Mon, 19 May 2003 11:29:18 -0700 (PDT)
One more thing .. or two.

I realize that this mass spamming may be getting out of hand so ... you have another chance to be removed from my "spam list".

Anyway, it is interesting here that for the first week or so, I was having cold showers. Well, after I noticed an electric switch, with wires going to the shower head, I flicked it, and ..... warm water. Now by north american standards, I thought that water and electricity weren't really supposed to mix, but I guess that in cuba it must be safe. Apparently if you touch your finger to the center of the shower head, you can get a little buzz.

Last night, I went to a huge concert that was part of some sort of festival that celebrates cban music. There were about 10K people there, and lots of dancing and partying. Every cuban there had a bottle of rum, which they drink straight because it is cheaper than coca-cola. They also all want to talk, and the line from the old mexican movies "Hey Miister wann my siiister" certianly applies here. They all use the same line to start up a conversation with you ... "hey fren wheeey you fron" ... I just ignore them most of the time when they try to talk to me ... they must think Canadians and tourists are pretty cold, but you have to be to avoid getting hustled by them. I think there are some decent people here, but not the ones who start talking to you ... only the ones that you talk to first.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot that I had an interesting experience last night as well. We were standing watching the concert, and at about 12:30, I noticed a group of 5 black guys (yeah elias, I am not a racist) standing behind me. They were pretty close, and it felt like they were basically rubbing up against me. I dףn't carry anything in my back pockets, and not much (just a little cash) in my front ones either, so if they were trying to pick-pocket me they didn't get anything anyway. I took a step forward and turned around to see what they were up to, and I could see them staring at the ass of this german guy (Akhim) that I was with. I started giving them a dirty look to let them know that I knew what they were up to, but it didn't seem to deter them. So, I told Akim to watch out for the pick pockets behind him, and that we should move. I started walking past the 5 guys, and one of them tried to block me, but I just pushed him out of my way ... then I saw akhim getting surrounded by them, and I went back and pushed them out of the way, and in the mean time, they managed to rip his watch off his wrist, but it fell onto the ground in the comotion. I then grabbed one of the guys by his arm, and I had my right hand cocked back, and ready to punch him out (note: the penalty for a cuban if he is caught fighting with a forigner is 75 years) ... but since there were 5 of them and only 2 of us, I let him go, at which point they disappeard into the crowd. It is amaing how un-professional these theives were ... fucking retards. My adrenalin was rushing for at least 20 minutes after that, and I could have killed.


Also, I found out about the accident that some people from my school had ... they went on a field trip to visit some town about two hours outside of Havana, and they had rented some old fixed up car with a driver. Turns out that on the way home, it was raining, and the driver couldn't really see well, and they had a head on collision with an on-coming vehicle. Well, in the accident the front right side of the huge seat came un-done, and the girl in front had her head go through the wind-shield. The people in the back were all OK, but they had moved forward so much that they actually got out of the front door rather than the back door. Then they go taken to a "hospital" which was more like a little room with 2 nurses in it, and the girl was bleeding quite a lot, and passing in-and-out of consciousness. Apparently the nurses didn't even really put pressure on the cut to stop the bleeding. Then finally about two hours after the accident, the girl made it to a "real" hospital, where they gave her a blood transfusion, sewed up her cut, and fixed the gash on her hand. It was pretty traumatic for all the poeople that were on the trip with here, and they all came back soaked in blood.