Phosphorescent vests, rechargeable headlamps, flashlights or even traditional oil lamps are used to move around the city
14ymedio, Mercedes García, Sancti Spíritus, 26 October 2024 — A couple crosses paths with a friend on one of the main streets of the Kilo 12 neighborhood in the city of Sancti Spíritus. They can barely see each other, because the lack of public lighting has forced the young man, who runs into them head-on, to wear “a miner’s headlamp.” When the man greets them they are dazzled by the light that, in the midst of absolute darkness, leaves them, for a few seconds, disoriented and stumbling over the holes and cracks on the sidewalk.
“People have already given up on the street lighting,” the woman admits. “If we get used to having electricity inside our homes only a few hours a day, then what happens when we have to go outside at night?” she asks this reporter. “What most people do is stay home, but we go to eat at my mom’s house two or three times a week, and we have to walk back because there is no transportation at that time.”
Phosphorescent vests, rechargeable headlamps, flashlights or even traditional oil lamps are used to move from one point to another in the city, to avoid stumbling into a pothole or breaking a leg after falling into an uncovered sewer. Some are guided by the light coming from houses that are are lucky enough to have electricity at that time, and others take advantage of the headlights of vehicles that pass to detect the nooks and crannies of the road in front of them.
Some are guided by the light coming from houses that are lucky enough to have electricity
“My brother sent me this miner’s headlamp, and it helps a lot,” Susy, a 42-year-old resident near the historic center of Espírito, told 14ymedio. “I use it if I have to go out at night, but also in the house to scrub my floor during the blackout, make food or wash my daughter’s uniform for the next day of school.” When the light is placed, clinging with elastic bands to her head, Susy acquires a strange appearance and knows it: “I’m like a firefly; I carry my own light.”
Without public lighting, residents in the city of Sancti Spíritus have come to the conclusion that everyone must provide his own light when going out at night. A long time ago, like the rest of Cubans, they gave up depending on the ration system’s basic family basket for food; they stopped waiting for the Electric Union to supply them with constant energy in their homes; they said goodbye to a Public Health system that guaranteed them everything from medical sutures to painkillers, and converted their kitchens to the use of coal or wood, tired of waiting for stability in the sale of propane.
On the list of orders that Susy has sent to her brother in Jacksonville, Florida, she has added two new miner’s headlamps: “one that can be adjusted for a smaller head, like my daughter’s, and another for my husband who leaves at dawn for work and really needs it.” At night and seen from above, the city is an expanse of darkness where tiny little lights move around. Each one is a person who is going somewhere.
Translated by Regina Anavy
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