Department of Student Loans, Kidnap & Ransom
Page 12
*****
Ally walked down from one of the women-only rooms at the hostel in Havana and found Mick in the courtyard finishing an extra large guava milkshake and eating some mysterious round fried objects.
“What are you eating?”
“Papas rellenas.”
“Stuffed potatoes?”
“Sort of. The Cuban style is mashed potatoes with meat and other stuff in the center, then deep fried.”
“Other stuff?”
“Veggies, maybe. I’m not sure. But probably not.”
“You’re going to get scurvy eventually.”
“That’s what the fruit shakes are for,” Mick said, shaking his shake at Ally.
“Feel yourself getting fatter? Has the self-loathing set in yet?”
“Nope. But I’m concerned about you. Your hair and your clothes are different. That blouse is quite loose, and actually fashionable – especially considering that you’re American. Are you covering a new baby bump or a recent weight gain? ”
“You actually like my new look?” asked Ally.
“Well, the American college girl beach look had to go. Now you look like a European, or a particularly fashionable grad student.”
“I guess you would know…”
“About Europeans?”
“No, grad school,” said Ally.
“Ah, yeah. What I meant to say is that you don’t look like an American undergrad anymore.”
“I look older?”
“A decade at least. You’re growing old with grace.”
“You aren’t.”
“I’m not what?” asked Mick.
“Growing old with grace,” replied Ally.
“Doesn’t matter. I’m a guy. We have longer shelf lives. I mean, it looks like there’s a fifteen year age difference between us, with me being your senior, obviously. But everyone here probably thinks that we’re a couple.”
“Well, up until the point where I go back to the women’s dorm room.”
“Yeah, what’s up with that?” asked Mick. “Why aren’t we staying in a nice hotel and sharing a big bed to protect our cover as a happy vacationing couple?”
“Well, for one, I’m more man than you. It would be awkward. Also, this is Cuba. We don’t need a cover. I could go out in the street and loudly pledge my loyalty to Insurrectionary Anarchism and not a single person would care.”
“So this country is like some sort of anarchist paradise?”
“No. Not even close.”
“So a libertarian paradise then?”
“No,” said Ally emphatically. “This whole deal with the zapping booths and the ban on eye glasses in public places, it’s all in service of government control and revenue generation. It’s not for reasons of libertarianism and privacy. It’s for reasons of control over the locals and to make a nice environment for the shady tourists who come here to gamble and hang out in brothels.”
“Hmm. Clear as mud. Repeat that again, please. And in a language that a person who’s not an anarchist wannabe can understand.”
Ally was getting exasperated, and Mick was probably just baiting her, but she had the energy and patience – for now – to offer a longer explanation. She also had nothing else to do.
“OK. For example, eye glasses with cameras in them. After they were introduced back in the day, they got banned in all sorts of places: in clubs, in the gym, in the classroom, at the beach, at some restaurants. But they weren’t illegal there. They would just kick you out if you refused to take them off. And when the cameras became so small that they couldn’t be noticed, the ban extended to all eye glasses. But then the cameras moved to places that were harder to notice, like your eyebrows.”
“I’m still waiting for them to be implantable right in the eyeball,” offered Mick, unhelpfully.
“Sure, give it another 25 years and you can have that. But you will be a second class citizen. You will be greeting by signs that say ‘No Cyborg Losers’ and by a zapping booth that will fry all your internal electronics. Say goodbye to your ridiculously expensive implant.”
“You’re killing my dreams, Alison.”
“Good. But for now let’s just kill your illusions… So implants that record audio and video make you unwelcome – but not illegal – in certain places, especially places where people want privacy. But when and where is it actually illegal?”
“Airports, government buildings, when talking to the police, that sort of thing,” answered Mick.
“Exactly. All these so-called Privacy Laws are to protect authority figures,” stated Ally. “The police love to record everything. And when they shoot or beat someone, their video equipment mysteriously malfunctions. But private citizens’ recording gear always works perfectly. And that is a threat. It’s a threat to corrupt and brutal police. It’s a threat to politicians who whore themselves to lobbyists and don’t want an audio recording from their free dinner at a 5-star restaurant to appear online. So what happened? We got the Privacy Laws. And who do these privacy laws protect? Police, government workers and politicians. Not you. You can be recorded at anytime. And the recording can be streamed or uploaded. But what happens if you upload a video of a cop beating someone? You go to jail for violating their constitutional rights. Record riot police? You are guilty of harassment and inciting a riot. Record and upload video of some nobody being a jackass in a club? No problem. Record and upload video of a politician’s son being a jackass in a club? To jail you go.”
“Yeah, I know. I just wanted to test your anarchist battle skills,” said Mick. “I’m on board, why do you think I chose the Yucatán? I’ve been hiding for a while. Uploading video of someone there will result in a severe beating. It’s just something people know not to do. Kids there grow up as if audio and video privacy is the 11th commandment. They don’t need laws to tell them to not be jerks.”
“Yes, but in the US we don’t have an idea of privacy for everyone,” said Ally. “We now have a caste system where it’s OK to record and upload random citizens, but not authority figures or powerful people.”
Mick paused for a second to think, then asked “And why do you not like Cuba’s system?”
