Havana: Travel guide, prices and free housing · 2026

UUSAblogi · Oct 5, 2009Read

That's how we ended up settling in Little Havana, a Cuban neighborhood in Miami... a tiny, tiny apartment... there's a 3cm hole under the door, and through it, 'guests' come to visit us—Florida cockroaches... or lizards... and once, there was even a mouse. But on the bright side, we only paid $500 a month for two, which is very cheap by Miami standards. We're surrounded by a Spanish-speaking community; the Cubans are a bit intense, crazy even—when you walk down the street in the morning, you hear characteristic whistling, greetings, obscenities, and loud kisses behind you... 'Hola, chikas bonitas! Hi, mami! Hola, muchachas...' At first, it was fun—we aren't used to that back home, and suddenly you're getting so much attention! But after a couple of days, it started to get genuinely annoying: you're standing at a bus stop waiting for the bus, and passing cars honk at you, nasty Cuban faces lean out of the windows blowing kisses and compliments or offering rides... one guy even pulled up to us twice while we were waiting—we barely managed to explain we didn't need his help, since he didn't understand English... eventually, we just started telling them all off—some in Russian, some in English... or answering their Spanish in Russian.)) At night, or even in the evening, it's better not to go out at all—it's dangerous. Also, one thing surprised us: you walk to work in the morning and see someone's sneakers hanging high up on the power lines... that's how the progressive Cuban youth entertain themselves—stealing shoes and throwing them up there. Our commute to work became shorter, but there was no entertainment provided—this isn't Miami Beach, where you can take a peaceful evening stroll through the city at night... everything is different here... so we had to come up with our own entertainment and tried to spend our shared days off wisely.

UUSAblogi · Oct 5, 2009Read

As I mentioned, our landlady took charge of finding us a place to stay. And I must say, she approached it with full responsibility. The very next day, she called me and my friend over and said she had found the best place ever! That place turned out to be... a house! Our own house with two bathrooms, a fridge, air conditioning... right next to Reyna's house, 5 minutes from work and the beach! The only thing was, there was no furniture, but we didn't have to pay anything. We worked in the heart of a national park; after sunset, no one was allowed in. The only people living in this part of the island were rangers (park staff) and the owners of the restaurant where we worked. If Reyna hadn't told us that someone lived there, we wouldn't have known, because the houses were far from the prying eyes of vacationers, securely hidden behind trees. One of the rangers had lived in this house before us, which is why there was no furniture—she had just moved out. There was still electricity, but it could have been cut off any day. There was no lock on the door, but as it turned out, no one on the island, in this part of the park, locks their doors—there's no one to fear, only animals around: rabbits, squirrels, storks, iguanas, raccoons, and parrots. By the way, it was the best place we lived in during our time in Miami. It's a pity we didn't stay there for long. For two days, everything was just perfect: we didn't have to wake up at 5:40 anymore, we slept until 8!!! Then we had a leisurely breakfast and walked to work—only 5 minutes away! We didn't lock the doors, and we finally had a place to leave our things. We slept on the floor (it was carpeted), and the landlady brought us bedding. We had our own house! A huge space, 5 or 6 rooms... two bathrooms! Beautiful! In the evening after work, we met on the beach (when we lived on Miami Beach, we couldn't afford that—we got home from work when it was already dark). And on the beach, everything was free for employees: sun loungers, umbrellas, pedal boats, and even kayaks! All the rangers knew us and treated us kindly; it was great! But happiness is never complete. It's a good thing we didn't unpack our things—we just knew. Two days later, Reyna informed us that we had to move out. Volunteers had arrived at the park, and the house would be given to them. It was very disappointing to lose everything like that... homeless again. But the landlady didn't abandon us in trouble; she said that if she couldn't find us housing, she was ready to take us in herself. But it didn't come to that. The next day, Reyna took us to look at apartments—a small flat in the Cuban district of Miami, Little Havana. Well, what can I say? After changing so many places, I wanted to be sure about tomorrow, I wanted to be able to unpack my things properly, put food in the fridge instead of wherever, and not carry a bag with documents and return tickets everywhere. But after having what was practically our own house, we were not ready to see THIS (what turned out to be our future shelter)... not at all. Here I must tell you in more detail about the place where we spent all the remaining time in Miami—our 5th house... oh, what a house... a tiny, minuscule apartment... the whole thing was the size of one of the rooms in our previous house. The walls were painted a terrible yellow color, and there was an air conditioner on the wall that made the wall vibrate noticeably. You had to go up steps to get to the bathroom, the kitchen was right in the bedroom (1x2 m), there was a microwave, but it didn't work, there was a stove, but you couldn't turn it on at the same time as the air conditioner—otherwise, everything would go wrong=))