Sorry guys, no pictures since there´s only modem connection here. Maybe next city will have faster internet.
It’s almost impossible to go a few blocks in Cuba without seeing C.D.R., Comite de Defensa de la Revolucion, something about Fidel or drawings of the 5 Cuban spies who got caught and are now in prison in the USA. For Cubans, they don’t talk about the Revolucion too much and seem to ignore the signs as if they are not there. But for a foreign traveler here for the first time seeking to learn about Cuba, the barrage of Revolutionary symbols and pictures is overwhelming. Even in a small town like Vinales that has only four streets, C.D.R. signs are everywhere, a reminder everything belongs to the government and everyone is for the Revolution.
Coming from a Capitalist society, some idiosyncrasies in a Socialist country are very strange to me. For example, almost everyone here works for the government. The guy selling meat at the market works for the government, so does the man selling theatre tickets; even the singer at a restaurant or the DJ who plays music at an outdoor patio works for the government. People here have some freedom to choose their jobs, but sometimes it takes a few months before you can start your new job. Given how little the government pays the people, there really is very little incentive to work hard other than to just show up at the job.
Vinales has a few attractions including a mural of prehistoric animals and people on the side of the mountain, tobacco fields, plantations and a Cave system. The prehistoric painting was done by 15 people over 5 years; from far away, it’s hard to imagine why it could have taken 5 years, but when I got up close, I saw that a mere patch of one single color is actually an alternating line of paint and rock. My guess is that they did it to save on the amount of paint needed. At the restaurant nearby, a few Cubanos were feeding and turning a music playing machine that took in punch card sheets of music and churned out accordion sounding music. The other tourists gorged away on their giant portions of roasted pork while the Cubano waiters looked on. Walking through the kitchen, the cook invited me for a steal of the pork. Quite delicious! Pork, I call it the national meat, is consumed by everyone everywhere in Cuba. Beef is prohibited because the Jefe (Fidel) says so. Fish is too expensive for an everyday meal, so most people eat pork and ham.
Biking through the country roads on my old 10 speed mountain bike, I came upon a tobacco leaf factory where the workers were sorting through the farmed leafs and getting them ready for a 6 months drying process in the storage house. A retried Cubano and I walked through the tobacco and plantation field and met some of the local farmers. Later he invited me to visit his house, a little shack which is a square room probably no more than 10 foot by 20 foot. There is no white paint on the walls and the chairs lack the wooden plank which usually sits on top of the metal frame. Still, we sat and talked. Inevitably, conversation somehow always ended up about the economic problems in Cuba. Before I left, I gave the man some things from my backpack and some CUC. There probably hasn’t been a day in Cuba when I have not given something away. My backpack is getting lighter J I have been asked to give money, my shirt, my jeans, my translator, my shoe, my backpack, my pen, the lock I use for my backpack and everything else in sight. If I was wearing my superman underwear on the outside, I would now be naked.
The next day I met a couple from Amsterdam who were driving through Cuba in their rental car. They gave me a lift to the Santo Tomas Cave, the largest in Cuba. A guide led us through 7 of the 8 levels in the cave; the climb wasn’t too difficult although there were some slippery rocks. We saw the a 0.5 cm frog, the smallest in the world, small crabs, algae growing on the rocks, and shimmering gems, or as Cubans call it “Pearls”, embedded in the cave rocks. At one point the guide asked us if we had been to that location before; none of us recognized the rocks there, but indeed we had made a circle and returned to the same place. The cave shielded us from the burning sun. After a few hours of hiking, I took the comfortable bus to Pinar del Rio, where I stayed the night before bussing to Cienfuego, a central province in Cuba.
Pinar del Rio really had nothing there; it felt like a suburb embedded in the middle of a heavy industry factory. There were a lot of cars, motorcycles and trucks passing on the street. The smog attacked my nose, throat and lungs incessantly; my virgin lungs are not used to this type of suburban smog. I took a long cold shower after a 2 hour walk around the town to rid myself of smog. I needed an oxygen mask but all I could come up with was using my red shirt as a makeshift face cover. I survived. I hope the smog is friendlier in Mexico City. I began to appreciate all the air quality and car exhaust regulations in the US. Even in NYC with its marching ants of taxi and limos, smog was bearable. Here in Pinar del Rio, a small passing motorcycle will blanket you with clouds of darkness. I moved happily onward to the next city.
In the old days, Cienfuego was the only French colony in Cuba and the buildings and the grid layout of the roads show it. Parque Jose Marti, the central parque in the city, had gates with arches that resemble the ones in the tourist picture of Paris. Theatres, galleries, shops, gardens surround the parque. The roads that led to the Parque Jose Marti is lined with more shops, cafeterias, art gallery and cafés. Clearly people in Cienfuego had more material things than Cubans I saw in other cities. Some has ear buds connected to their iPods while many others had flashy watches, new FUBU shirts, jewelry and sporty shoes. By only the way young Cubanos are dressed in the disco clubs, I would not have been able to tell if I was in Cuba or South Beach. On a 10 CUC a month salary, there is no way these young Cubanos could afford the material things they wore. As I discovered, there are three Cubas, the colonial Cuba and beaches for the tourists, the Cuba struggling and working for the