“Because it is so similar to the American system. They have different slogans, but the same content. The state spies intensively; the people can’t do the same in return. We as tourists are given the privilege of being anonymous. We are allowed to pay for everything in cash, we have an anonymous tourist visa, and we can go to casinos, clubs and brothels and be sure that our image or voice won’t be captured. We are in this hostel and the manager has no idea who we are. He only knows that we paid. But locals don’t have any sort of privacy like we do. This whole system for foreigners is set up to boost tourism and to scoop up the tourists who are too shady to be allowed to visit a classy place. Now do you want to hear about how Cuba is economically unequal and exploitative?”
“No. When I went for food I saw the nouveau riche yuppie larvae in their luxury cars and the street kids begging on the same street. It’s clear enough.”
“So you are developing a sense of social justice?” asked Ally.
“No, no. Not at all,” replied Mick “I believe what Alexis de Tocqueville said: ‘Every nation gets the government it deserves.’”
“Mick, that was Joseph de Maistre.”
“Well. I at least narrowed it down to Frenchmen,” said Mick, shrugging.
“de Maistre was a right-wing monarchist Frenchman who thought that the Pope should rule the world. Nice of you to reveal your true self, Mick.”
“Well, you’re no fun.”
“Sorry, those are the facts.”
“There are no facts, only interpretations.”
“Mick, if you start quoting Nietzsche, I will personally inject you with Cubola.”
“If I was in the unfortunate position where I was to be regularly subjected to your lecturing, I would inject the Cubola myself.”
Ally scowled.
“You’re not witty enough to have
come up with that yourself. Who are you paraphrasing now, Mick?”
“Sorry. I don’t know. But you’re right; I’m stealing that from someone. Or recycling… whatever.”
Mick and Ally then took a moment to enjoy the silence.
Mick’s enjoyment of the silence soon ran out and he lightly kicked Ally under the table. He looked at her and said quietly “Don’t look right away, just turn around casually and check out the guy over there.”
Across the small courtyard was a tall and skinny young man with questionable style in clothing that may not be accepted as fashionable for at least another five years, if ever. With a furrowed brow, He was furiously punching away on a faux old-fashioned typewriter with his phone attached, screen spread wide. Mercifully, the typing of the plastic and metal keys was muffled.
“Maybe this guy is going to write the great novel of the 21st century?” guessed Mick. “That honor is still up for grabs. But I bet he’ll at least write a best seller and make a ton of money, maybe even enough to pay off his loans for that Master of Arts in Critical Literature Studies. Maybe he’s even the second coming of Ernest Hemingway. I mean, we’re in Havana, right?”
“God, I could imagine a guy like you absolutely loving Hemingway in a hero-worship sort of way. He was such a real man, not soft and indecisive like today’s men,” said Ally, as drily as possible.
“What? Hemingway was a clown…and a fake.”
“Seriously? He’s not the real uber-man that all you types fawn over?”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” said Mick with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Hemingway invented the Bloody Mary, he hunted Nazi submarines with his yacht, he braved war zones, etcetera, etcetera. But come on, really? Look at those ridiculous photos where he’s posing with all his props, usually guns – typical of a guy who was never actually a soldier. Or that famous photo of him striking an old-school boxing pose with the gloves on? Hemingway says, and his supporters helped perpetuate the myth, that he challenged anybody and everybody on some island in the Bahamas to defeat him in a boxing match. Big cash prize. What a man-child fantasy: he defeated an entire island of black men! Everybody who wrote about Hemingway – all fans – didn’t mention that the first half-competent guy to step into the ring kicked his ass. That fact was discovered way later.”
“Oh, Mick! Your pursuit of truth is so noble,” said Ally, far less deadpan than before.
“Yeah, whatever. But listen… Now, since at least, what, the 1990s, we can debunk people’s BS with a crowd-sourced investigation online? If Hemingway was alive today we would have video of him getting spanked in the boxing ring. We would have surveillance footage of him senselessly attacking another writer in some publishing house. His ex-wives and one-night stands would have an outlet for their stories. He would be destroyed. People who saw him in war zones would be able to upload their thoughts on, what, maybe his cowardice, who knows? And his hunting in Africa? He probably had some Rhodesian guide hold his hand and walk him to some tethered cat to blast away at. It was probably somebody’s pet lion. Back then, before the internet, you could create whatever image you or your publicist wanted. Whatever. The dude liked getting drunk and watching Spaniards kill cows while other Spaniards cheered. Anyways, the man was a good marksman at short range with a shotgun.”
Mick had clearly rested his case.
Ally was not impressed.
“Mick, did you switch majors after half a semester of a Bachelor’s in Literature? Because that was the worst critique of a writer that I have ever heard. You avoided his writing entirely and went straight for attacking the man. It was like the internet comment section of literary criticism.”
“I love internet comment sections! I feel that, there, in that special place, I’m in my element.”
“Mick, take your ADD meds!” laughed Ally. She was actually not annoyed with Mick. He was starting to grow on her.
“No, no. I’m focused. Hemingway, right. You know, I read Old Man and the Sea. I liked it. But I’m not sure about his other books. I’ve never read any of them.”
Mick was silent for a while. Then he said, while avoiding looking Ally in the eyes, “Actually, I watched the film. I didn’t read the book. A park in Mexico was playing classic movies for free at night during the summer. I watched a Spanish dubbed version of Old Man and the Sea. I was a little bit drunk because the beer vendor kept coming back to me and my friends because we were paying more than the locals. So that’s maybe why I thought I read the book. I guess that’s why I had such vivid images in my head.”
Mick looked up and shrugged.
Ally was not surprised.