Foreign tourists who travel to Cuba, help prop up a decaying dictatorship and its apartheid oppression of the Cuban people, no matter how many old clothes and toothpaste they might take for workers at their luxury resort.
Canadian correspondent Mary Ellen Kot doesn’t comment on why Cuban maids and gardeners need the handouts, i.e. the bankrupt communist system, but a careful reading of her piece, illustrates the desperation of so many Cubans today. For example, Kot writes:
Near the end of our week, I asked our morning waitress if it was OK to give her some clothes for her young cousin. I was afraid of insulting her, but she replied enthusiastically.
“Yes, it’s OK. We have many friends from Canada who bring us clothes and shoes.”
A young man also reassured me that I was not insulting anyone. He explained many of the housekeepers at our resort were doctors and nurses who felt very lucky to work in tourism because of the possibility of gifts and tips. I had wondered why shampoo was often mentioned as a good gift until he told us that a bottle of shampoo costs about one-third of a month’s salary.
The help obviously is needed and appreciated, by those lucky enough to get it. But it is not enough to assuage the guilt Kot and other foreign tourists should feel when they travel to play on the island. A few hotel workers may benefit from their largesse, but the tourists also are at least partially responsible for the continued survival of a regime that leaves so many Cubans begging.
Just throw crumbs at the quaint peasants and you can sleep without guilt that night. These people are sick.
You think Jude Law, Leonardo DiCaprio, Oliver Stone, Steven Spielberg and the rest of the useful idiots carry any guilt? Don’t think so.
I did not see any author guilt in that article. On the contrary, I felt pride on the part of the writer. The first page tells things as they are — doctors and nurses happy at being able to work as helpers and maids at tourist hotels because the tourists will give them hand-me-downs and used shampoo bottles before going back home. The second page, though, makes it “obvious” why the doctors and nurses feel this way: the AWFUL AMERICAN BLOCKADE.
So, you see, if you are a Canadian and travel to Cuba, and use Cuban professionals as your maids, don’t feel ashamed. It’s not your fault, after all — it’s the fault of the Americans and the Cuban-Americans who put pressure on the US government. So go ahead, Canadians, just make sure to fill your bags with used clothes and cheap bottles of shampoo (and to follow the links the author gives you to the communist groups that will make sure those who deserve them get the goods you’re bringing to the island), and enjoy your trip!
Oh, and why aren’t Cubans allowed to go to these five-star beaches, restaurants, shops, etc., tourists love so much? Is that the fault of the blockade, too?
Maybe we should write the paper and ask if that will be the topic of an upcoming article…
Very sad
I find it interesting that the European Union, China, Russia nor anybody else can be considered as and effective trading partners by the Castro regime. I would seem by this argument that only the US can effectively trade with Cuba … nincompoops
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