Sawt Falasteen - In crisis-hit Cuba, World Cup offers brief respite

And for 100 minutes, as Morocco held local favorites Brazil to a draw, Cubans complied and put their troubles aside as football's World Cup came to state television on Saturday -- two days late.

In a small cafe in the densely populated Centro Habana district of pastel-colored townhouses with peeling facades and washing lines strung from the balconies, men perched on stools were watching the action on a small screen.

Baseball-mad Cuba has never taken part in a World Cup tournament.

But on the communist island, reeling from the worst economic crisis in over a generation, intensified by a US-imposed oil blockade, football is king among the kids particularly.

So when state television announced, a day after kick-off in nearby Mexico, that it would broadcast 16 games from the opening stages, the national mood lightened.

Now, if only the energy gods would also play ball by keeping the lights on for the matches.

There was no such luck for Ismael Veranes, the round-faced human resources director of Cuba's national theater.

Sipping a juice out of a carton -- his one indulgence for the game -- he came to the cafe after spending 20 hours without power at home.

Speaking in fluent French, this man of mixed Les Bleus and Selecao loyalties said the tournament provided a welcome respite amid chronic fuel shortages which have grounded most cars and public buses.

His commute to work now is an eight-kilometer (five-mile) roundtrip by foot, in crushing summer heat.

"And when you get home, exhausted, there's no electricity," he complained. "It's hot and there are mosquitoes."

- 'Clear our minds' -

An hour before the game, on a nearby corner, nine-year-old Lionel Messi fan Michael and his 10-year-old sister Meiliuvis were dribbling with a bottle top, under the benevolent watch of beret-clad Che Guevara on the wall of a gallery across the street.

Whereas in the past Cuban children were weaned on baseball -- Fidel Castro was known to bat for the crowds -- since the arrival of smartphones in 2018, "children lean more towards football," Michael's father Osmany explained.

And while the crisis is also etched in the island's "very degraded" football pitches, the World Cup "allows us to clear our minds for a while," he said with a smile.

Many Cubans speak nostalgically of World Cups past, when all the games were broadcast by state television, and food and fuel were not as scarce -- except in the early 1990s, when Soviet aid dried up.

This time round, only bars with cable TV and expensive beer show all the games, leaving many on the outside looking in, literally -- from the sidewalk.

"It's not the same," 36-year-old Alan said mournfully as he stood on the street discussing Brazil's prospects with two friends, a can of beer in hand.

In Cuba, however, some football fans are more equal than others.

In Havana's leafy middle-class Vedado neighborhood, pints at a dollar a pop were flowing at a watch party in a cultural center festooned with a Brazil flag and World Cup bunting.

Outside, a row of SUVs attested to the existence of a small elite that is doing well on dollar salaries from the expanding private sector -- even as other Cubans rummage through rubbish bins for food.

But even here, the long arm of the crisis is visible, with the TV reception periodically freezing, triggering loud groans from supporters clad in the yellow Brazilian jerseys of stars Vinicius Junior, Neymar and others.

Victor Diaz, a 24-year-old biologist, looked grave as he described the need for escapism.

Having "something to lighten all the burdens that we're dealing with day by day is incredible," he said.

A.AlHaj--SF-PST