Socialist government and earning in Cubano Pesos and the Cuba with families in the United States. Cienfuego clearly has a big portion of the latter Cuba. As such, people in Cienfuego have much more time for cultural events then people in other cities. At the theatre, there are many dance and musical performances by local and foreign artists. The garden had showing of foreign films. The art gallery has live traditional music performances. Some artists work in the street like Henry, a wood sculptor I met in the street who had been doing it for 13 years. I love this Cuba that has its own distinct culture, rather than the one trying impossibly to catch up to the materialistic Capitalist outside world one CUC at a time. Cuba is a changing place. I only saw older Cubanos at the traditional music performances, whereas in the disco clubs, after only a few salsa songs, reggaeton and techno music played on. Still, younger Cubanos remember some of their traditions, but traditions itself is morphing. They danced salsa to reggaeton music, which as far as I could tell does not have the Clave, which is what makes dancing salsa to the salsa music. Maybe dancing to the heavy downbeat of raggaeton is a new form of art and an old folk like me has been left behind. Who knows? Younger Cubanos also love to sing. Three of them were happy just standing, bouncing their heads and yelling the lyrics of the raggaeton songs into each others ears. They were all smiles.
While walking around the city, I met an UK couple who were trying to sort out a little car accident. Interesting thing about them is that one of them works in Marketing. Since there is no such a thing as marketing in Socialist countries, they had much work to do to explain the concept.
As a tourist, I was beginning to feel like just a material object to some Cubanos. Almost every time I was approached by a Cubano, I had a negative experience, whereas when I approached Cubanos of my choosing, I had a much more positive experience. The Cubanos I approached, like the ones working in the Judo and wrestling gym, were much more genuinely interested in finding out about me, my country and my culture than just getting something from me. Their sources of information are limited to newspaper and the television. In the universities, one student told me most of the textbooks are from the 1980s. Even for tourists, I could not buy internet time for one entire week. Imagine that, in the capital city of Cienfuego providence, there is no internet for one whole week. One Cubano approached me and after finding out I was only paying 15 CUC to stay in a Casa Particular rather than a hotel and that I was paying Cubano Peso to eat street food rather than in restaurant, he immediately lost interest in talking to me. That is the second Cuba, the one without families in the US to support them, that struggle to earn money from tourists.
Along with 7 other tourists from Holland, Norway, Spain, Canada and Cuba, I took a hiking tour of El Nicho, by far the most beautiful place in Cuba I have seen. We vanned into the mountain and hiked through the woods, checking out local trees, birds. We came upon a few waterfalls and swam in water that usher out from the earth at top of the mountain and flow down the rocks. The water in the pool was clear and I took many gulps of it while swimming. Usually I buy it in bottles. I didn’t want to leave El Nicho. I love the shades from the trees, the branches hanging above the pool, the waterfall, and the feeling of it all. The lunch was excellent as well. Having chicken was a nice change from the typical rice, beans and pork meal.
It was Mothers day and Cubans don’t need many excuses to drink Ron, or Rum in English. Farmers brought their pigs, plates of prepared rice, beans and meat, fruits and vegetables to sell on the street. Salsa music played on. Cubans surrounded a portable, gigantic beer keg enclosed by metal frames; two Cubanos work inside to distribute the beer. I bought street pizza and some pork as topping and then ate a premature guayaba. As much as people here drink, surprisingly I haven’t seen many overly intoxicated people. Even at night along side the malecon, an area by the beach where young people hangout after a night at the disco, there wasn’t the lurking feeling one gets outside a popular night club in the US. Maybe the sedated nature here is due to its education or part of its island culture.
As there was no internet, I left east for Trinidad a day earlier, skipping the forts and local museums. Trinidad, for whatever reason, is a big tourist city, despite being relatively small with only about 52,000 residents. After arriving here and finding my place to stay, I hiked up to the tallest part of the town where a man works at the radio station there. He took me to the roof where I could lookout to as far as the Caribbean Sea and the surrounding sugar plantations which are no longer in operation. Since a few years ago when Russia became more capitalists, the Cuban sugar for Russian machinery trade stopped. The sugar plantations were now used to feed cattle for milk. He too thought Raul was making better economic decisions for the country, switching more land from sugar production to other vegetations. The Cubano said that Cuba sell their high quality sugar and buy cheaper sugar from other countries for consumption so that they have money to buy more goods. He also that it’s possible for foreigners to buy houses in Cuba. Many Spaniards own houses here for vacation. An undeveloped coastal colonial city like Trinidad would become an even bigger tourist attraction when Cuba finally opens up for foreign investment. There are few hotels in town and therefore most of the tourists stay in private houses. Speaking to him, I remembered the stories I read of the economic transformation and privatization of Russia national enterprises. Opportunities abound during those times. China is undergoing these changes now and I have no doubt at some point in the near future, Cuba will as well. After a few days here in Trinidad, I will head to Santa Clara to see the Che memorial and then finally Santiago de Cuba for its Afro-Cuban history, music and dancing.

