Changes from below: new spaces, attitudes, and actions in contemporary Cuba.(REPORTS)

Walking through e streets of Havana, one is immediately truck by a myriad of contradictory images, sounds, and sensations. Five-star hotels, fancy cafés, bars and shops offering imported foods, modern appliances, mountain bikes, and perfumes from Paris stand side by side dilapidated and decaying apartment blocks, empty peso shops, and local bodegas, where Cubans can be seen standing in long lines waiting for their monthly food rations. Flashy Mercedes Benz, Toyota, and funny egg-shaped taxis bustle through the streets next to overcrowded guaguas, camellos, and particulares (different types of local public transport). Churches, new and old, Catholic, Protestant, and especially Pentecostal are being rebuilt, restored, and revive& while Afro-Cuban religions have become so popular that many foreigners are now flocking to the island to become initiated. In many of the city's tourist areas more and more people, especially the elderly and children, can be seen begging for money, clothes, toiletries, or just asking for chicle (chewing gum), while tourists and members of the newly emerging Cuban nouveau riche class can be seen lounging around one of the five-star hotel pools or bars. Although Havana is not Cuba, these contradictions are emblematic of many of the changes the island is currently undergoing. Cuba is no longer the isolated island, cut off from the rest of the world's political, economic and social events, popular cultural influences, and consumer culture. Since the Special Period, and particularly in the past decade, Cuba has experienced fundamental and enormous changes on all levels of society. In this article ...