I hadn’t seen my sister in over three years. The pandemic made it difficult. I recently decided to change that and travel to our motherland: Cuba, to see her.
I grew up without my sister. Politics and second marriages changed our childhood upbringing forever. I left for the United States when I was four, her 13 when she adjusted to her new life without our father. I learned on this trip that he didn’t tell her he was leaving with his new wife and four-year-old daughter to the States. A fact she shared with me on this trip. “Cowardice,” she said. “That’s the only way I can describe our father’s actions.” I couldn’t challenge her. I had to agree. I thought, what if I were in her shoes? I would feel the same.
It was unfair to her. To only have a father until the age of 13, whereas I had him until I was 30. And although I had him longer than my sister, that didn’t mean we lived happily ever after. He was conflicted. Leaving a child behind couldn’t have been easy. He never expressed this loss to my mother or me, but I always felt something was missing, a longing he could never fulfill.
When I arrived in Cuba, it was unbearably hot. We are well into fall in the U.S., and my body temperature has adapted accordingly. “Oh, it’s breezy now,” my sister said before I arrived. After eight days there, I was still waiting for this breeze. Thirty-one degrees Celsius/88 Fahrenheit doesn’t exactly call for a momentary gust of wind. But that was the least of my discomfort. There was a toilet paper shortage, a lack of bottled water in stores, limited napkins, and four currencies to keep track of. Before I arrived in Cuba, I knew things were in short supply, like the U.S. or the rest of the world, but not to this extent. I was outraged. Where was all the money going into Cuba (over 65% by foreign countries) going towards? “It’s the embargo,” my sister would say. “Do you really think Cuba will thrive if the embargo is lifted? I asked. What about all the government corruption on the island?” My sister stood behind her statement. She also discussed why Putin wasn’t the enemy; Ukraine was. I was speechless. Who is this person? I knew she didn’t share all my Western views, and we both disdained Trump. But saying Ukraine is the villain didn’t sit well with me.
We stopped talking about politics. It was a mutual decision. We both wanted to enjoy each other’s company, free of tension and disagreements. After all, I had to travel to a communist country to see a sibling I missed and loved. Before he passed, our father made it a point for us to communicate by letters in the 90s to get to know one another, once he couldn’t write her because his diabetes had taken sight from his right eye. We’ve been close ever since. To feel her warmth in person is worth forgoing essentials I sometimes take for granted in the U.S. Until next time, Cuba! May things get better for you.
Finally traveling to my dream destination has been one of the highlights of my life these past few years. Behold Thailand; 20 hours of travel time; one boyfriend with a fear of flying, and few time zones later, I made it there. Precisely, during Southeast Asia’s rainy season, we arrived to our hotel in Bangkok, our first stop in our tour of the country. Thailand is like Miami in that there will be short bouts of massive downpours throughout the day and then a blazing sun infiltrates the sky like clockwork shortly after.
On the return trip home – everything changed. With the 4 security checkpoints in Dubai’s airport, I took off my shoes twice, they scanned me for weapons and metals at least three different instances and they checked the photos on my Cannon camera. Odd! All this securing made the plan late by 3 hours. Where was my pleasant flight experience? What happened to me feeling like a coddled toddler? Sitting on the aisle, I was constantly woken up by the abrupt stewardesses bumping my arms or legs as they hastily tended to passengers. Instead of 12 hours to JFK the flight was close to 15 – big difference! Although my boyfriend and I kept getting up every few hours to stretch and stimulate circulation in our limbs, when we got home, we both noticed are ankles were so swollen they had become cankles. Mine were bruised. I was shocked. Where did these old lady legs come from? I had to take a sleeping pill to forget about the situation and woke up the next day at 4:15pm. One week later and I’m still feeling the effects of the trip. I sleep two to three hours max a night and feel drowsy around 3pm daily. What fresh Hell is this? I was only gone for 10 days. How long will it take to adjust to New York time? This is some severe jet lag, man!
Don't Suck My Collagen 