My iPhone doesn't work here, I can't get wifi (which, in Cuba is pronounced WEE-FEE, so get it right if you ever go there, my capitalist peoples) so I didn't expect the big BOOM outside the airport.
Then another boom.
That's it, I grab my mother's hand. Either the Americans are invading again (yay? boo?) or the heavens are about to explode. My weather app and CNN app and Twitter app are flaccid, helpless here.
The small one-gate airport in Cienfuegos, Cuba was built in the 1920s and looks like it was last updated before the Revolution with the exception of the barbed wire that lines the one story building, giving the building the appearance of a US prison. There are no TV's playing CNN, and I have no idea what is going on which is why I am peeling my nail polish off, nail by nail, channeling every bit of fear into something small.
After a long pause another BOOM fills the airport -- probably magnified by the wall-sized window framing the opaque post-sunset plane landing area --- and then the electricity goes off and everything goes dark.
My mom slides her hand into mine and we squeeze fingers. This is it, this is our last trip to Cuba, we did everything we came to do, we said our goodbyes. We are at peace. If only we can get out of here.
