We arrived at the hotel in Cienfuegos after a long day on the road. Before dinner, Mr. Doughty gave us time to swim and hang out at the pool. After we swam, we walked around for a bit. We came across a palm tree that had some coconuts on the ground under it. We wanted to open it. The day before this, at the market in Havana, we saw how the people opened the coconuts for the water. They sliced them open with a big machete. However, we knew that was not an option because we didn't have a machete. We resorted to using rocks to open the coconut. It took an hour but we finally opened the coconut. But the water was not fresh and the coconut was old. Then a man offered to help us. He had a machete and pointed out to us a tree with fresh coconuts. We couldn't believe we hadn't seen the tree before because we had tried to open the first coconut a few feet away from it. He cut the coconuts down from the tree and opened them for us. This time, the water fresh and sweet and tasted great. While we drank our coconut water we took some time to talk to the man. He told us he was a boxer and learned how to open the coconuts at a very young age. After having a nice conversation with him, we thanked him, and gave him a tip to show our gratitude. This moment was memorable for me and my friends because we learned that it was not that hard, and extremely fun to interact, and make memories with people who spoke a different language than us.
-James Gravante
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