Cuba!

Aaand, Im back from Cuba. I'm sorry for the lack of life on facebook and email the last ten days, but as you might know, the internet access on Cuba is very limited... I had to go to one of the big hotels in Havanna to use a computer, and even then it was incredibly slow, about half of the time was spent waiting. But despite laggy connection and a bit difficult computers, I managed to submit my application to Copenhagen School of Business, so now I just have to wait and see...

A few minutes after I posted my last post, I went to board my plane. Since it was going to Cuba, they had an extra checkpoint with soldiers and a dog checking for drugs and stuff. Suddenly the dog starts sniffing my backpack. I started thinking that someone might have slipped something in my bag, and obviously got quite nervous. It didnt help that the gun wasn't pointing at the floor anymore, but at me. The dog didn't mark (luckily), but the guards nevertheless wanted to check my bag. In the end it turned out that the dog was simply hungry, and wanted my half-eaten chicken sandwich. Unprofessional son of a bitch. (pun intended) Thus, slightly shaken, I boarded the plane.#thatmomentwhenyoufindyourselflookingdownthebarrelofagunafterthenarkotics-dogtakesaninterestinyourbackpack.

When we got to Cuba, the first thing that met us was yet another security controll. I guess they REALLY dont want you to smuggle anything into Cuba... The customs and immigrations was ok, but they didn't quite like my American visa (from my time in NY). Nevertheless, I got through it without problems.

After retrieving my baggage, I got in touch with a couple of other travellers, and since I really didnt have anywhere to go, I followed them to their casa. In Cuba you don't have hostels -you either live in hotels (which costs a lot), or you live in Casa Particulares, private houses who rents out rooms to tourists. Me and Roy, one of my friends from the airport, ended up at the house of a sweet old lady, Rakel. Even though it was a bit odd at first, I must admit that I liked that more than fancy hotels.

The first three or four days were spent sightseeing in Havanna. We visited Museum de la Revolucion, Plaza de Revolucion, and all other places which had something to do with the revolucion, Fidel Castro, Che Guevara or Jose Marti. Which is more or less everywhere, because these guys are REALLY popular in Cuba. Now, Im not going to start on any political stuff, but it was quite interesting to visit the museum. We learned how (and I quote) "the brave freedomfighters sacrificed themselves in the battle against the despot Batista and his terrible henchmen", and how "the "imperialistic Yankees" did everything in their power to stop them"...."But then the heroic revolutionaries managed to overthrow the dictatorship and brought a new era to Cuba, one of enlightenment, freedom and prosperity - free of capitalist influence". You get the drill.

During these days I spent most of the time with Roy and a few other people, and so we all decided to go to Trinidad together. We were four in total, Bruno from Brasil, Yuko from Japan, Roy from Israel and me. Quite an international group. After a round of bargaining, we got in a taxi, but five minutes later, the guy were like "umm, I actually don't have a license to take people to Trinidad, so if we get pulled over, you are not paying me. Im only a friend doing you a favor". Quite.

Everything is very regulated in Cuba. Cubans can't live in the same Casa Particulares as tourists, you need licenses for everything, and the casas have to report which persons are staying with them at all times. In adittion there are two currencies in Cuba. A tourist currency, Pesos Convertibles (CUC) and Pesos Nacionales (MND). One CUC is approx. one US dollar, and one CUC is 24Mnd. Both currencies are used by everybody, but there are some restrictions. For example, its illegal to charge for lodging in MND. And since both currencies are called pesos, you have to allways make sure whether you are talking about CUC or MND. If not you can end up paying 15 dollars instead of 0.40 for a tortilla. There's also the story about the ignorant tourist who wanted a pinapple. The price was 25, so he gave the guy 25CUCs, saying "damn, Cuba is expensive". Of course, the vendor did not correct him, he just got a weeks salary for an already over-priced pineapple.

Anyways, in Trinidad, we mostly spent the days at the beach. And what a beach! Pure, white sand as far as the eye could see, blue water and palms. The palms also had coconuts, so Bruno and Roy went hunting for these. A short while later, we were drinking fresh coconut water mixed with rum and ice. In adittion I had brought the biggest cigar I could find. Life was quite good.

As all the members of our little group were from different parts of the world, we were all eager to learn about eachothers culture. As a result, on friday night, we had a traditional sabbatical dinner led by Roy. (video will come later-hopefully). On saturday, the people we stayed with had a family party, and we were of course invited. The evening was spent dancing, playing domino (which was surprisingly fun, especially when we beat the cheating kid) and chatting. It was very, very nice, and I appreciate that the family invited us.

The day after we went back to Havanna, but then Bruno had to leave for Jamaica. The day after, Yuko left as well, and there were only Roy and me left. Thus, we decided to go to Vinjales. We got there in a slightly foul mood. There were a shitload of rain, and our taxi driver had cheated us quite badly (we paid half the price when we went back to Havanna). Cuban taxi drivers in general are not the nicest people... Anyways, the highlight of Vinjales was a trip on horseback. For the first time in my life I rode for more than five minutes. I was a bit nervous, but the horse was very nice, and I survived the four hour trip - although my thighs hurt pretty bad. The trip itself was awesome. We rode in what's known as "the valley of silence", and it was quite beautiful. We visited a tobacco plantation and learned about the whole tobacco-process, saw a big cave and went to a lookout-point. All in all, very nice. And speaking of tobacco, quite a few cigars were consumed during my time at Cuba, but since the part of the leaves containing nicotine is removed when you're making cigars, you wont see mee walking around town with a cigarette anytime soon. Mom, you can relax.

