A particular taxi ride

by Nicole Figueroa de la Peña (Germany)

A leap into the unknown Cuba

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The city which seems to have stopped on time, the place where the buildings seem to tell magnificent stories, where the colorful old-timers driving around the city taking passengers from one place to another, where the people enjoy the closeness from the Cuban capital to the easy going beach-life. After walking around the whole day in la Habana my mom and I decided to take a ride back home, we argued for a while if we should take a normal cab, an old-timer or a „coco taxi“; but since some locals told us to have a ride on a coco taxi was totally worth it and the weather was beautiful, we decided to give it a shoot. So, we walked a little along the Malecon, enjoying the sound of be waves crashing into the wall and the sound of the gulls flying around looking for fish. We got eventually tired, we stayed under a shadow and waited for a „coco taxi”, since it was almost dinner time and most of the people had off work, we had to wait for a while to get a cab. We were standing there, looking at the fishermen standing on the roadside with their fishing poles, having a beer while fishing when we saw a free coco taxi and made the driver a signal to stop where we were and hopped into his vehicle. These taxis are three-wheeled motorcycles with a yellow cover on the back part that goes from the back bottom to the middle top, simulating an opened coconut. As we hopped in, the driver smiled at us and he introduced himself: „Hello, my name is Alejandro, how are you doing? “. He was a young driver, maybe in his mid-30´s, black hair, mestizo, a big bright smile and dark eyes, who moved to the capital in order to study. As we kept on driving, he explained us, although he had studied to be a teacher, he has been a taxi driver for almost 10 years and that he really loves his job, but it hadn’t always been that way, because he used to have other goals in life until his girlfriend got pregnant. Despite this situation he still loves living in la Habana and being a taxi driver, since he gets to know a lot of new people every day. Besides, Alejandro and his colleagues are not only cab drivers but also tourist guides, entertainers or psychologists, everything just while driving people to their destination. At the very beginning, we drove alongside the Malecon and even though we were not driving that fast, we could sense the breeze of the ocean, smell the salt and feel the sun shining on our faces. As we were riding a coco-taxi, we were not allowed to take the 5th Avenue, which is one of the most important avenues in la Habana, because of the speed limit. Therefore, Alejandro had to take some other smaller streets and alleyways to take us back to our place. We kept on driving and we could see a whole different side of the city, the place where a lot of locals live, barefoot kids playing soccer on the streets, the older ladies having a smoke observing everything that is going on, the houses which are not in the best conditions or as colorful as in downtown but are good enough for people to live there, music playing out loud, young and older ones dancing to it, neighborhoods where they seem to know and support each other. As we drove by one of the neighborhoods Alejandro hooted and greeted pretty much everyone we saw on our way, he told us, there is where he lives with his family and smiling, showed us his place… A small pink house, with a white fence which did not seemed to be complete and beautiful colorful flowers. Everyone there, as well as the other neighborhoods we drove through, the people seemed to be truly happy and be proud of who they are and where they come from; despite how hard the situation at their country might be, they all seem to be proud “habaneros”.