Pictures

Hello everyone, I am alive and ok. No one kidnapped or robbed me. Well, not unless you count the time when the woman, who rented me the room, stole half a bottle of my family size Target body wash while cleaning the bathroom. Besides that, all is well.

It’s a short 35 minutes flight from Fort Lauderdale to Nassau, Bahama. At the Bahama airport, I expected crowds, just like in the US, after all it’s a tourist destination. But I found none; closest thing was a 3 men band playing easy listening music. Onward to Cuba.

Flying into Cuba reminded me of movies about Vietnam War I had seen over the years. The runway was between plots of tree not too far away; I could have just as well been landing in an empty field and probably couldn’t tell the difference. The neatly painted lines and flashing lights were inconspicuously missing from this airport. Alas, I am here.

My ride from the airport to the center of Havana felt like I was in a rural version of NYC. On the one hand, there’s the seemingly orderly chaos that comes with unpainted two lane roads filled with two taxis and one slow tractor riding side by side. On the other hand, just like in NYC, if there were any traffic rules regulating taxis and other cards alike, I didn’t notice them. On several occassions, we drove by large posters of drawings of Bush and beneath it the words “Terrorismo”. I really had no idea how fast we were going because the speedometer pointed to zero no matter how fast we went.

Cuba has two money systems, the CUP (cuban peco) and the CUC (peso convertibles, pronounced “cook”, 24 CUP = 1 CUC). Foreigners exchange their currency into CUC, whereas Cubans use a combination of CUP and CUC. At government stores such as food distribution stores or pizza stores in citizens’ homes, people can pay with CUP. However at tourist places and street venders in Havana, CUC is used. Cuban government pays in CUP to its citizens, albeit not very much. One man working at a bar told me he is paid 250 CUP a month, which translates to a measely $6 US Dollars a month. Food is provided for via food cards, but they only get the bare minimum, rice, beans, candy and some chicken. In the few days since arriving in Cuba, I have yet to see any green leafy vegetables anywhere, probably only in fancy hotels.

Many Cubans are eager to strike up a conversation with a tourist since and hope maybe the tourist would buy them a Bocanero, a local beer that has 5.4% alcohol content costing 1 CUC. For them one CUC is extra spending money most don’t have. Some also offer to sell you cigars or find you a chica. Usually I could tell pretty quickly what they wanted. In a society where no one has very much of anything except the tourists, Cubans didn’t seem resentful. Perhaps because no other Cubans have very much, there are no classism problems. Tourists are opportunities for them to earn money, rather than people they have to compete with.