The next day, we went back to Havanna were we were once again greeted by Rakels open arms. But this was my last night, and the day after (today), I had to go back to Mexico. Now, Cancun is not the worst place to go back to, but it sucked that I had to leave. I spent ten days in Cuba, but I could easily have spent a couple of months there. There were so much to see, so many friendly people (locals and tourists alike), good food and drink (the drinks especially). The cars were amazing as well, they do actually have old, american cars. They are in various conditions though, the one we had to Vinjales had a leaky roof, so when we got there, there was a small puddle at the bottom of the car, and my bag was wet due to the broken window.---

Now, this has been my longest post ever, but there is still so much I could write about what we saw and did, the people we met and cuba in general. But that will have to wait. Knowing myself, I will probably tell you everything both two and three times when I get back anyways. I also have a shitload of pictures, and since I for the first time in months actually have a good connection, I'll upload a bunch

Lastly, thanks to Roy, Yuko and Bruno for making Cuba awesome! #powerofthegroup

Peace and love!

Mexico!

When I first got to Flores, I planned on staying there for a couple of nights. Seven nights later I finally left. Destination: Palenque, Mexico.

In company with my friend, Asian Andy (his words, not mine) I took a bus to the border, crossed the river in a tiny , local boat and then a bus onwards to Palenque. The border-crossing itself went without a hitch, but the journey took ten hours or so, we were quite exhausted when we got there.

The town of Palenque itself doesn't have anything special to see, but there are some quite nice ruins nearby. The Mayan city of palenque was quite big, with temples, palaces, towers and all. In addition the nature there is beautiful. Worth a visit. After a couple of days here I caught the bus to Campeche, a few hours north. And for the first time in ages I was actually on a real bus! All the buses I've taken in Guatemala was minibuses, so it was nice to relax in a big, airconditioned bus with reclining seats and movies. It's more expensive than Guatemala, but worth it. And besides, it was quite fun to watch Fast Five dubbed in Spanish.

The bus rides themselves are also quite eventful. During my six busrides, my bus has been stopped five times on routine inspections. The cops are looking for drugs, illegal immigrants and weapons. They are very polite, and there hasn't been a problem yet, but they always have their hands on their guns, ready for everything. Quite different from back home.

And speaking of police, I've discovered that Mexico is organized quite like the US, in fact, the official name of Mexico is "los estados unidos Mexico". It's probably all well and good, but it has to be a judicial nightmare. Tourist police, local police, state police, federal police and the military. I'm glad I don't have to deal with all that.

Anyways, Campeche is another nice city. It was the first place Christopher Columbus touched land on the Yucatan, and ever since then, it's been a big, Important, and last but not least, a wealthy city. This caused the city to be a hot target for pirates for decades, until the Spanish decided that enough was enough, and made Campeche to the biggest fortress in the new world. The defenses consisted of big walls, fortresses and outlying batteries. You can still see quite a lot of these today, and they have several museums dedicated to this, the pirating, weapons, ships and a lot of other stuff. During my second day in town, I visited no less than three of these.

After a few days in Campeche, I took the bus north to Merida, another colonial city. I spent a couple of days strolling around town, visiting museums and other touristy stuff. Then I spent a day In the city of Valladolid and the ruins of Chichen Itza. Chichen Itza is probably the most famous of the Mayan cities, and I think it's onof the new seven wonders of the world. It is quite spectacular, but I must admit I got a bit disappointed. I think that after visiting the ruins of El Zotz, Tikal and Palenque in two weeks, I've just seen too many stones and pyramids in too short time. #firstworldproblems.

But since I've been such a good tourist lately, I have decided to do something else for a few days. That brought me here, to lovely Cancun. The city of Cancun is basically built as a city for tourists, and there is an abundance of big resorts, malls, clubs and bars, kind of the Mexican Las Vegas. But whereas Vegas is in the desert, Cancun is by the ocean, and the beaches are amazing! Pure white sand and crystal clear water. Definetly a good place to start tanning. Cancun is also similar to Vegas at another point - the partying. Europeans go to Greece and Spain during the summer for partying, and American students (and everybody else) comes to Cancun for the spring break. During March and April, the city is packed with students, all out looking for a good time. The clubs are awesome, and the parties fantastic! Yesterday I went to Coco Bongo, the biggest place in town, and the show they put on was very, very good. Actors, dancers and acrobats, smoke, lazers, confetti, light and sound - you name it. The atmosphere was accordingly, and people didnt leave untill it started to get light outside. The downside with all this is that you are so busy having fun that you dont notice how much money you are spending untill its to late. "Insuficcient funds" is not a good message to get when you are trying to withdraw money... Im just glad that I booked my tickets to Cuba before the weekend and not after, haha. And yes, that's right - Cuba. Since I only did one month of Spanish school instead of two, I now have time to go there as well. My flight is leaving in an hour, and then I will spend the next ten days chilling at the beach, while drinking rum and puffing a big cuban cigar. Life is good!

