of $40. That must have been more money than Miguel had earned in a month because he kept pumping my hand, repeating, “Mi amigo, mi amigo.” I don’t care if I did overpay him, he was worth it.
Visits to Cuba by U.S. citizens during the early years of 2000, were frowned upon by U.S. Immigration but often overlooked. So long, that is, you didn’t flaunt the violation like blowing Cuban cigar smoke in the Immigration official’s face or wearing Cuban souvenir tee shirts. So how would the U.S. Postal Service react when it processed postcards from a U.S. citizen mailed from Cuba? Then I came up with a brilliant idea, I would pretend to be a Cuban citizen named Santiago (“James” in Spanish) who had seen Jim Stark and was reporting his travels. I wrote 27 post cards with the following message:

Dear XXXXX,
Your friend Jim Stark asked me to send this card since U.S. citizens are not able to make purchases in Cuba. He has completed 350 miles of a 1200-mile sailboat delivery from BVI to Galveston, Texas. He looks wonderful: tan, lean, and very muscular. He hopes to stay that way and see you again back in the U.S.
Adios, Santiago.

Some months after my trip I ran into my friend Herb Hoover who had received one of my cards. Herb said, “Hey, a few weeks ago I got this strange postcard from some Cuban guy about you,”
I said, “Oh, Herb. Didn’t you figure it out?”

Then Herb shook his head and said, “Oh no. It was from you.!”
Herb had kept the card and returned it to me with the word “Gullible” written across the card’s face.