A decade ago, we could not have filmed in Cuba.

Now, we can visit the country and take in its African roots and the prominent role of Cuban women, the peculiar and intriguing role of athletics, the widespread artistic expression and burgeoning economic opportunities.

An island and its society formerly closed to people from my country.

Ah-hah, yes.

Funding for In the Americas with David Yetman was provided by Agnese Haury ♪ Funding for In the Americas with David Yetman was also provided by the Guilford Fund.

♪ ♪ In the Americas with David Yetman theme From Miami, it's about a half hour flight to Havana.

It's only 90 miles from Key West Havana is Cuba's capitol and by far its largest city: a little over 2 million people.

For us in the United States, Cuba is a different and until recently, forbidden world, but that's changing.

Havana is alive with restoration and reconstruction, full tour buses, and taxis.

New business opportunities are everywhere awaiting government approval and new rules and regulations.

But Cuba has a seemingly endless supply of cultural and natural treasure and the invasion of tourists has just begun.

♪ ♪ ♪ My friend, Myra García Rodríguez is a Havanera as Havana women are known.

She is immersed in Cuba's culture and has seemingly endless connections into a world of Cuba, unknown to most outsiders.

This place where we are now exemplifies that which is a fantastical reality as our Cuban writer, Alejo Carpentier would say.

An imaginative world that emerged from one of the great Cuban creators and artists our country has produced.

His name is Fuster.

Fuster emerged in the 1990's when we were going through a special period.

In the early 1990's, Cuba experienced what Cubans now call "the special period."

Almost overnight all foreign aid was cut off from the Eastern block, which sent the Cuban economy into an immediate tailspin.

It is estimated that during that five years the Cuban population lost 30% of its overall weight due to the privation brought on by the US blockade and the end of funding from international sources.

People were experiencing an extreme privation within the community and Fuster wanted to improve their living conditions, to improve their surroundings.

Since we had no material goods, he sought instead to provide spiritual wealth, and in that way, improve people's lives.

Fuster creations are laden with symbolism and what we might call Cubanism.

If we start here on top, it looks like a cross but it's actually a peasant, a Cuban peasant, symbolizing being on the top but also the suffering the peasants have undergone.

If we look at these various representations, here is a whole group of Cuban symbols.

We have the peasant and the peasant woman exchanging flowers, a symbol of equality.

We have the royal palm, the symbol of Cuba, and the royal palm on the tail of a caiman, a member of the alligator-crocodie family.

If you look at the island of Cuba on a map, it looks just like a caiman or an alligator.

The rooster standing on the top of the caiman which is a dangerous thing to do, is calling everyone get up in the morning and get to work.

We've got work to do, let's get it done.

All of these put together is a striking symbol of Cuba, the work to be done and the equality and representation of a whole country.

Cuba has gone to great lengths to stress its cultural roots derived from Africa.

Our next stop is in a museum in the heart of downtown Havana.

This is the only female folkloric performance company in Cuba.

It was formed with the international folkloric group in 1991.

And in 1994, it became an indipendent group set by the first women who dared to play the bata drums.

They accompany songs and dances of the Yoruba region or Santeria as it is known here in Cuba.

Yoruba, a religion, forbids women to play the bata drums but because of the importance of these drums in the development of our popular and traditional music and because it gives Cuban music international significance.

We believe the role of the drums needed to go beyond the boundaries of the religious practice.

The challenge was to get people to understand the difference between the drum playing for religious rites and the secular drum that is played in orchestras.

Play almost anywhere.

What we would like is for the world to understand that women here are always moving forward.

And we are ready to demonstrate all of our potential if that is in performance art, better still In Cuban history, women have been largely invisible Cubans have tried to change this.

One sign is a startup transportation business, begun, owned and operated by women.

As in many, many countries of the world, the bicycle is more than a neat invention.

Here it█s a basic form of transportation and many, many people require bicycles to get to work or to the store or wherever they need to go.

This bicycle shop is private ownership but the private ownership is a cooperative run by women.

We came up with the idea for business because there are no bike shops in Havana and I believe this is the same for all of Cuba.

We offer bike maintenance and repairs.

Students and retirees pay 30% less for services provided.

For children, their bicycles are repaired at a 50% discount.

Others who need something done sometimes aren't charged anything.

We are satisfied just by helping others.

The state sells bicycles but we have customers who do not want their bikes anymore and we will help them sell their bike.

It will be almost two years now since we opened and it has been very good, very productive.

Yes, we have many customers and some of these bikes are rental.

