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[audio logo] Can looking back push us forward?

Ladies and gentlemen, Ms. Billie Holiday!

[frantic violin] Will our voice be heard through time?

Can our past inspire our future?

Acts of concern.

[applause] [music playing] There is a long list of reasons to go to Havana.

Art, architecture, music, and culture are everywhere.

Not to mention the mojito, the daiquiri, and the Cuba libre were created there.

Americans have been going to Cuba for a long time, and although it's easier to get there than you think, there are some challenges when you arrive.

Credit cards and major international cell phone carriers don't work due to the embargo.

You often can't even access your bank, and the internet is very slow, if it's available at all.

But it doesn't mean you can't get what you need.

An embargo or no, tourism is a critical part of the Cuban economy.

But since the pandemic and certain political changes in America, tourism has dropped off significantly, and with it, much of the prosperity of the small and burgeoning private sector that catered to it.

Through perseverance, resilience, and creativity, Cubans see a new future for their country, a future that remembers Cuban cigars, boxing, and music.

There's room for entrepreneurs and dried mangoes.

[lively percussion] [non-english] [laughs] [exciting beat] [music playing] This is the Madrigal, one of the many beautiful and storied bars in Havana.

Though Cuba is undergoing rapid change, you don't mess with perfection.

The Cuban cigar, iconic, complex, and essentially illegal to import into the US.

It's a must do, especially when you have a cigar aficionado, like Luis, to guide you through the experience.

He started in a cigar factory almost 20 years ago.

And though he is not such a good roller, he spoke several languages and became a tour guide and ambassador for the one and only Habanos.

His business depends entirely on tourism, and it has fallen off of late.

But you would never know by his demeanor and his love of cigars.

This is like there's gold in here or something.

[laughs] The very best of Cuba.

In Cuba, traditionally, we do it cigar and rum.

Yeah.

But I love it with scotch with a good cup of espresso coffee, not Americano coffee, espresso.

Real coffee.

Yeah.

With chocolate.

There are no rules.

And our special guest, one of the most famous Cuban brands, Montecristo, founded in 1935, Habanos.

Habanos is the only cigars in the world that have a protected denomination of origin, like champagne, like Bordeaux.

Why are cigars particularly so embedded in the Cuban psyche?

For us, this is not just a cigar.

When Christopher Columbus arrived in Cuba in 1492 is when for the first time, Westerners, Europeans saw these local tribes smoking a sort of dry, rolled tobacco leaves as part of a ritual, that they called the ritual of the Cohiba.

Actually, they did inhale the smoke of the tobacco because the idea was to get in touch with the gods.

Actually, if you inhale the smoke of a whole cigar, for sure you are going to be god.

You're going to see him walking around because it's a really bad experience.

Then the Spanish adopted that habit, took it to Europe.

In the end, tobacco, mostly among the aristocrats.

And the Cuban cigars again, have a very good reputation.

How do you approach it when you start thinking about the cigar?

It's a matter of personal taste, like I always say, but thicker the cigar tends to be milder, more aromatic.

Thinner, they tend to be a little bit stronger.

It has less complexity of tastes and aromas.

The length is more a matter of time.

Then the important thing is that we cut always the head.

Try to make it as straight as possible.

Doesn't need to be the perfect cut.

There.

Look at that.

I think that's perfect.

That's perfect.

It's your first cigar.

We have rabbis that do this where I'm from.

[laughs] This is a ritual, the proper way to light them up.

You put the flame straight and the cigar in a 45 degrees angle, 1 or 2 centimeters away from the flame.

And you roll the cigar slowly in your fingers.

So you're just warming it up, basically.

That's it.

That's what they call to toast the cigar.

That's a rule number one.

You do not Inhale.

You puff the cigar but only in your palate, only in your mouth.

The idea is to mix the smoke with your saliva, and then you puff it out.

Tobacco, as I said, has been part of every aspect of Cuban life.

Our national hero, Jose Marti, when he was exiled in the US, he founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party there in the US.

Most of the money he collected to restart the independence war against the Spanish, he did it from the Cuban cigar makers who were immigrants in Key West, Tampa, and New York.

Actually, the order of uprising was sent from the US to Cuba inside the cigar, that since god, nobody smoked that one.

