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The wife and I visited Havana in September. The second we stepped off the boat, we couldn't believe how bad the buildings and infrastructure looked. We knew it would be somewhat run down, but this was beyond what I expected. Not every building was that dilapidated (tourist attractions looked ok). But going to certain places in the city, you'd think the building was about to fall down around you.
What we were told by the tour guide was that the government owned the building, but the residents owned the inside of their apartments ("from the paint in"). So, if something in the whole of the building needed to be fixed, they could either wait on the government to do it, or they could all pitch in to help with the repairs. Ironically, in a communist country, no one is willing to take on that cost. That's why trees were literally growing out of the guttering (if the gutters were still completely up).
Even the old classic cars they want the tourists to ride have refurbished Hyundai engines in them.
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“Critics are men who watch a battle from a high place then come down and shoot the survivors.”—Hemingway.
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