[Orema]

Originally Posted by imperfect_cupcake

oh I only went for a holiday, I didn't grow up there.

I talked to a LOT of cubans there about growing up there, their history.. we hired a local guide - a kid about 25 who graduated Uni locally and was into history and poli-sci. So we asked so many questions from everyone we met. We wanted to know everything, how people lived, felt, grew up - how things have changed over time... how people were educated, got health care, the nations cuba traded with - *everything*.
What's this? this? and this over here??
I'm not a beach person. I want to know about the people, the culture, the history, their dance, art, food, ethos, politics - especially the politics.

I talked to everyone I could, I went to as many museums as I could, I hired the guide, I asked for reading recommendations from cubans about cuba - in *their* words from those who stayed and lived there.

It's a complicated answer - historically. But in the last 15 years, people don't want to leave, not permanently. They know they have a good thing - they just want to move around, see stuff, get away from the embargo a bit, and to do that they marry out. Usually Canadians. Then if they have kids, they come back to cuba for the kid to be born and spend its first 2-3 years.

Then the kid is Cuban. And entitled to all things Cuban. But with access to Canadian life and citizenship.

Personally I can't think of a luckier fuckin' kid.

I pretty much found the same when I was there in 2011. At that time, 70% of Cubans were born after 1959 and didn't want to leave permanently. They wanted to travel freely, but they wanted to return to Cuba. I would love to go again.