Its Time to Lift the Embargo Against Cuba :: Argumentative Persuasive Essays

It's Time to Lift the Embargo Against Cuba I waited an hour and a half for my first camello. It was too hot at the bus stop to do anything but stand and stare at the corner where the camello-a semi carrying a small jail, as a friend described it-would turn onto 23rd. The line was long, maybe forty people. When the camello finally arrived, the line broke into a desperate mob. I let myself be pushed inside. A pregnant woman in front of me panicked and began swearing and throwing elbows. I caught one in the ribs and tried to make space for her. Inside I kept one hand on my bookbag, one hand on the rail. But there was no way I could have fallen; we were like sardines in a can. They let in more people at the second stop. Now the camello was too full to close the doors. A man next to me joked, "Quà © subdesarrollo"-"What underdevelopment." Camellos were introduced in Havana to help solve the public transportation crisis in 1995. They are city buses, capacity of probably two hundred, pulled by flatbed trucks. Their two humps give them the popular name camello, Spanish for camel. The running joke is that they are like the Saturday night movies and may contain sex, violence, and adult language. I used camellos to get around Havana in July because it was cheap-one cent per trip-and I had time. But also because it is what Cubans do. I invariably got off the camello drenched in sweat, clothes wrinkled from being packed in, and not feeling well. I met Cubans who spend three hours taking camellos one way to work each day. Waiting in long lines is part of living Cuban. There are other quirks that an economics professor might call "inefficiencies endemic to socialism," or maybe just underdevelopment. To get things done requires a contact and a special favor. For instance, to get a phone line out of the country I would ask my friend Mario to call his cousin who works at the phone company. Electricity blackouts and water shortages are common. Another friend has the money to buy a car-relatives in Tampa send money- but it will take him years to get through the paperwork.