In Cuba, on the other hand, a simple bar of soap is bound to be quite scarce. One woman told a foreign journalist that she hadn't been able to wash her daughter properly for over two and a half months. As for animal rights, there are also reports that due to chronic food shortages, the number of cats and dogs in Havana has been dwindling.
Since the "special period" when Soviet investment was suddenly withdrawn, Cubans have lost an average of 20 pounds each. The fact itself reads like the stuff of propaganda. The reality was altogether different. What amazed me was how quickly you could fall in love with the economics of less. There are no ads, no billboards, no graffiti, no shops, no cars. People perch on the sea wall in couples, in groups, and talk. They are affectionate and caring, with a real sense of unity and an honest reverence for Fidel Castro.
Everybody seems to be working for public good rather than private greed. In the morning, I would see clusters of volunteers—government ministers, white- and blue-collar workers—heading out into the countryside to work in the fields. They all do it for 10 days each month.
The threat that Cuba poses to Western business interests is that it is a society that knows how to live without excess, without consumerism or commercialism. That is the revolution America fears. It has the best healthcare system in the world, with one doctor to every 196 citizens (the States manages a 1:405 ratio). It has almost 100-per-cent literacy. If a system that exists under such severe economic restraints can manage such achievements, there is surely a lot it can teach us.
One thing that really struck me was the enthusiasm of the foreign diplomats I encountered. One went so far as to mention Utopia. For myself, I felt there was no horizon I could not get above or beyond in Cuba. I remember with such affection waking up and thinking, "Here I am where I ought to be, because here I could belong."
[Ed.: Note that when people are impoverished in a capitalist economy, it is a vice, but in a socialist economy it is a virtue. Also ask yourself: if we had a 1:1 ratio of doctors to patients, what would that suggest about the quality of our health?]
