The elevator in the best hotel in town is broken and will not be repaired. The rooftop bar on the third floor is therefore closed.
The doors to the balcony do not open in the hallway and do not close in the bedroom. The door to the room barely closes and the door of the closet has never been opened. When somebody showers in the next room it sounds like a train whistle. The bed has one tiny pillow and by the feel of it has been filled with crumbled paper. The sheets are stained.
The phone in the room can only dial reception. The phone in reception can only be dialed using a special code by the receptionist. A 30 sec call to the next town cost $1.20 but it takes 10 trials to get through. The internet computer costs $5 an hour but not much happens in that hour on your screen.
Nightstand lamps are rare but your room will be lit by bright energy saving fluorescent light. The aircondition makes the sound of a 737 at take-off and is either on or off and cannot be adjusted.
Cockroaches will live in the bathroom if you are lucky and in the bedroom if you are unlucky. The credit card machine in all hotels is broken and you can pay only in cash. You will not get a receipt.
Taxis need to be shortwired to start. Taxi doors only open from the outside or never. Taxi drivers always stop at the next gas station to fill half a gallon of fuel in an empty tank before driving you anywhere. The taxi driver that dropped you off will wait for your return indefintely and hopelessly optimistic.
The taxi driver will always have a friend that owns the best guesthouse in town and if you don't like it he will have another friend and another friend and another one. And one with the best restaurant as well.
Every car can be a taxi. A 30 year old polish Fiat 126 the size of a lawn mower is not too small of a car to be a taxi. Most taxi drivers pick up babymilk along the way and will deliver it 100 Miles later to their brother, cousin, friend or uncle. Bicycle cabs will insist on taking you home to your hotel including wife, two kids and two strollers.
People stop on the highway and walk across the median to get a coffee at the rest station. But with literally no traffic anywhere it is safer than crossing a road in Brooklyn.
There are people on horse-drawn carriages on the highway, and grazing cows and men on horses with or without saddles and cyclists and thousands of crabs on yearly migration and police officers in broken Ladas and trucks from the old Soviet Union filled with sugarcane.
Taxi drivers will refuel their cars behind the farm next to the highway. Out of a barrel, between the chickens, pigs and cows.. Just to save 40 cents on a gallon of petrol.
There are live bands in the corner of every restaurant that play the same 10 songs and will ask for a donation after three after you have refused to buy their CD. Toiletpaper is only available on request and you will be asked to pay for using a bathroom.
A slice of pizza can cost 10 cents, 50 cents, 1 dollar or 3 dollar. Same with ice cream or beer. The bottlled
water is called 'tourist water'. There is no Coca Cola or Fanta or Pepsi or Magnum or Fritolays or Pampers or Budweiser or Axe or any global brand. But Aqua Pana for reasons unknown. Cheap rum can be purchased in a milk carton and is the same price as 'tourist water'.
All food comes with rice, cooked green beans and plantain chips with a tomato, cucumber and lettuce salad without dressing on the side.
All banks require a wait time of minimum one hour. But there are cash machines. About 10 in the entire country. Mostly out of service. When working only dispensing 5 dollar notes which come in handy when you have to pay your 800 dollar hotel bill in cash...