Too good to be true!

 I love Tamarac Senior Center. Not only for the great exercises I can do there daily,  but also for the new friends one can make there.

New friends made on the trip

Another enjoyable aspect of activities there are the outings; shopping, theatre etc. 

For a while, these trips were on hold, so when I heard about a new one to Boca Raton Museum, I jumped at it, especially when I heard the price $3!!!!!

In front of Boca Museum 

According to Google, it was Richard Carlson an American author who came up with the saying; if it sounds too good to be true, it is.

Well, I fall for it every time 😬. 

So when the Senior Center promoted a $3 trip from the Center on Wednesday February 21st to Boca Museum, although it sounded too Xtra good to be true,  I swallowed it hook line and sinker.

And so did the almost 40 other seniors who boarded the bus today.

Some of the others who swallowed the bait😊.

Front of the museum

When we got there, we discovered to our chargin that the museum had not been informed that our group was coming, so no arrangements had been made for a tour.

$3? Hah.

 That was just for the bus ride for we had to pay another $10 each to enter the museum! 

So much for swallowing bait!

Sigh.

We all went in anyway and in my book it was more than worth it.

On the first floor, they had a section called Smoke and Mirrors where they showed how magic tricks were performed over the years and also debunked so famous fakes.

To explain the magic tricks, they used projectors to create the illusions. 

See some below.

Fascinating stuff and eye openers for gullible people like me!

This to me was more than  worth the money.

And there was more, as they had a section exposing some notorious evangelical frauds.

One was Peter Popoff.

I had seen his ads for miracles on tv and had marveled about his chosen name, as in our Jamaican language, Popoff means scam. 🤣🤣

 Well they exposed 'his miracles' fully, explaining how his wife worked the audience before the miracles, to set up everything,! 

The second floor was good too. It was pure art. 

I especially loved this one by Andy Warhol of Mohammed Ali and the Ancient Americans and African exhibits. 

Some pics are below.

A school trip was there too.

There were some good sculptures on the outside too, in the sculpture garden.

A sculpture outside.

Yup. It turned out to be a good day after all and we were carefully driven to and from the venue by the ever reliable Mr. Elliott.

Pics below of Mizner Park, in front of the museum.



Transportation in Cuba

A sidecar

As far as I am concerned, the most devastating effect of the continued US embargo against Cuba, is to be seen in the transportation system.

On a recent visit to Holguin and Santiago provinces, Isaw the most decrepit and uncivilized forms of transportation as people were packed like cattle into anything on wheels, from wagons drawn by tractors, oxen and horses, bikes with side cars to trucks on which rough covering have been installed, at times allowing you to see only the eyes of the passengers in what would be prison like lorries in other countries.

Bicycle taxi stand

The roads are also full of very old American cars which run like a charm and a spattering of new cars and a number of Russian made Ladas.

In the cities the novelty is s.the bicycle taxis which all have umbrellas stashed away to be pulled out when the rain falls.

Of course, there are well organised tour companies run by the government and these have brand new airconditioned buses to take tourists around, but no such luxuries for the natives
I guess the only benefit of this terrible embargo is that because people have to walk and ride a lot, there are very few fat people around.

During our week long visit, we started to count the fat people and after only finding five in the first four days, abandoned the project!

Of course the benefits the Cubans get from exercise seem to be widely counteracted by the widespread use of cigars and cigarettes, but like us here, I guess they say, what the heck, who wants to live forever!