My Experiences On The Cosmos Cuba Trip

It is not every day that you get the chance as an American citizen to go to Cuba. I had to take advantage of this opportunity afforded to me by the New York Cosmos. I’m a big fan of the team, but my motivation for going on the trip was more about seeing Cuba before it is commercialized through more open relations with the USA. For both reasons, it was a very special experience that I will remember for a long time.




The Cosmos put together a very nice itinerary for the fans who came along. Since we arrived at the hotel very late on Sunday night, that was pretty much that. We checked in and went to sleep. Of course, the flight down itself had been the entertainment for that evening. It’s not every day you are on the same plane with your favorite soccer team, as well as Pele and Carmelo Anthony. When we arrived it was to a media frenzy at the Havana airport. Pele and Raul are very famous there, and those of us on the trip (including Raul’s teammates) vicariously experienced their fame.



The tour of Havana began Monday morning. We went to the Havana Club rum museum. Rum like cigars are one of the staples of Cuba. On bus 322, the bus assigned to the fans along with some Cosmos staff, we had a wonderful tour guide named Elias. Elias described the history of what we drove by in Havana with a rich accent that added to the entertainment value of his descriptions. Great guy. His descriptions were from a Cuban perspective but balanced to not be offensive to Americans on the occasions where we came across monuments of conflict between our two countries. Elias embodied the vibe we got from the Cuban people in general: welcoming of us as guests, proud of his culture and looking forward to better relations in the future rather than being hung up on the past.




After the rum museum we went on a walking tour of the Golden Mile in Havana, a beautiful section of Havana that has been restored for tourists. Beautiful parks, lovely colorful buildings, open plazas with old churches, pubs, shops and street entertainers trying to lighten our load by a few CUCs (Cuban Convertible Pesos). Upon seeing my Cosmos t-shirt, Jeremy Wilkins, the Vice Chairman of One World Sports and basically Seamus O’Brien’s right hand guy, bought several of us mojitos in a local bar claiming to make the world’s best (they have a strong claim).



The Cosmos had arranged for lunch at a paladar, a privately owned restaurant. Paladars are one of the few examples of private businesses in Cuba, where the government owns at least 51% of almost all businesses. As a result, you don’t find tax added to your charges when you are shopping, though Elias told us that taxes are coming next year. Perhaps this is a precursor to more privatization of industry.




When finished at the paladar we headed over to the Romeo y Juliet cigar shop where many people stocked up on their maximum of $100 in value per person of cigars and rum that we were allowed to take back to the USA. Then it was off to the hotel for some free time before the evening’s welcome reception hosted by the Cosmos, with free mojitos and other drinks, as well as plenty of appetizers to fill up on. After this myself and a group of fellow fans who had become companions went to the hotel’s cigar bar, where we found Carmelo Anthony and his crew. Carmelo was gracious enough to take pictures with us before he headed out to another venue. Rumors around Carmelo investing in a NASL team swirled around the trip, from reviving the Puerto Rico Islanders to starting a new Puerto Rico team by Fall 2017 to wanting to put a team in Havana itself.



The following day was match day. In the morning, Elias took us to a marketplace in Havana, which resembled a flea market. Prices were negotiable and various products were on sale from clothing to leather goods to children’s toys to artwork. This was great place to load up on souvenirs for family and friends. One interesting thing about Cuba is that your credit cards and debit cards don’t work, so its only the cash you bring with you. That itself gets converted unfavorably. I converted US$100 and got 87 CUCs. Surprisingly, prices of items were pretty much in line with the USA, so your money doesn’t go further like you would expect. You are also pretty disconnected there, since your cell phone doesn’t work. The hotel Internet was 14 CUCs for 2 hours of service, and the connectivity felt like a 56K modem. Between that and the streets filled with classic cars, it felt like traveling back in time. The classic cars are mostly taxis, because the average Cuban cannot afford a car. From the market it was back to the hotel for some free time until we headed over for the game.



At 3:30PM, we loaded back onto bus 322 and headed over to Estadio Pedro Marrero. The stadium itself was not much to write home about, but the experience was amazing. The Cuban fans had loaded into the stands by the time we were let off the bus. Once we went through ticketing and waited for everyone to gather, it was time to head down to the seats. I happened to be the first of us to walk into the stands. The Cuban fans began chanting “USA, USA, USA” as we entered. It was an overwhelming and gracious welcome that sent chills up my spine. The others felt that way too. We made our way to our section and interacted with the Cuban fans around us with a kind of cautious curiosity. They were again very welcoming and soccer fans just like us. One section of Real Madrid fans began chanting something, and then some Barcelona fans chanted against them good naturedly. As you can imagine, everyone wanted to see Raul. Another spine tingling moment was when the Cuban youth choir sung the Star-Spangled Banner.


