CUBAN TRANSITIONS

What has two wheels, handlebars and a unique presence on the Cuban streets?

Surprise, surprise! This time I’m not focusing on bicycles. Here’s a hint:

A Cuban license plate on a Harley-Davidson, a U.S. brand (Frazier).

For my part of the final project with Danielle, Alli and Ian, I studied sustainable bicycling within Cuba’s ravaged economic context of the Special Period. The price of fuel soared unbelievably with the collapse of the USSR, and Cuba was left to seek transportation alternatives to pricey busing. Spoiler alert: an early 90s bicycle boom. To be exact, 1.2 million bikes were imported from China during this time. Job-holding citizens acquired the bikes at a subsidized price equivalent to a modern $6 CUC or 150 moneda nacional (Warren). The bikes were and continue to be a hit, even if they are now imported from Russia and Canada as well. On our trip, I kept my eyes peeled at first, but soon realized I didn’t have to look very hard. Bicycles were everywhere, painting an interesting street panorama with their hodgepodge of Chinese, Russian, Canadian and Cuban parts. And no wonder their popularity: they guzzle no fuel, demand no high maintenance fees and last for years. In short, the use of a bicycle saves money and (perhaps inadvertently in reference to Cuba) earth.

The motorcycle, a cousin of the bike, conserves neither, but every now and then, I spotted one flying down the highway towards Pinar del Río or weaving through the narrow labyrinth of Old Havana. I’m not nearly as keen on motorcycles as I am on bikes, perhaps because they release exorbitant air and noise contaminants (or perhaps because the only time I ever tried to ride one, I crashed into an elementary school). Despite my general disillusion, the motorcycles I saw on our trip sparked my curiosity. How are they maintained when an economic embargo limits financial and physical access to spare parts and fuel?

CNN assures me that my eyes weren’t deceiving me; a small group of “harlistas” (as they are known in Cuba) keeps a motorcycle culture alive. After extensively investigating the development of Cuban bicycle culture, I assumed that the biggest challenge or obstacle for motorcycle enthusiasts would be the acquisition of parts, but Patrick Oppman of CNN identifies another: “… being a Harley fanatic courted controversy in the early years of the Cuban revolution when everything American, from jazz music to rock ‘n’ roll, was considered suspect. It also didn’t help that Harleys were the motorcycle of choice for police during the Batista dictatorship.” This brand did recall a reign of terror to some and signify a threat to communism to others. However, many of their current riders find this association regrettable. One owner of a Harley Knucklehead , Luis Gonzalez, keeps a sticker of Che Guevara on his motorcycle as an ode to the revolution. He explained his feelings on riding in a recent article by Peter Orsi of the Associated Press: “I love everything about [riding my motorcycle]. It’s like my girlfriend. I love the heat, I love the vibration, I love how it rides. I feel like a plane floating through the clouds” (Orsi).

The first Harley-Davidson rally in Cuba (Orsi).

About 2,000 motorcycles, primarily Harley-Davidsons, settled in Cuba in the years before the 1959 revolution. Their riders were often police and military men, but motorcycles changed hands quickly when the U.S. embargo began to hinder economic welfare in Cuba. Many of their owners sold their motorcycles illegally, whether they stripped them down for parts or not. Around 270 to 300 of these original motorcycles are believed to be registered legally with the Cuban government at this time, the only known survivors of more than 50 years of wear and tear. These antique machines would be retired as collector’s items by now in other countries, but Max Cucchi, a Harley owner and scholar currently writing a book on Cuban motorcycles, told the Associated Press, “Here people use them to live” (Chung). Despite their natural deterioration after fifty years of use, motorcycles continue to be a source of working transportation, even if they have undergone dramatic repairs. One legend has it that a motorcycle’s tire popped in rural Cuba during the Special Period, and its owner, with no alternatives, filled it with grass until he could find a way to patch the hole (Orsi).

The first Harley-Davidson rally in Cuba (De La Osa).

Harlistas hosted their first national Harley-Davidson rally the weekend of April 14-15, 2012 in Varadero, Cuba. About 70 of the registered 300 motorcycles (and their riders) attended the two-day event and arrived in generally good states of upkeep (Oppman). Some motorcyclists mentioned that the trade embargo has crippled their financial and physical access to spare parts, but trade restrictions have lessened in recent years. Their friends and family abroad can more easily ship goods or visit. Still, within Cuba, name-brand Harley-Davidson materials can be hard to come by. One Harley enthusiast, Jorge Fonseca, admitted that inside the body of his 1954 Panhead is an alternator from Ural, a Russian brand. That part cost him $15 CUC, whereas the same part from a Harley would have cost $400 (Orsi).

Harley-Davidson is a brand that publicizes itself as patriotic to the United States, but I wonder if the addition of a Russian engine dilutes those sentiments in Cuba. If not, these motorcycles’ decals of Che Guevara’s iconic image certainly do. This mestizaje of parts is unsurprising, especially after my research on the importation and collage of the Cuban bicycle. Still, I wonder if the iconography of Cuba’s revolution has the biggest weight. A Cuban Harley might boast a prestigious U.S. brand name and a new engine made in Russia, but it seems Harlistas are most inspired by the history of their revolutionary countrymen. “Seremos como El Che.”

Che Guevara and his friend Alberto Granado during their 1951- 1952 trip across South America on a motorcycle they called "La Poderosa" (D'Orléans).

El Che and Granado with friends during the same trip. Many believe that Che's experiences on this trip were formative to his future as a Cuban revolutionary (D'Orléans).