I'm the only one here with bicycle experience, but the girl who work here like the bikes and have learned a lot.

Well, I started cycling at 12 years of age.

I became a professional cyclist.

In Cuba, being professional means being a member of the national team of the country.

During the special period, there was insufficient means Now we see cooperative ventures between the state and indivuduals, people who earn a living by providing expanded transportation services like taxis, buses, and thee are also classic cars cooperatives.

we, in this shop, promote bicycles as a healthier means of transportation.

Well to give you an example, from Cerro, they call us by phone and we go to their homes to fix it on site or to bring it back here for service.

70% of workers here are women and 30% are men.

Traveling anywhere in Cuba, visitors are overwhelmed by the vintage automobiles that serve as taxis.

It's a result of the 50-year blockade of Cuba by the United States.

Cubans have made the most of a virtually complete embargo.

For many years, Cubanos have had to be the mechanics of our own cars.

We have not had a chance to bring in parts from the US.

Therefore, we have had to restore the old cars with our own resources to keep them running which is why they're so valuable.

This car was a family car; it was my uncle's, a guy who lived on the outskirts of the city.

He gave it to my mother in very poor conditions and I began to restore it six years ago.

It took me about a year to finish the restoration.

And because of opportunities created by the government to open up the private sector in Cuba, I started working as a taxi driver with this car.

And all of the Chevy cars that I own are from 1955 to 60.

Our company, Nostalgic Car is divided into two parts.

The garage is operated by my husband, Julio, and I am the one who manages the rental business with the state travel agencies.

We have a group of drivers, 22 drivers also very passionate about classic car restoration and they keep them in good condition.

And I give them employment to all of them.

And each car up to four passengers will fit and we'll handle groups of 40, 50 people.

Sometimes, they ask me to find up to 25 classic cars for large groups or for individuals with a tour guide or sometimes without tour guides.

And the drivers tae tourists around the city and evn to places outside of Havana, to the most important tourist places in the country.

You know, during the special period we had fewer problems than we have now because during that time many car parts still came from the Soviet Union when it was still the Soviet Union.

And many parts of those Russian cars will work on these cars.

At that time, there were still things available in Cuba and the cars had no major problems yet.

Then we started to see more problems that began when modern cars arrived with more sophisticated technology, making it more difficult to fix them.

Everything is original on this restored with uh-what a treasur!

They don't make them they like they used to.

Julio was able, has been able to go to the US and get some parts and bring them back for restoration.

This mirror isn█t original but he was able to go to the US and find one and bring it back and put it on.

That's the opening piece.

So, this is uh, actually a Toyota motor, the same one that's in a Toyota Four Runner.

Uh, it gets much, much better mileage; it's much more powerful.

And the parts now are such you don't need a computer to work on this vehicle.

A good mechanic can work on every single part of the whole car.

This is a 59 Chevy Impala convertible.

There are very few of these.

Uh but he has gotten a hold of it and he is beginning restoration from the bottom very much to the top.

This seeming mess then will be restored to a gleaming beauty So he's got another six, seven months of work.

The steering is not in good condition so everything here goes and the result will be otro tesoro.

This is a 58 Chevy Bel Air, 90% of it is original.

Ah, ha Yes!

Uh!

What a marvelous machine.

El sonido Chevrolet.

Chevrolet, yes!

So, this is the last car he bought.

It's a 60 Chevy and that was the last time you could import any kind of car into Cuba from the United States or virtually anywhere.

These are the original windows.

The guy had it in a garage so it's in very good shape and he agreed to sell it to Julio.

It's the original radio, 1960, works.

It's an old time radio.

They have tubes and when it goes inside a garage, you can't get good reception.

Here it goes.

The oil light goes off.

You're ready to cruise Cuba's intervention into the economy extends to sports.

Just down the street from the car shop is a very Cuban training camp.

For over a century, boxing has been big in Cuba.

The Olympic games are often dominated by Cuban boxers.

The tradition continues but what is really different is now women boxers are appearing in Cuba.

Since I was a child I watched boxing on TV and I loved it.

And boxing for Cuba is to say, well many say it's like baseball But to me, boxing is going for the gold.

It's like the king of sports here in Cuba.

And when women's boxing gets certified, it will be more pleasurable.

I think the Cuban people will accept women's boxing with devotion and tremendous pride.

In fact, when I was walking down the street like right now on the way here, a neighbor told me that we will approve women's boxing, and you know, I say of course, that will be something fantastic.

Boxing for Cuba is everything.

We've been training female boxers here for several months, waiting for official approval.

