In a past column I admitted to collecting small soaps and shampoos from hotel rooms.
Elaine Sloan of Windsor, Ont., sent a note that I shouldn’t feel guilty: “These items are put in your room for guests to use. So what is the difference in using them during your stay or using them later in your home?”
Sloan shared a great idea: take these along on trips to poorer countries to use as gifts.
“I collected such items and gave them to the hotel maids in Cuba in 1998,” wrote Sloan. “I also took them lipstick samples I purchased from my Avon lady. Soap of good quality, cosmetics, etc., are either non-existent in Cuba or out of their budget.
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“They were so grateful for these items. Pantyhose is also appreciated and good old U.S. money. Cubans are allowed to have U.S. money now. A U.S. dollar buys a lot.
“I also took wrapped hard candy to hand out to children who hang around where the tourist buses stop in Havana.”
Sloan sent me an excellent article she wrote about Cuba, including descriptions of the countryside, the buildings, the economy and farming.
The article helped bring the island to life: from the sounds and smells she encountered to describing the people as they survived the challenges of living under a dictator.
Her perspective went far beyond that of tourists who are confined to hotel beaches.
She described children playing ball with a piece of wood since they had no bat; a worker returning home at noon with a cabbage strapped on his bike carrier; and farms using six oxen hooked to a tri-dem hauling sugar cane, then unloading with ropes in a sling “like we used to unload hay in barn lofts.”
Thanks for your sharing your rich experience.
