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Getting robbed abroad does not happen to many people; it happens to us in the worst way. It doesn’t happen to the vast majority of people to have to deal with the police during a trip. While our vicissitudes with the police in Cuba is an anecdote that I always enjoy so much when I tell it.
Going to the police during a trip, but staggering
Without knowing where to go, and without notifying the chick in the casa particular, we walked out to find the police. We were in a daze, my friend was staggering. The account of those who spoke to us on the phone was that we sounded drunk. We wandered around the metropolis (there was no Google Maps at the time) for maybe an hour. Incidentally, we were also in the suburbs, until we happened to be right in front of a police station.
We spent the whole day in their company. They proved willing, but very poor in means. We toured police stations, hospitals, the complaint sites, and made statements and rough sketches. Unfortunately, all vain efforts; we did not speak Spanish, they spoke neither Italian nor English.
We were assigned to a very sweet female inspector. On some rounds she had a police driver (to open the beat-up Lada she had to give the door a vigorous shove). On others she called her taxi driver boyfriend. The picturesque aspect of this by the way very kind taxi driver was the fact that he was disabled. In particular he had a deformed hand and practically drove with one hand.
I remember the horror and disgust I felt when I had to enter the hospital bathroom to collect my urine. More amusing was noticing the smiling faces of the policemen who went into the bathroom with papers and came out without them. They were using papers instead of toilet paper!
In addition, the police in Cuba at the time had no PCs or cell phones. Even in the following days they never called us, but left word with the casa particular that we would have to call them back.
Robbed abroad: holy my brothers
They stole my cell phone, not my friend’s, which was really a ruin, and it was our salvation. Although we later found out that the good Castro was charging exorbitant rates for intercontinental calls, I think 8 euros a minute.
Another paycheck went away because in addition to the many phone calls to update and ask for help, I heard every day, several times, from my virtual girlfriend.
The next day, again on foot and under a tropical downpour we went to the embassy. Being robbed abroad in most countries is not a big deal, in Cuba it is.
We thought we could find assistance and help. But all we were told was that the credit card we had was not working in Cuba because of the embargo. While mine that I had left in Bologna, on the other hand, I knew it would work because I had inquired about it. According to them, the only way to receive money was to follow procedures outlined in a document they gave us.
If the misadventure had been limited to theft, certainly the balance would have been negative, but still much better than it was for heeding the embassy’s advice. We were given the opportunity to experience three agonizing days of fasting, wandering around greater Havana.
With the inevitable delay due to the time difference, we were helped by one of my brothers who, following instructions, went to the branch of the specific bank indicated by the embassy to forward us the money. Although he explained that we were without money abroad, thus in an extreme emergency situation, they would not accept his request. They claimed that he would first have to open an account and deposit a significant amount. He tried in the branch in another city where they laboriously forwarded the international transfer to us.
Wandering between offices.
The next day we went to the office that was supposed to receive our money. But they explained to us that they used to work with all the banks in Europe except the one specifically pointed out to us by the embassy. They were not at all certain that that money would ever arrive and were surprised that they had given us such baseless indications. We called back our compatriots, also surprised, who told us they could give us 50 euros.
I point out that that morning, just to try, despite what the embassy said, we had tried to withdraw from an ATM with my friend’s card, but to no avail.
At that point another one of my brothers had an idea; report my card lost (despite the fact that I was sure I had left it in the car in Bologna) and ask for a cash advance. Brilliant idea, but given previous misadventures, until we had the money in hand we didn’t want to believe it.
Robbed abroad? first solution laugh!
In the meantime, we no longer had a dime, the particular house chick kept providing us with a hearty breakfast, but that night we had dinner sharing a packet of mignon chips. On the bright side, we never despaired; on the contrary, the idea of finding ourselves on the other side of the world without a penny and without knowing how to survive for another 10 days made us laugh, especially thinking how other friends in the same situation would have reacted instead We returned to our room (in the meantime at least we put ourselves to sleep in the same one to save money) drenched by yet another tropical downpour and with the sgrigna (a Romagnolo dialect term to describe when you can’t stop laughing, even without having the reason for it).
Well before the office opened, the next morning we were where we were supposed to get our money, which was actually there, but very taxed and significantly less than we had asked for. At least now we could finally get out of Havana, we paid the lady who had hosted us and took the bus to Cienfuegos. Although we had practically lost a week as well as money, we thought we could still enjoy at least half of the planned vacation.
Let’s take a look at some of Cuba
Our misadventures were not yet over, and they were enriched with some other movie situations, albeit in the Cuban version and therefore a bit fake. We were not only robbed abroad, but there was more.
That evening we found ourselves in a small bar where at one point a guy started talking, we guessed that it was a book presentation. Neither of us understood a word of when it was being said, but everyone was laughing heartily, and so we started laughing too, not knowing why, and indeed the fact that the people around us did not know that we were laughing despite having no reason to, made us laugh even more.
In Cuba, at least until recently, the cars were all old, patched up and beautiful, as is explained in this link.
Movie situations, police recognition
Back at the hotel we were told that the police had been looking for us. We called them back and they said we had to go back to Havana because they thought they had found one of the girls. We were supposed to confirm that it was her like in the movies (actually in a much more homemade way).
They thought they had tracked her because of my phone signal. The issue is that in an equipped country, you can identify the phone very accurately, whereas with Cuban means at that time, they had only been able to know that she was in an area the size of Tuscany.
In Cuba, crimes against tourists are punished very heavily, and the 2 chicks were risking so much because they would be charged with very serious crimes; the police were committed, but, as mentioned, their means were extremely limited. So much so that when they showed us the 3 girls among whom one of our scammers was supposed to be, we had to say that none of them even vaguely resembled us; it was nothing like in the movies where you always identify the bad guy. Being robbed abroad is not always the same.
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