Brazilians Take Advantage of the Night
HAVANA TIMES – I grew up hearing from my parents that in Cuba, people don’t work. At first, I didn’t understand why they would say that, but when I started my working life, I had no choice but to agree with them.
I spent my first ten years jumping from job to job. At the first sign of trouble, I would tell myself, “I don’t have to put up with this,” and I would leave. Sometimes, weeks or months would go by before I found another job, but my father covered all the expenses, so I didn’t feel any financial pressure.
In all the places where I worked (state companies or institutions) the goal was to leave early. Often, there wasn’t much to do, or the staff would turn a blind eye to avoid working.
“Eight hours of real work can destroy anyone,” my father would emphasize.
Here in Brazil, the workday in most companies is seven and a half hours, six days a week, with an hour or an hour and a half for a break. This adds up to eight and a half or nine hours dedicated to work. Maybe a bit more if you consider the preparation time and commute.
At first, it seemed too tough. During the last ten years as an independent journalist in Cuba, I had worked two or three days a week, only half a day. The rest of the time was spent running errands and struggling for food.
Here, food is within reach, no need to “fight” for it, but the work is hard, and there’s no turning a blind eye during those seven and a half hours.
So, household duties and other tasks are done in the remaining time, sometimes stealing hours from sleep. And if you still have the energy to study, improve yourself, pursue a hobby, get a driver’s license, etc., you have to squeeze your schedule even more and steal more hours from sleep.
And many people do this. A manager at the company where I work told me that to graduate in veterinary medicine, she spent a long time sleeping only one hour a day. “I stayed awake with showers and coffee,” she said on my first day.
When someone asks for help, some of the members of the church I belong to, leave their jobs and go assist others, and they get home just in time to eat and shower before sleeping. There are also those who work at a company until five in the afternoon, then go do Uber until ten at night.
In this soccer-loving country, teenagers train at night, as I often see on the field in my neighborhood. For them, it’s the only way to pursue their dreams.
Surprisingly, I have also gotten used to this rhythm of life. Today, which is my only day off during the week, I will also work to make a little extra money, and in the few free minutes I have, I’m taking the time to write this diary post.