A Drone in Front of Saratoga Hotel and One of My Friends

By Carlos Fraguela

HAVANA TIMES — A few days ago, when I was on my way to work, I passed by the Saratoga Hotel entrance and found a right ruckus, the kind that forms when people get together in any city to see something they’ve never seen before or something new, I soon saw the first drone I would ever come to face with in my life.

I had seen them before in videos, however, when I saw this one which was different, I knew it was a drone. Its precise movements revealed the technology it had behind it. I read in Kiwik just how much they cost and I asked myself, why are they using it? It was getting late, that’s why I only took a picture.

When I got to work, I was told that one of the colleagues on my building restoration team had been arrested and fined. He is a young man who is called Denis, possibly the strongest out of all of us. He reminds me of a drone, he’s able to carry out extreme tasks and to top that off, he’s a very kind friend who we all like very much.

It turns out that he was stopped by the police on his way to work and made to open his daypack so they could search through it. He was carrying a kitchen knife inside which he had brought from home so that he could sharpen it on the stone we have at work. That’s why he was fined 500 pesos and they still want to prosecute for carrying a knife.

Arbitrary laws create more danger for human beings than preventing it. The government and the police have to look for a more productive ways to collect money other than taking it off workers. My friend has to work very hard in order to support his young son.

The next day, I saw a street peddler who sells knives visibly carrying 8 large ones in the Harris Brothers shop and I thought, what do you have to do if you buy a knife and need to take it home? Do you need to hire the police to escort you? In Cuba, our laws treat people like criminals and dumb slaves, unable to take responsibility for their actions.

The only people authorized to carry knives are the prisoners who the system uses to weed the city’s streets using machetes and who travel on public buses a lot of time out of necessity, I’ve seen them my myself.