The Art of Being Present

One of the blessing and curses of Cuba is the lack of access to the rest of the world. In my experience travelling in the past domestically, in Europe, and even in South America, a large part of the experience is always documenting the experience. The art of being a tourist; in balancing experiences and remembering experiences for later sharing, is a delicate dance. I often find in this time and age, people spend a great amount of their time trying their hardest to try to capture an experience. This could mean taking pictures of every meal you eat to ‘re-eat’ it later, saving a rock from a trial to recreate the memories you have associated with that space, or writing in a journal to savor your thoughts from that time and place. Memory is a fascinating idea – to what extent are we changing our experiences for the idea of what the memory should be? If we come into a space, for example, Cuba, what do I choose to photograph? Why do I choose to take an image of Habana Vieja versus the Hotel Presidente that I spend so much time at? I have found that Cuba has been unique in the practices of being present. For a long period in the beginning of the program, I didn’t have a phone, accessed internet maybe every two weeks, and had relatively no way of contacting other humans (other than the home phone, god forbid!).  This sever between myself and everything else, was refreshing at first. It gave way to fluid experiences, and for me, minimal stress. As time went on, and the vacation turned into a routine, it is becoming difficult. As the world catches up with me, the divisions become more and more apparent. If I am dealing with a family emergency, or even just attempting to register for classes, doing anything is just that more difficult, which in turn makes my contacts ‘with the outside world’ extremely distracting from living in the present. I’ve been told by the abuela that lives down the hall that “asi es la vida”, and that I need to have a balance. My question remains, is there a possible balance between the present and absent? Does the anthropologist need to leave everything behind and live with the tribe for the rest of their life to truly learn anything?