Now we currently have four women boxers training here.

We only have one that is training today but we have four in total.

As you can see, there is a girl who is 56 kilos and we have other girls competing at 41, 60 and 52 kilos.

In my opinion these girls, when they open up boxing to women, they have the talent to be national champions and maybe world and Olympic champions.

Just as we have Cuban champions in the men's sport.

Boxers from this training camp have been world champions and Olympic champions.

We have a pyramid structure here where the boys are selected from the base, the basic training centers.

The quality ones move upward, hopefully arriving at the top of the pyramid, the national team as they get older.

Here right now, we have a world champion, Daniel Matellón, a world champion.

Daniel has been a student here since childhood.

Many other champions began their careers here.

I have never laced up a boxer's gloves before but I think I am pretty good at it.

They could probably hire me.

These boxers are not professionals but they're professionals.

They're actually government employees, it's what they do.

Since 1957, Fidel Castro ended professional sports here in Cuba He wanted every Cuban to take part in sports and the best to become government employees and receive their success in th█ Olympics and other places.

Oh, my gosh!

These folks work six days a week, all day that's what they do.

So they have to be really fit.

I'm not going to take any of them on.

Are you sure you don't want to go out and just spend five minutes training?

The number one sport in Cuba is baseball but boxing is the number two in popularity.

It's always been the case since about 1900, there have been these great professional Cuban boxers before 1957 and afterwards there have been these remarkable amateurs.

It will be really interesting to see what happens now with the changes taking place.

I began boxing as a hobby.

I was the only woman who came here to train in the gym.

But since sports in Cuba are free, you can practice the sport of your choice.

I was accepted here to start my training.

To be a female boxer in a gym where all are male, everyone around you are guys, it is super fantastic because you're the center of attention.

Everyone loves you.

Everyone supports you.

Each boxer tries to teach me a little of his technique, try to help me, try to teach me his style, the boxing technique.

And now more girls are starting to box and I serve as an inspiration to them because I have a higher technical level, intense desire and a graceful style as a female boxer.

And despite my age, the young female boxers watch me and are inspired.

From boxing, Myra takes us to a street gathering unlike anything we would see in the United States.

It's an impromptu celebration of Cuba's African roots through music.

We're here in the streets, an alley called Hamels.

This is the place where the Afro-Cuban culture breathes.

We come here to see the rumba.

The rumba is a genre of music that is born spontaneously.

As a matter of fact, every Sunday has become a meeting place for rumberos.

Every Sunday, a rumba group performs here.

The musical rhythms, chants, themes, expressions emerge spontaneously.

It is a meeting place for Cubans and a way to have fun.

Along with that, we had a chance to see incredible call and response singing and dancing taking place.

And drumming that is associated with Santeria religions, popular culture and Catholic faith.

A mixture?

A mixture, absolutely.

One thing that strikes me here is that Cubans everywhere acknowledge the huge importance of African-Cuban culture in the society.

Everywhere, they brag and brag as they should.

But one of the last things that Fidel Castro said when he was leaving the presidency, he regretted he was never able to incorporate African-Cubans into the higher echelons of government and the Communist party.

Well, it's easy to outlaw prejudice in society but you know there's nothing you can do, uh, about people's attitudes.

That takes education, it takes longer even than the fifty years of the Cuban revolution.

It will come, I have no doubt about it.

That there will be a growing sense of equality of all Cubans.

It's safe to say that in terms of advances of people of color in the society, Cubans could teach the United States a huge amount.

As the situation becomes normalized, we are both gonna be enriched by the opportunities to share those values together.

Join us next time In the Americs with me , David Yetman Ecuador is mostly jungle.

That's not well known by the casual traveler or even most Ecuadorians since the bulk of them live in the Western...

The Amazon has few roads and until recently few people besides the Indians who have lived there for eons.

Things are changing.

With the influx of tourists, the Cuban government has realized they need to accommodate the culinary needs of these hordes of people now coming into Cuba.

One of the ways they have done it is to allow for semi-private enterprises, families to operate semi-private restaurants.

And these restaurants are ordering it to attract certain clientele.

This particular place is the first place in Havana to offer sushi.

Funding for In the Americas with David Yetman was provided by Agnese Haury Funding for In the Americas with David Yetman was also provided by the Guilford Fund.

Copies of this and other episodes of In the Americas with David Yetman are available from the Southwest Center to order call 1-800-937-8632 Please mention the episode number and program title Please be sure to visit us at intheamericas.com or at intheamericas.org