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Cafunga, that Coffee is Mixed Up
Güines, December (www.cubanet.org) - Traditionally, Cubans are great consumers of coffee, infusion which is obtained by roasting and grinding the bean produced by a rubiaceous plant, a native of Ethiopia in the African continent, named coffee bush.
This costume of drinking coffee in great quantities has decreased after the Communist triumph of Fidel Castro in 1959. Up to that time, the nationals enjoyed the privilege of buying one pound of the powder (around one half kilogram) at the modest price of 96 cents in any commercial store in the country.
Today, reality is different. Each Cuban can buy by the rationing card system the minimal amount of four ounces of coffee mixed with peas or wheat, although sometimes when these grains are absent they are replaced by soy.
This distribution of coffee in Cuba is made every fifteen days, at the rate of two ounces per person in sealed envelopes, although there are some areas in which the distribution is made in 50 lbs bags to be divided in the markets and establishments prepared for this task where the product runs the risk of being adulterated by the employees of the same.
On the other hand, delays of up to two months have been known to occur, in the assignment of the mix to inland Municipalities such as San José, Güines, Melena del Sur, Jovellanos and Calimete, where their inhabitants have resorted to the black market to obtain the aromatic powder.
Several persons interviewed in Güines Municipality, Havana Province, revealed that the product has increased its value in the black market due to delays in the distribution by the State (45 days without receiving coffee by the rationing card). One pound of coffee is presently quoted at 40 pesos.
Trusted sources from the provincial roasting place, located in San José de las Lajas, stated that the delay in the distribution will continue during the next months due to lack of diesel fuel for the vehicles that distribute the powder to the remaining Municipalities in Havana.
In the meantime, the Cuban continues, one way or another, trying to maintain such costume that for centuries nobody has been able to erase, the traditional sip of coffee, that although now is called cafunga, for the nationals is a habit or a necessity.
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Translated by the staff of Círculo Güinero de Los Ángeles.