Text and Photos by Nester Nuñez (La Joven Cuba)
HAVANA TIMES – Even if I were tortured, I could never say the exact number of times I traveled on trains without tickets. I didn’t do it out of innate juvenile mischief or because I lacked the seven pesos the ticket to Santa Clara cost, but because buying it consumed hours of life in a tumultuous and dangerous line where you had to put your physical and emotional resistance into practice: shouting, fighting, regaining calm and normal blood pressure to come out victorious.
It was easier for me to slip towards the platforms, wait for the conductor to look the other way, slip through any door, and once on board with the train in motion, avoid the police and inspectors. It was a kind of adrenaline more authentic and satisfying. Ultimately, if you were caught, you would have to pay double the fare: fourteen pesos. And the extra fine, twenty. I made five hundred a week with some cigars I bought in Cabaiguán and resold in Matanzas.
Regli, Yackelín, Liudmila, Yula, the people from Colon, and Jaguey Grande studied Law, Psychology, or engineering at the University of Santa Clara. Traveling was part of our lives for at least five years. Traveling, breaking down on the way, spending hours lying on the edge of the dark road, experiencing thirst and hunger… Each of us probably considered the possibility of quitting the career at some point, but we pulled ourselves together and kept going. It was mainly driven by hope, the idea of a better future, or perhaps the inertia we carried from the 1980s. The truth is, we didn’t get off the train, although, to tell the truth, some preferred the bus. Not me. In buses, I have always felt my freedom restricted.
Today is one of the many times I return to the city where my son was born, the city that rewarded me with a book and where great friendships still live. One of them, knowing my aversion to all things related to procedures, paid my reservation on the Viajando app from the comfort of her home. It cost 57 pesos, 1.8% of the average s
