April 28, 2014  Havana, Cuba

After a fitful night of sleeping and waking intermittently to listen for Cuba security skulking outside the house, I wake up before the maid and driver arrive at Ed’s house.

The gated fence to enter the compound of Ed’s house and school across the street where Cuban “spooks” watch.

Walking through the empty house I look in the kitchen for a glass to drink some water. Sure enough, near the cabinets where the glasses are kept is the bulky water treatment tank where the potable water for the household is purified. Ed had already warned me not to drink untreated water anywhere in Cuba, so I carefully pour myself a glass of water from their large purified water dispenser.

In the 1950s, the Cuban middle class enjoyed all the civilized comforts of modern conveniences, including a then-modern plumbing system.

Havana was also a popular travel destination. My mother had told me stories how she and my dad had honeymooned by taking the ferry from Key West to Havana to visit Cuba in the very early days of the revolution. You can watch a short clip of the ferry docking in Havana here – the dresses and purses the women wear in the video brought back memories of my mother’s closet.

After 50-plus years of infrastructure neglect, Cuba’s plumbing and sewer systems are as cracked as the lines on the sun scarred face of a campesino farmer toiling on a Viñales tobacco farm. With every flush of a toilet, wastewater leaks and contaminates the country’s supply of drinking water.

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