[laughing] This is really, really-- And it gets better.

When the tobacco is getting warmer is when it's going to really show its real character.

But the name itself, Montecristo, what's the story behind that?

It's all tradition we have in Cuban cigar factories since 1865.

The reader of the cigar factory.

That's a person who reads for everybody, newspapers in the mornings and in the afternoons, a book chosen by the same workers.

That's why it names Montecristo, Romeo and Juliet.

That still goes on in cigar factories.

It's a tradition that is still there.

And it's a very respected job.

Cohiba was founded by Fidel Castro himself.

And then Fidel had the idea of making of Cohiba brand only for diplomatic purposes in the beginning for the Cuban government to make gifts to presidents, ambassadors, friends of the revolution, et cetera.

That's why its name is so famous.

Castro was the original influencer.

He was an influencer, definitely.

What this is, not just smoking a cigar.

It's everything.

It's more than that, definitely.

Cigar is more than only ashes and smoke.

It's a big pleasure.

It's a pleasure to know you.

Yeah, thank you.

[music playing] Another Cuban tradition that has suffered greatly under the embargo is Cuban boxing.

We went to one of the most iconic boxing sites in Havana, the Rafael Trejo gymnasium.

Held together by lead trainer Alberto's blood, sweat, and tears, it survives almost exclusively through donations and small fees they charge tourists and even locals for entry.

The training is free for the youth to show up, and it's often all they have.

Alberto and his apprentice trainer, Ernesto, ran the neighborhood youth through their morning routine.

[whistle blown] We didn't last long in the heat.

We did learn about the importance of boxing for the youth who come here.

[laughs] So in this barrio, in this neighborhood-- Where did they come from?

Very early-- Every place?

Every place, yeah.

So what makes a good boxer?

Heart?

Physical?

What do they need?

Everything.

Be focused to the training.

Yeah.

So you have a belt or something that says, fight your limit?

Always in the mind.

Yeah, always in the mind.

And Ernesto?

He's my assistant.

Assistant.

Next Alberto.

Next Alberto.

The next Alberto.

Although women have trained here for some time, it only recently became legal for them to compete.

We briefly spoke with Joanna, who won a gold medal at an international competition in Germany.

She won the Germany gold.

Oh, wow.

She's the one that won the gold in Germany.

Wow, congratulations.

A year ago, it's illegal.

So then it became legal, for competing in boxing.

So she was saying they used to do it hidden.

Yeah, escondido.

So they would just do it kind of in a gray market.

[speaking spanish] You do everything?

Yeah.

You take care of the canvas, the ropes, and you train.

They care only about money.

Here, 40 years.

Working 40 years.

You're helping these kids with discipline and structure, and they become better people?

[speaking spanish] They're the soldiers.

And his role is really just function to get these guys in one place.

[speaking spanish] What he's saying is they learn the sense of discipline.

Yeah.

Mental strain and-- [boxers yelling] Well, I notice they all do this together.

Yeah.

And they're doing-- and they're not paying for it.

None of these guys pay for it.

They commit to him.

Right.

So that's when it's valid.

[interposing voices] Only a few boxers rise to the surface and are able to leave the country to compete.

Even for one of the best, like Joanna, the US embargo and the economic realities of her day to day to make it difficult to pursue professional sport.

But it doesn't keep them from coming back.

And if Alberto and Ernesto do their job, what they take away stays with them, long after their boxing career is over.

Oscar La Playa was a professor of economics for 18 years until he inherited a farm and put his knowledge to use in the private sector.

He created a dried fruit business, the first in Cuba, and became the first private company to export fruit.

Thanks to changes in the law.

Well, we have here is dried fruits paradise.

We are processing mango, pineapple, sweet banana, coconut, tomato, tomato powder, habanero chili, everything that is growing in Cuba.

Actually, we are making some experiments with fish.

Oh, really?

Fish.

Yeah, we have it.

And we have some samples there.

In Cuba, we have a food security issue right now.

But at the same time, we have a lot of fruits in the fields that are just waste because of lack of processing capacities, logistics, and whatever.

So this business is trying to recover all this waste and to convert it in a significant help.

My estimation last season, for example, 50,000 to 60,000 tons of mango were just dropped in the ground.

Yeah.

Come in.