Walking around Havana at night, I felt very safe, not because of the few police standing in street corners or few dimly lit street lamps, but because I felt the people here are passive. Even late at night, there are people sitting outside in the dark on their doorsteps talking. People usually leave their doors open; I could see the small living room where an entire family of 4 or 5 sit together and watched TV. Some bars are open 24 hours, but the bar is empty of all types of alcohol except a few bottles of Rum. The bartender is half asleep when I arrived; he was working a 24 hour shift today. He puts on some salsa music by “Compay Segunda”. With the help from my translator, we talked about his job and Cuban people. Coming from La Casa de la Musica, a salsa dance hall, some seemingly sober young Cubano and Cubanas trickle by. I suspect they didn’t have enough money to buy drinks. There was no last call at this 24 hour bar. I gave the bartendar the last copy of Maxim I had brought to Cuba, putting a spark in his dreary eyes. In the empty dull room that is the bar, the only color was the faded painting of a waitress on the wall. The bartendar eyes were glued to the capitalists pictures in Maxim, now the most colorful thing in the room. At least for a while, he didn’t have to think about how to earn more CUC from the tourists.

Since arriving in Cuba, as I went around sight seeing, I have been bringing some clothes from my big luggage of giveaways and giving them away to Cubanos. They felt good about receiving new clothes and I felt good for giving them away. Yesterday, one of the Cubanos asked if he could see what I had to give away, so I thought “sure, why not?” As he was going through the luggage of my stuff in my room, I started to feel uneasy about it. It no longer felt like I was giving things away. It felt more like I was getting robbed. As he left with two full plastic bags of goods, I began thinking about why I was feeling that way. Isn’t this why I brought the clothes that I no longer wear to Cuba, so I can give them away? Does it make a difference really if I feel good about giving them away or letting him pick through my things, and instead of getting just two shirts, he got 2 full bags of clothes, pens, and some tools? Here is a Cubano who works a government job during the day and makes next to nothing, and at night, he goes out to meet tourists and try to make something extra off them to help his family. One new shirt in a Cuban store costs about what typical Cubanos make in a month. Imagine that, working for a whole month and making just enough to buy one shirt. The equivalent analogy in the US would translate to say 30 USD for a shirt and one works 200 hours a month for it — meaning one makes $0.15 an hour. Putting things in perspective, do I want to feel good about giving away my things? Yes, but do I really need to feel good about it? What difference does it make to me if in the end, getting those two bags of goods means so much more to him than me losing them? I am beginging to see why Cubans don’t resent tourists because even though tourists have so much and Cubans have nothing, earning from tourists is the only way for them to live beyond poverty.

Many Cubans here want to learn English. I met a Cuban at a local softball game who enthusiastically practiced his English with me. He spoke Spanish to me and I spoke English back to him. For both of us, listening was the harder part of the language than speaking. Cubans speak a fast version of Spanish and often don’t pronounce the S, L and R in the word. I would have understood “Te ` baseball?”, but instead, I heard “te uta babe.” Right now I understand maybe only about 5 percent of what people are saying. Fortunately, at least they understand 80 percent of what I say in Spanish.

One thing Cuba has in common with NYC is the many 24 hour stores that are open. Most stores sell the same things, rum, candy, Bocanero, cola and some snacks. Rum is everywhere in Cuba, famous for its Havana Rum; it even comes in a milk carton for the go. All along the Malecon, a stretch of sea wall on the northern part of Havana, Cubans sit out there and drink their bottle of Rum and bottle of coke. Other types of stores that are open are little windows to people’s homes. They usually sell pizza, juice, sandwich and sometimes rice and beans. These are not fancy pizza or sandwich. For example, one item would be sandwich with mayonnaise, which is literally two pieces of bread with mayonnaise spread. That’s it! Pizzas cost 7 to 12 CUP or about $0.50, same goes for the sandwich. My two favorite drinks in Cuba so far are the fresh sugar cane juice “guayapos” and mamey, a fruit that tastes similar to papaya, shakes. Many Cubans stop at the guayapo shop for a refreshment while on their way about the city. For only 1 CUP per cold glass, or $0.05, no wonder there was a huge line out the door.

Contrary to popular belief, there is not salsa music and cigars everywhere in Cuba. I expected to hear salsa music everywhere I go and to see people dancing, but my guess is that most people don’t have stereos to play salsa music. Havana is quite dormant for the entire week until Friday and Saturday. Other than salsa, kids play baseball in the street with makeshift ball that is a bottle cap and a bat that is a wooden stick. Many Cubans also play chess and domino on doorsteps or at the government chess hall that provide tables and chess sets. I also haven’t seen people smoking cigars as I walked around the city. The only mention of cigars or “bodegas” is from people selling them on the street. Few people do activities or have material things that other people don’t have. In a Communist country, this should come as a no surprise.

