WHEN YOU ORDER A BEER IN CUBA, you’ll likely be presented with two options:
Cristal (a watery, government-owned light lager) or Bucanero (a watery, government-owned dark lager). As a group of young Cubans and I littered a restaurant table in Havana with dead soldiers of both varieties, an argument broke out as to the etymology of the latter brand.
“Buccaneers were pirates, amigo, who specialized in stealing ham,” said Sergio Leon, 25, bearded and bearing a respectable resemblance to actor Gael García Bernal.
“That can’t be true,” I said, referring to the ham part.
“Sí, I promise you,” he said. “I know this for sure. We read about them.”
Well, read about this, I thought, and reached into my pocket to settle this dispute the way men do -- with Google. But all it did was make everybody laugh.
“Lo siento,” Sergio said, glancing at my iPhone. “Remember, you are in Cuba. Our country is stuck on airplane mode.” https://www.thrillist.com/tech/nation/cubas-internet-is-fcking-insane-and-the-ways-cubans-use-it-are-genius/tech