-Magnus

PS; my internet sucks, so unfortunately Im not able to post any pictures at the moment. Ill try to do it later.

Welcome to the jungle!

A couple of hours after I got to Flores I lay in the hammock, chilling and doing nothing. I was quite tired, so my plan was just to chill for a couple of days, then spend a day at Tikal, this huge Maya city nearby before heading west to Mexico. Suddenly this dutch couple whom I've never spoken to before came and asked if I wanted to do this three day jungle tour. This was as far from what I had planned as possible, but after thinking long and hard, I thought "why not?" and said yes. Now, a few days later, I'm very glad that I did. The trip was amazing!

The trip started at 6:am, and after a breakfast at a local comedor, we began to walk. It was seven of us in total, Gus and Susanna from Holland, Eirin from Canada, Deborah from Switzerland, two local guides and myself. The trip started at a leisurely pace with us walking down this dirt road through the outskirts in the jungle. While we walked, we chatted, and the guides taught us about various plants and their medical abilities. One of them had roots which worked as pain-killers, and when we chewed them, we could actually feel our mouths go numb. It it worked way more quickly than ibuprofen and other stuff...

After a few hours of walking we came to a small campsite where we would spend the night. At dusk, the guide took us to this grotto, and when we sat there, thousands and thousands of bats left the caves and flew out over ourheads. It was quite a sight.

Next morning we got up at 4:30, yes I actually got up voluntary at 4:30 , and hiked for 30 minutes to the ruins of El Zotz, a small city. There, from the top of a 35m high temple we watched the sunrise and had fresh fruit. Twas quite an amazing view. And as we sat there we could hear the jungle waking up, especially the howler monkeys. These monkeys are quite small, but they make a lot of noise. Apparently, their screams were used as the base for the dinosaur-roares in Jurassic park, that's how loud and powerful they are. I'm pretty sure they are used as the dragon sounds in Skyrim as well, and as I sat there with skyrim songs playing on my iPod , I couldn't help feel like I was in the game - which is totally awesome. And that was my nerdy moment of the day.

Anyways, after sunrise our guide dressed up in this costume made of leaves and performed a dance o f his ancestors, the Mayans. Very interesting. Later we explored the ruins before returning to the campsite for lunch. During the walk that day, we came into the real jungle, and I have to tell you, if the jungle was a person, it would be a two-sided one. Granted, there are all kinds of medical plants and trees that can give you water and stuff, but at the Same time, it's dangerous as hell.

Unlike the Norwegian forests that I'm used to, the jungle basically wants to kill you. When we walked, we had to watch our feets constantly in order to avoid tripping and stepping on snakes and other animals, and when we looked up, we would find small vines (or gigant logs ) few inches from our face. The wines were often covered in small, but very painful thornes. Even many of the trees had spikes. In addittion to the evil plants, there are all kinds of animals. We had to dispose of a couple of snakes and scorpions laying in our path (which is why the guide always walked first), and there were of course an abundance of mosquitoes, ants, ticks, flies and spiders. I quickly learned another lesson; Norwegian bug-spray sucks. Seriously, even though I covered my body in thick layers of spray four times a day, I still got bitten all the time. Not cool. In addition, this huge ant crawled inside shorts and bit my inner thigh while we were playing cards. The pain was surprisingly strong, and I could hardly walk for an hour. Damned ants, what did I ever do to them? And last but not least, there's the climate. The jungle is so dense, hot and humid, so we basically bathed in sweat after five minutes. Yummy.

Day three we came into thicker jungle. We tried to keep stuff from hitting our faces, but after five minutes we just gave up and let plants, spiderwebs and other stuff slap us in our faces more or less non-stop for five hours.. Nevertheless it was great fun, and I liked that it was a bit challenging. After five hours of briskly walk, we came to Tikal. I have never been so glad to see other tourists in mywhole life. To quote Eirin "look, clean people!" Needless to say, they weren't too happy to see us, us seven dirty, sweaty and smelling people. We couldn't had cared less though, and we just sat there, enjoying our cold sodas.

After lunch we had this sunset tour, and that was awesome. Tikal was one of the last big Maya cities, and it is believed that more than 100, 000 people lived in the city centre, with many more living in the surrounding villages. There's many big temples there, and a lot of stuff to see. The sunset itself were also amazing.

So, to sum it up; even though it was tiresome and I've never been as sweaty, dirty and mosquito-bitten my whole life, the trip was amazing. It was fun walking in the jungle with a local guide who told us stories from his grandparents and Mayan folklore, and we saw some amazing things. The people were really nice as well, s so it was absolutely worth it. And for those who wondered, we walked around 60kms in total, which is not that bad in two and a half days.

Now I've spent couple of days chilling in Flores, and tomorrow or the day after, I'm heading to Mexico.

So long!



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