Come inside.

Come this way.

Yeah.

My brother was running this place as a cafeteria before pandemic.

So we close it, we join it, and then we started to use this place with the furniture, the tools, and all the workers.

We have been building this area, for instance, to peeling the fruits and cutting.

And this way is a storage for fresh fruit.

And this one is a container for the final product.

Right now, these are the two dryers we are using.

But the first one, it was this.

This was an artisanal dryer we built ourselves for when we started.

Now, we are conquering the world, two hours later, it was completely burned.

We discovered it that we needed more airflow.

I call a friend.

He's a owner of a computer workshop.

He gave me some fans.

The fans that you see on the back of a PC.

They keep the PC cold.

Yeah.

So we placed cooler here, the fans, and behind.

So now, these that looks artisanal is actually high tech because it's IBM inside.

[laughter] Are you an engineer?

I mean-- No.

You just made all this.

I'm an economist.

But I'm a Cuban, a Cuban.

So this attitude, you are going to find it at every Cuban, doing whatever to survive, to adapt.

The resilience is, I will say, that is the most important feature that a Cuban could show.

With this artisanal dryer, we made our first export.

And then we realized that we became first Cuban company ever to export dry fruits.

These startup stories happen everywhere.

But here in Cuba, they're particularly interesting.

When my mom saw the first dried sweet banana, she said, what is that, pork skin?

[laughter] Chicharron?

Come on, mom.

Yeah, chicharrones?

Come on, mom.

The things are first dreams, then goals, and then plans.

So what we have is a plan.

We are going to export to the United States in 2025, and that's a plan.

I mean, you have a lot of success and all the innovation and everything you say, resilience and things.

There's something about being a Cuban that allows for these innovations, but there's also some practical things that have been changing in the country.

We have a hard private sector in small scale and very restricted for more than 20 years.

Since 2021, the government decided for the first time to authorize the recognition of private companies as companies.

So this is not my-- this is not my table or my equipment.

These are the assets of the company.

Since that moment, we were allowed to export, import, to make contracts, to sell direct to the customers or whatever, like any other regular company in the world.

That's something very new.

Imagine, two years after this started, we had in Cuba, more than 11,000 of private companies registered-- Wow.

--in two years.

So what's going to happen next?

I don't know.

But like you say, two years ago, there was nothing.

Is that why you have a new son named Andy for 30 days?

Yes.

[laughs] What do you feel like for the future?

What is Andy's future?

You know, as an academic, I studied a little bit the Chinese transformation and Vietnamese transformation.

I feel like I'm the Chinese entrepreneurs from 1978.

We are fighting against the walls, the walls coming from everywhere, walls coming from the US embargo, walls coming from the Cuban American Congress guys, and walls coming from the Cuban government.

So we are facing all this because I'm completely sure, my boys are going to inherit a different country.

And you're making it happen.

You're part of-- Yes, I'm part of that.

And you want your children to be Cuban?

Yes, I want them to be Cuban.

I want them to be open to go anywhere.

I want them to know the world.

But they belong here.

I feel that Cuba deserves a better future than we have.

I mean, this conversation is so illuminating.

It's hard to understand it without someone like yourself who not only understand it from a high level, macro level, but actually is operating on a day to day.

So again, congratulations on the success.

We can't wait till you take over the world.

[laughter] Oscar's commitment to making the most of an uncertain future in Cuba was echoed in a diverse group of entrepreneurs that we met over coffee in downtown Havana.

Africa is a graduate of the National Opera Theater who now explores retro funk soul, Cuban fusion as the bandleader of Chic Soul, an all-female vocal quintet.

Adriana left her post as a university professor, making $20 a month to found Beyond Roots, which curates Afro-Cuban cultural experiences, while also running a hair salon and beauty store.

O'Neill left a well-paying government biotech firm to start a consulting firm for business and corporate services in the burgeoning private sector.

Craig and I have a ton of questions.

[laughter] We have a lot of questions for you.

Really, it's hard from a Western mindset to understand, what was it like before?

And then what is that seismic change that kind of happened?

Having a private company in Cuba here right now is probably more or less, the same compared with other countries, I mean, in terms of structure.

The big difference is Cuba itself.

There is a big crisis going on in Cuba right now.

The economy is not going well.