Since the existence of the US embargo, China is playing an increasingly dominant role as a trading partner with Cuba. Just like in the US, most goods are made in China, except in Cuba, people can’t afford those goods since they are sold mostly in CUC. The tourist buses I see in the streets have Chinese producer names written on the back of them. I even stumbled upon a China town in Centra Havana last night, complete with the symbolic Chinatown gate. Walking further into the one street Chinatown, I came to a house where an old Chinese man was selling sweets like sugar crackers, ice cream and cookies. As a fifteen year old boy, he came to Cuba in 1949 to escape the Mao Communists revolution in China. Years later, he is still here, but with much resentment. He invited me into his house and spoke hand-wavingly and passionately about life in Cuba. “Work for 3 days for only 1 dollar, only one dollar!” he said in Spanish. Between his sighs, he showed me the sign language of Cuba. He stroked his chin as if he had a beard, “el Jefe”, or the beard, and then he gestured as if to wipe dusts off his pretend military uniform. I understood he was talking about Fidel without saying it. Only in the privacy of their homes can they talk about things like this. As much as Cuba has barred information from its citizens, the American TV series “Lost” was playing on his TV accompanied by Spanish subtitles. I felt a certain connection to this old man, not just because he is Chinese, but also because we share similar experiences. I came to a foreign country, the US, when I was about 12 and have had to assimilate to the culture and people there. I am certain he went through a similar process. How lucky was I to get to the US instead of a closed society where people labor three days for one dollar. It was past midnight when I arrived and he was still toiling away. Today, I will be bringing him the rest of my two luggages of goods and buy some ice cream from him.

I don’t usually smoke anything, but while in Cuba, I had to try the cigars here. When I walked around Havana, especially the tourist areas, I was constantly asked if I wanted to buy cigars. Finally I met an old man who has been working in the cigar factories for 30 years and thought who better to share cigar than the man who rolls it. We smoked Marebas, small cigars by Cuban standards, but plenty for me. I would later try bigger and fancier versions with two Norwegians I met at Hotel Florida, who have been traveling in their sailboat for almost a year. (www.royalwings.no) I got the hang of puffing it pretty quickly and began to taste something, but it was hard to describe the taste. It’s more of a smoky feeling in my mouth. People say you will probably need to smoke 10 cigars before you can really start to enjoy it, but I would say I enjoyed that one cigar pretty good.

I had been looking for a good salsa dancing spot, but really haven’t seen great dancing until last night. The usual places in guidebooks like Casa de la Musica were full of tourists rather than Cubanos. A Cubana told me about the bar at Hotel Florida, which had actually closed its doors because the bar was full. Usually there are many Cubanos outside bars and discos who try to tag along with tourists to go into these places and hope to have tourists pay for them. A few of them struck up conversations with the two Norwegian girls I met a day earlier. One of the Taxi drivers told me that he knows of cases where Cuban men have met foreign tourist women who help them leave Cuba. Mail-ordered brides are not just for men any more. Lonely ladies out there, if you have some money, you too can find yourself a Cubano. Most people in Cuban unsurprisingly dance Casino style Rueda salsa. I was hoping to find someone who might know Mambo, so I was ecstatic when a Cubana said she knew it. Once we started dancing, I realized pretty quickly that Mambo in Cuba is different from Mambo in the US. There is no concept of dancing “on 1″ or “on 2″; they always dance on 1. Mambo here is essentially “shines,” footwork and body movements that each dancer express without the partner, in American Salsa/Mambo. In each Salsa disco I have been to in Cuba, I usually found two or three dancers lined up side by side doing shines together; that’s something you don’t see very much in the US. I will bring that bit of salsa dancing back to the US, or for all my salseros in Florida, you can start doing it!

Wrapping up my first week here in Cuba, I am heading out today to Vinales, a photogenic outdoor spot west of Havana. I can finally breathe some fresh air rather than the smog coming from 1960’s puffing Chevys and Eggs-on-wheels taxis. Goodbye Havana.

