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Where the Action Is These Days in Havana

Blackouts have wiped out the movie theaters and the Coppelia ice cream parlor in El Vedado; life is now in the kiosks where they advertise: “We have everything here.”

By Yoani Sanchez (14ymedio)

HAVANA TIMES – This time the route is southward. I have to get to the market that stretches beneath the overpasses at 100 and Boyeros in Havana. My eternal search for some part to fix leaking pipes brings me to one of this city’s main open-air markets. “We have everything here,” reads a sign I find at a kiosk at the entrance to the flea market, where you can buy antibiotics as easily as soldering tin.

Nowhere along the trip to the market is there internet access and, in stretches, not even a mobile signal for making calls. Cubans have come to the conviction that chatting with friends, watching reels, or posting on Facebook is becoming a thing of the past. Too bad X no longer allows posting by text message (SMS), as was possible in the old Twitter. We have even lost smoke signals.

Disconnected but walking quickly, I approach the overpasses. If along the whole route I had barely run into half a dozen people, the closer I get to the market, the more the scene changes. At 100 and Boyeros there are more people than at 23 and L, the iconic corner of La Rampa, in El Vedado. The crowd that no longer gathers around the movie theaters, clubs, or the Coppelia ice cream parlor seems to have concentrated around the stalls selling instant glue, clothing, and tools.

For sale—there is even companionship for sale. Stationed at some points in the market are women and........

© Havana Times