In the town where Hemingway lived and wrote, I spotted a simple sentence painted on a wall: Yo soy Cuba (I am Cuba). To my eye, this scene summed up a lot of what I saw in Cuba. It was colorful, but also faded. It was urbanized, but also rough at the edges. It was lovely, but also hard and tragic and rough.

I have many emotions surrounding this trip, and most of them conflict with each other. They are still sorting themselves out in my head, and I am not at all sure where things are going to land. I’ll keep you posted…

Cojímar, Cuba
photographed 11.6.2022