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SamizBOT's avatar

I visited Havana for about a week a few years ago. I did not enjoy myself. The poverty is grinding and eye opening. The entire experience is catered and artificial. The food is not varied. Prostitution is rampant, and it saddened me a great deal. The "pace of life" that Nic alludes to was (sorry to admit) deeply offensive to my Protestant sensibilities.

I enjoyed the jazz clubs, I will admit that. I also attended a baseball game, about which I could write a great deal. Cuban baseball is obscenely slow paced. The fans had an unfortunate affection for the vuvuzela.

Overall, I was struck by how frankly boring the place is. One gets the same impression from visiting ancient ruins. A sort of wistful nostalgia as you wonder what it must have been like when these glorious structures were actually built and maintained and bristling with activity. Alas, I can get a similar sense of torpor in my own backyard.

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Mumbler's avatar

“does universal poverty reduce racial friction?”

In Essays Against Everything, Mark Greif said money is the solvent of identity. I wonder if Mark’s quote a lot and I think it’s a good answer to your question.

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