(poor video quality, apologies, but its worth it for the audio)

The teams took the field after some ceremony, and began a match which quickly became more chippy than I had hoped for. After all, this was a friendly and my hope for the game itself was primarily that now one got hurt. As I was happy to remind the coaching staff during the trip, the key matchup is on June 17th and let’s keep everyone healthy for that. The Cosmos put a goal on the Cubans rather quickly via Lucky Mkosana. Then another came through Guenzatti and another through Chirishian. Still in the first half, the general sense among the Cosmos fans I was around was “very nice boys, now take it easy a little bit since there are 15,000 Cubans behind us that we don’t want to upset.” Then Lucky scored again, a beautiful strike before half time. The Cubans remained gracious hosts. Fortunately for international relations, things settled down in the second half, the Cubans got a goal and aside from David Diosa getting jacked up like a NFL wide receiver catching a ball over the middle right in front of an awaiting linebacker. Fortunately Diosa and Leo Fernandes, who also got hurt earlier, are OK according to Alyssa Alpert. The game ended 4-1, Raul having gone 90 minutes without injury, and we headed back to bus 322.



It took a while for some folks to regroup, so we watched a heated discussion between some Cuban fans that Elias assured us was normal post-game banter between friends. It consisted of several gentleman yelling in each others faces and walking around each other confrontationally. The bus took us back to the hotel, where after an hour to get changed the Cosmos had arranged for us to have dinner at the Havana Cafe, where we were entertained by the Grammy-winning jazz band, the Buena Vista Social Club. It was a heck of a show.

From there we went to the hotel bar, where we ended up running into several Cosmos players, including Danny Szetela, Adam Moffat, Hunter Gorskie, Roversio, Hunter Freeman, Carlos Mendes, Hagop Chirishian and Jimmy Maurer. They were very friendly and took pictures with us. The players in general were friendly and happy to take photos with the fans. Maurer and Gorskie both talked to us for a while on at various points the trip, as did Mads Stokkelein. Very good guys and down to earth people. I also chatted with NASL commissioner Bill Peterson for a while. He gets a lot of stick, but he is a very nice man who was comfortable talking to the fans.



The following morning before the flight was free time, so a few of my companions and I headed over to the Museum of the Revolution to take a look at history from a Cuban point of view. One thing that I found interesting there was that it was much less Fidel Castro centric than I was expecting. Beyond that, Raul Castro was not featured very much. The reverence was spread fairly evenly among a group of “founding fathers” in Fidel Castro, Che Guevera and Camilo Cienfuegos, as well as the poet Jose Marti who was cited as an important inspiration for the revolution. There was even a bust of Abraham Lincoln their museum, as the Cubans admire Lincoln. They also had artwork of Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, but those depictions were not flattering to put it nicely.



Back to hotel from there to pack up and head to the airport, and after an uneventful if somewhat delayed flight back to reality, with everyone’s faces back in their cell phones to catch up on days of messages. It was a special time and I am grateful to the Cosmos for making it possible. It was wonderful to meet many new friends who I hope to see in the future at Cosmos matches.

 

I want to say there were 10-20 supporters on the trip depending on whether you are counting family members of players and staff or people only loosely affiliated with the team who paid their own way (10 if not, 20 if so).

I didn't get much of an opportunity to interact with Raul, just bad timing on my part. He had a bodyguard who was pretty on top of things during event times but more relaxed when things got less formal. A few of the other guys got pictures with him. Alyssa Alpert was with the team all of the time so we didn't see her too much but I got to speak with her at the airport and I asked about the health of Senna, Diosa and Fernandes and asked her to have Senna ready to go vs NYCFC.

I would have liked to have chatted with Bill Peterson a bit more as he was quite friendly but circumstances kept my conversations from getting long enough to really dig in. I told him great job on Miami with that ownership group and said now we need California/west coast teams and some more Northeastern teams. He said he's working on it with good humor.

One of the reporters on the trip told me that OKC is still very much alive and closer to reality than people think. Virginia is a dead, though. Personally I'm more interested in newer possibilities.

 

Do a google image search for Bush Reagan Artwork Cuba and it's the one called Rincon de Los Cretinos