A lot of people are leaving our country or migrating.

And the country is still facing the consequences of pandemics and also the impacts of the sanctions of the United States government against Cuba.

That's the reality.

There is a combination of optimistic in people like us that we are in the private sector, but also we try to be real realistic because we want to push forward our businesses.

Africa, the music of Cuba is very well known.

What is the music business like now?

It's not easy because we are our own manager and producer, so we have to negotiate everything to find our own work.

We have learned about lawyers, about contracts, about business money.

Both of you guys have businesses that benefit from external people coming into the country and enjoying the music, participating in that, buying products, and things like that.

Has the tourism also been a component that's really changed in the last few years?

Yes, but sadly, it has changed for the worse.

For the worse.

Yeah, it's not a coincidence when you talk with different entrepreneurs that they say like, I opened my business in 2015 or 2016.

Actually, since Obama opened up, there was a boom in the private sector.

We had to factor that affected tourism in a really bad way, first, the change in the US administration and second, the COVID hit.

Also, you noticed that, for instance, if she works also in the tourist industry, she will get money to go to my business and buy my products.

And it's you see more money, exactly.

circulating in the economy.

When you walk in the streets-- you are right now in Old Havana.

Usually at this time, you should see-- So it should be packed.

Exactly, this place should be packed.

The good news is that we got to be creative enough to survive without the tourism.

What do you do it for?

I mean, how does that-- Oh, good question.

I have a feeling of belonging.

I have travelled to be in different parts of the world to stay actually 3, 4, 5 months.

Every time, I feel this need of coming back home.

The second thing is that I started Beyond Roots here.

And when I was saying that it's my baby, I mean it.

It's like literally, you have a baby.

So we have a vision, and we stay focused on here.

So everyone can see Cuba is hard, and it's falling apart.

But at the end, I'm just looking like, oh, O'Neill is doing great.

Joel is doing great.

That means that people is generating value, that there are more people that are seeing the light as I am.

So I'm not crazy.

When you land, everyone claps and whistles.

Yeah.

Yeah.

They love being back home.

This feels like home.

Yes, it's hard.

Do these changes allow for you to be more optimistic?

Well, I think that this changes allows me to have more control.

"Optimistic," in a moment when the country is going through a deep crisis is probably not the best word to use.

I think that these changes finally allow us to build something that can last and can help this country to change.

Africa, in your music, when you're thinking about, what is the stories that we're telling?

I want to say that Chic Soul is more than five Afro-Cuban girls singing soul, singing music in English.

No, we are representing women in Cuban society.

We are representing young women, young musicians from Cuba, fighting against everything.

There's little girls always see you perform that want to be there.

They want to be able to.

Yeah.

So there's always that.

What is the future for Cuba look like in your world?

Real revolution.

Real revolution.

A real revolution.

And what do you mean by real revolution?

A real revolution, a real change.

Yeah.

A real change for everybody, with real opportunities for everybody.

What I love about these conversations are all of you guys feel like they're part of-- you guys are all part of whatever this is.

Whatever is going to be Cuba, it feels like you guys are all part of all of that.

Salud for that.

Salud.

And then, sorry, what's left of your coffee.

That's right.

It was great.

Thank you so much.

Cheers.

Cheers.

Thank you, guys.

It is a testament to the resilience and ingenuity of the Cuban people that they continue to invent and create under extremely difficult and often changing conditions.

They believe in their country and in its future, even though they see a hard road ahead.

They also see a kind of revolution in their future, one that changes everyone's lives for the better and makes it possible for more Cubans to live in Cuba as they wish.

Funding for The Good Road has been provided by-- Can looking back push us forward?

Ladies and gentlemen, Ms. Billie Holiday!

Will our voice be heard through time?

Can our past inspire our future.

Act of concern.

[frantic violin] [applause] What makes a good road?

Blazing a trail, making a difference, being unafraid to take the path of most resistance.

Toyota has a beyond-zero vision for a carbon-neutral future that lets you find your own good road with Toyota's electrified lineup, including battery electric, hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and fuel cell electric vehicles.

Designed to get you where you want to go, from work, to school, or wherever your adventures take you, Toyota is all about paving good roads.

Toyota, let's go places.

[audio logo] [theme music] [audio logo]