This is a picture of things I am bringing with me. Two backpacks for my trip and two luggages of things to give away in Cuba. Hola , mi Cubanos. Christmas is coming. My group from my acting class final performance this weekend. I played a heartless doctor from the play “A Change of Plans”

Do you remember what it’s like before you had a cell phone or are on the computer for 8 hours a day? I don’t really remember, but as I get closer to starting the trip, I think about how my life on the road would be different. No cell phone, no constant high speed internet connection (I can no longer feed my addiction of checking email every two minutes), little access to people I know and talk to often, but at the same time, I now have the opportunity to see, do and experience a lot of new things.
I sold my bedroom furnitures, my bed, my desk, my car and gave away a lot of stuff to friends. The only thing I have left are two boxes and two bags I left with Jose and my two backpacks that I am bringing with me. How strange to think that all I really need are two backpacks when all this time, I have had a full apartment of things. I will miss the comfort of big fluffy towels and my soft pillow-top mattress. Instead I will be sleeping on people’s couches (I use www.couchsurfing.com to look for couches to sleep on, and yes I intend to sleep on someone’s couch in every country I go to) and stay in hostels.

Last night I dreamed about traveling in Cuba. Tonight, my dream comes true.
http://picasaweb.google.com/cwjacklin/20080427_preTrip

Today I went boating with Jose and Carlos down around Key Largo. The sky was clear, water was very calm and sun was out. Pretty much the perfect day to enjoy the day out on the water. We met at Jose’s parents’ house. I went in and greeted his parents. They are probably in their 60’s or early 70’s. Jose told them that I am about to go on my 9-12 months trip starting in Cuba. Immediately, their faces turned from joyous ones into questioning and disapproving look. “Why are you going there?” “You are supporting Castro by giving him your money?” I knew Cubans in Miami usually don’t like Fidel, but boy, this was my first hand encounter with them and they definitely will let you know they don’t support Fidel. I discreetly extracted myself and went on my merry way.

Later that afternoon, we took the boat out and was cruising down the coast at a good 34 knots. The water was calm so that made the boat ride a smooth one. For a while, I was sitting up at the front of the boat, the wind blowing in my face. Even with my glasses, the wind was making my teary eyed, but it felt really awesome.

On our way to Tiki Bar, a restaurant where boats can pull up to dock, we stopped to get some gas. So if you think your car eats up too much gas, check this out. This was the bill for half a tank of gas on a 28 feet boat!!!

I guess I won’t be getting a boat any time soon.

So Carlos and I started talking about Fidel and why the Cubans in Miami don’t like him. Eventually we got around to talking about Jose’s parents and their dislike for Fidel. As it turned out, the old man I met a couple hours earlier, who sat pleasantly in his lazy boy chair, tried to start a mini-revolution against Fidel’s government in 1998. The story goes … he and his two buddies took a small fishing boat, one probably not much bigger than the 28 feet boat we were in, filled it with rifles, small arms and grenade, and arranged to meet their Cuban counters parts at a bay in Cuba. Maybe Bay of Pigs?! Of course, something went wrong; because of some miscommunication, they never made the connection and had to hide in some country house for a few days. The Cuban government somehow found out about it and caught them, sentencing them to 26 years in jail.

Putting things in perspective; these were 3 grandfathers, who back in 1998 would have been in their late 50’s or early 60’s, armed with rifles and granades attempting to do what the CIA and anti-Castro groups could not do in the 1960’s. I couldn’t help laughing when I heard this. I just met a real-life revolutionary rebel. Picture this, 3 old men on a fishing boat, trekking the 90 miles to start a revolution against Cuba, run by the bearded one…ie Fidel.

Haha. Luckily for them, Cuban government probably just thought these were 3 harmless grandfathers who had too much time on their hands. So after 3 years, they were released from prison to go back to Miami. Fidel probably got a good laugh out of this I am sure.

More pictures here

I’ve never done any types of martial arts before, so I thought I’d learn some self-defense skills. Plus it might come in handy during my trip. Who knows?

In the last two months I have been training Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu with Pablo Papovitch’s camp here in FL; I do mostly BJJ with gi and a few wrestling and no-gi classes to round out the skills. Friday nights, there’s also MMA training, but usually I just go in to roll with the guys and leave when MMA starts. I feel pretty comfortable rolling with other white belts in the class now and do decently against them, but I haven’t trained much in stand up fights.

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