A rare opportunity in february of 2012 — see havana During a time of freer travel

My wife’s uncle teaches a martial art called Aikido. He started studying and practicing it in the early 1970s and made it his lifework. Decades later he’s a globally-respected master and so in February of 2012 we accompanied him to a Havana for a week of seminars. His wife’s family is from Cuban and left when Castro was busy “liberating” the population into “equity” of opportunity for education, highly competent and advanced medical care (for a minority of the population), jobs and universal poverty — excepting for the line-toeing ruling elite.

In a few word: having been, I could not return. It was something of a human safari. Seeing poverty, living in need, decay, corruption and safe in barely roadworthy vehicles and middle class neighborhoods — such as they exist.