At least they have health care, don't they?

On Fidel's isla paraíso they have what Venezuela aspires to;

It is Cuba's take on "samizdat" - the self-published literature once passed around the Soviet Union among dissidents. Here though, flash drives are more likely to be loaded with Hola! magazine than Solzhenitsyn.

And sometimes, the internet-hungry Cuban gets lucky. Word will spread that a wi-fi network has been left open, without a password.

It happened recently in Havana, quickly drawing a small crowd to the kerb outside who crouched under the palm trees and frantically tried to hook up their iPads and telephones.

"I just want to chat to friends abroad on email or Facebook," one man there explained, adding that official internet centres were too expensive to use often.

"This is very slow," he says, of the free guerrilla wi-fi. But until it is discovered and closed down, he shrugs, "at least it's something".

Cuba, still loco after all these years.