After wobbling through the '90s, the island's economy has improved thanks to tourism, foreign investment, and private enterprise. In 2014, Cuba has picked itself up off the mat. It's an escapade I've kept secret for 23 years. I don't know it yet, but I'm about to have a romantic adventure in Cuba. Haitians landing on Virginia Key, the saga of alleged airline bomber Orlando Bosch, Mariel prisoners being deported for the first time - I'm racking up big headlines on the front page.Īnd after years of inhaling the secondhand smoke of exile nostalgia, I'm finally seeing the island for myself. I'm covering immigration, Cuban exile affairs, crime, and anything else they throw my way at the Miami Herald.
In 1991, I'm enjoying a peak moment of my life. The low point will come in 1994, when more than 37,000 balseros are stopped at sea en route to Florida. Desperate Cubans by the thousands are roping together inner tubes and launching themselves across the Florida Straits. Worse, the imploding Soviet Union is withdrawing its massive economic support. The economy is cratering as global sugar prices sag. Stop blaming apps, no one is forced to use them.The year is 1991, and Cuba is suffering. There are plenty of guys I thought would be out of my league in terms of looks who liked me after talking to me. It keeps the looks portion which would normally be short lived extend into the most important part of the exchange. You could meet hot guys just going about your daily errands and they’re actually able so socialize because they do something other than stare at a phone all day pretending to be something they’re not.Īll apps do is make people obsess over looks which in normal situations only go so far. The people complaining don’t realize all they have to do is stop using the apps, keep up on current events, and actually talk to people outside in normal settings. There’s a reason THEY prefer apps even if they’re physically attractive, socially they’re quite unattractive, and that matters far more once you get past the looks.Īll they want is sex because they know you’ll lose interest five seconds after they open their trap to speak. In fact the few times I’ve interacted with people from online sites/apps they were really terrible socially and couldn’t hold actual conversation. I feel like most of the people who gravitate to these apps are not very good socially so they don’t realize when people are actually hitting on them. I get hit on every time I go outside, I’m not always interested, but people do actually TALK. Go outside of the big dumb cities(or even still in them) and actually talk to people. Uh nothing has changed in America really. One bi guy has accounts on all the apps, but he seems pretty much over it:
Though Grindr founder Joel Simkhai calls Cuba “a growth opportunity in a market dying for Grindr,” the locals don’t seem to be all that enthused about the possibility.
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( Cuban salaries, on average, 20 Cuban convertible pesos a month.) Apple users additionally, once their iPhone is unlocked, must pay middlemen to install apps, with several gay Cubans saying they were either too poor or too embarrassed to request an installation of Grindr or its ilk. The experience is even more uphill for locals, who pay 2 Cuban convertible pesos per hour for internet use.
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But a recent series of Grindr check-ins here by this reporter revealed, on average, 11 online users in this city of two million (a population roughly equivalent to Houston’s).Įven in a five-star hotel along the Malecón with four-bar Wi-Fi reception, one typical check-in, after several false starts, required 14 minutes to open the app. The New York Times has a fascinating piece on the throwback gay culture of Havana, which seems like something out of NYC circa 1978 – in a good way:Ĭuba has up to 4,000 active daily Grindr users, said Jennifer Foley Shields, a publicist for the app. Gay culture in Havana, Cuba is a respite from the app-obsessed culture of the rest of the world since they’re not really up to the technology, and the gays seem to be more than OK with it.