As I was passing by one of the corners at the Cuatro Caminos farmers market, a crowd caused me to stop for a moment. I wanted to try and see if they were having another caserolazo (pots and pans protest) over the food shortages and high prices there.

Obtaining food has become a personal battle for me. Every week it’s a struggle to find one or another eatable that’s in short supply. That’s how the month goes by. Last week it was eggs.

Competing. Competing and trying to win. This is the idea behind several programs directed at children shown on Cuban TV. There are others that — though they could cultivate creativity — end up generating frustration.

I had to pack up all my stuff once again, with this making it the third apartment I’ve lived in since I finished college.In just one year and five months I’ve bounced through three municipalities here in Havana

The city of Sancti Spiritus doesn’t smell bad. There’s no garbage set out along the streets or perpetual mounds rubble or the suffocating odor of diesel. Instead, when the sun sets, the city’s gardens give it the fragrance of night-blooming jasmine.

In December I took a bus back to my hometown of Sancti Spiritus, avoiding the torturous train, which — because of its slow speed — has been baptizing as the “milk train.” It had been almost eight months since I’d gone back home, though that’s insufficient time to forget the characteristics of the route.

This year I didn’t participate in the customary rituals of every December 31. For many people here, throwing water out into the street at midnight is a spell aiming to purge the evils of the past year. It’s supposed to end and distance misfortunes from the year that has just begun.

I ended up with nothing from my salary for these last days of the month. Actually, this is the norm for most salaried employees in Cuba. The same thing happened with partner, Eddy.

What justification did the city’s officials have for canceling a cultural activity created by the community? Who gave the order?

The wind has started kicking up and pounding on the windows of my interim apartment here in Alamar, on Havana’s far east side. These gusts of cool air always suggest that winter’s on the way, anxiously anticipated but always timid here in the tropics.