CUBA

Okay, I'm spoiled rotten I know. After a great life altering vacation to New York, but a month ago, I decide on a whim to go on a sell off vacation to Cuba. Just for the fun of imagining a warm place in the dead of winter, my work mate Danielle and I went onto a discount vacations website to see what they had available. What we found was an deal we could not pass up on. Our contract ending the next day, and the new one not to start till the following week. On a whim we booked the ticket and were scheduled to leave two days later.

I can to say going to Cuba on an all inclusive vacation is not in any way an indication of what Cuba was. I learned very little about locals ( except that those working at the resort were extremely kind and lovely), and got version of a country designed especially for me the tourist. I did however, get a chance to meet some great Canadians who shared with me their stories, and sat on a beach that was mostly beautiful--aside from the jelly fish that washed up on the shore most afternoons and made it difficult to enter the water. ( And although dangerous in their own right, they did have a beauty to them that was unparalleled)

I drank a lot of mojitos and Spanish coffees, sat in the sun at the beach and the pool, watched the live entertainment, ate buffet, and chatted, and drank and drank. The trip in fact degenerated my brain power so much that by the end of it I could barely read a People magazine because it had too many words. ( So much for the 6 books I insisted on bringing).

I did manage to get off the idyllic grounds for but an afternoon to see some of Havana, listen to live music and get soaked in the craziest torrential rain I have every seen. ( The streets turned into rivers, and all we could do was walk and smile as we soaked to the bone). Havana is such a cool and dynamic city and I wish I had had a chance to see more of it, although a bit intimidating for two women.

The highlight of the trip was by far the snorkeling. Mostly because it was something I was very nervous to do and had a hard time getting into. Being a person who suffers from bouts of claustrophobia and anxiety makes it hard to breathe through a little tube and stick my face in the unknown of the water. Once I figured out how to relax, I was overwhelmed with what I saw. A world in which I did not belong, but was allowed into as a silent observer began to surface. Creatures came out of the nooks and crevices and I could have stayed out there forever. At one point I began to swim out into the blue, before I new it I was in the middle of nowhere, only the light of the deep ocean pouring in through the surface and the soft sound of my breathing. The panic of realising I was so far from land was eclipsed my the inner calm I felt.

Now I'm back, and my new contract finds me sitting under the dim lights of the warehouse at Elections Ontario pushing papers. Although I may not necessarily want to be back in Cuba I keep thinking of being elsewhere as I listen to my ipod and feel my eyes and body get tired. Although the job pays the bills, and it redeems itself based on the fact that I'm not in it alone ( there's a whole troop of us doing the same mind numbing work), I keep thinking I wish I was doing something more creative that used the skills I have.