Vanessa Bauza

HAVANA · Buffeted by hurricanes, droughts, a tougher U.S. embargo and high oil prices, Cuba's economy has limped through yet another year of chronic shortages, leaving many Cubans with little cause to celebrate and fewer savings with which to ring in the new year.

In Havana, store windows decorated with multicolored lights, artificial Christmas trees and shimmering garlands beckon to customers, displaying luxury items like refrigerators and television sets that cost 10 times the annual salary of an average worker.

"Everything for a dollar" shops are a favorite among the lucky few with money to spend on gifts. But prices for many products are up by at least 15 percent compared to last year while paltry salaries have remained stagnant. Holiday spending is simply unaffordable for most.

"It's been a long time since I celebrated Christmas," said Maira Pérez, a former statistician who peddles used clothing in central Havana, surviving on the meager profits of her black market business. "I don't put up a tree anymore. The decorations cost 60 or 80 pesos. I could eat for a week on that."

The Bush administration predicts tough new economic sanctions enacted this summer will cost President Fidel Castro's government about $500 million within the next year. But average Cubans say they are the ones feeling the economic crunch.

"They don't squeeze Fidel, they squeeze us. Fidel will keep on living the way he does," said Rosa Sosa, 36, who works as a maid at a private bed and breakfast catering to tourists. She was out of work for two months this year due in part to a drop in American travelers. Now she has no savings with which to celebrate the holidays.

"We are not doing anything for Christmas, no wine, nothing," Sosa said. "If we have an end of the year party, we won't have anything to eat in January."

Some Cubans with relatives in the United States said they felt doubly punished this year, first by the Bush administration's tightened embargo restrictions and then by the countermeasures imposed by the Cuban government.

"The problems don't come from one side, but from both," said retired carpenter Ricardo Pérez, 77, who supplements his miniscule state pension with $300 cash transfers he receives from his daughter in Miami every three months. The Cuban government now takes 10 percent of Pérez's greenbacks.

To make matters worse, Pérez's daughter is barred from visiting him for the holidays, as she had planned, as a result of changes in U.S. travel restrictions that now limit Cuban Americans to visiting their homeland once every three years.

Cuba's Tourism Ministry expects trips by Americans and Cuban Americans to drop by 30 percent this year due to the U.S. travel limits. In Miami, the Marazul travel agency, which books charter flights to Cuba, has seen holiday travel plummet from an average 3,500 Cuban American passengers in past Decembers to 250 this month, said vice president Armando García.

The tough U.S. sanctions have been compounded by other factors: Cuba's western provinces were pounded by two hurricanes that destroyed homes and agriculture, and in the eastern provinces a wrenching drought shriveled sugar cane fields, shuttering 23 mills in this year's harvest.

Among the few rays of light, Cuban tourism officials reported an average 9 percent increase in tourism between January and September. Also, China, Cuba's third most important trade partner, announced last month it would invest $500 million in Cuba's nickel industry, a top export.

According to the Cuban government, last year the island's economy grew by 2.6 percent. This year, officials predicted a slight increase.

Retired tobacco roller, Maria Luisa Santos recalled with nostalgia the Christmas Eve or "Noche Buena" feasts of her youth. Now all her $6 monthly pension buys is a few household staples, supplemented by remittances from her daughter in Sarasota.

"The family would gather around a long table with lots of food and everyone was invited," Santos, 64, recalled of past Christmases. "The youth today don't have a feeling for what Christmas is like."

Indeed, the holiday was officially ignored for almost 30 years before being reinstated in 1997 as a concession to Pope John Paul II's historic trip to Cuba. For 24-year-old Jesus Llamas, the holidays are a source of stress he'd rather do without.

"There is a lot of pressure about how to spend the end of the year," said Llamas, who had to close his sidewalk snack stand for lack of business. "I'd like to have a dinner at home, celebrate, have drinks and music, but that requires money, money, money."

Vanessa Bauza can be reached at vmbauza1@yahoo.com

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