"They raise our pension and prices rise faster. It’s like running after a bus that doesn’t stop."

San José de las Lajas (Mayabeque)/The facade of the Banco de Crédito y Comercio de San José de las Lajas is chipped here and there. In front of the office, the line stretches along 47th Avenue like a tightrope between fatigue and hope. Sergio, with his hat tilted and his hands resting on his cane, observes the coming and going of the cars and utters a phrase that is lost in the heat: “I spent my life working to die of hunger when I retired.”

The old man says he is in no hurry to cash the checkbook. “Total, I can’t even afford a pound of rice, beans and other nonsense.” Since the Government announced the increase in pensions and retirements in July, the lines at the banks have been filled with the same irony: more money and less purchasing power. The interannual inflation that reached 39% in the middle of the monthaccording to American economist Steve Hanke, has risen to 45.7% according to the same source. Furthermore, the expert places the loss in value of the Cuban peso against the dollar at 30% since the beginning of this year.

In Sergio’s pocket the money comes out at a speed that barely manages to keep a few bills after the first two weeks of the month. The Consumer Price Index continues to rise, driven by food, transportation and electricity. Each peso that reaches the wallet is worth a little less than the previous week and the pensioner knows it well, given that he does not receive remittances in foreign currency.

In line at the bank, the same anguish over the cost of living multiplies. A dog and his owner sit on a ledge near the ATM, because the machine is out of service: out of cash and without connection to the head office. “This looks like a museum of money,” murmurs Letty, who comes to collect her mother’s pension. “Last month they gave us 5 and 10 peso bills. To buy a carton of eggs you have to carry a wheelbarrow of paper.”

Bank workers do what they can. Two employees man several windows at the same time, while the doorman tries to impose order without much luck. “When the first payment came with the increase, they did it by age, now it’s the usual every man for himself,” details another retiree waiting to collect. The man tells 14ymedio who occasionally guards a school or the local cinema to add something to his pension. “Now they give me 4,000 pesos for my checkbook and almost all of it goes to blood pressure pills. I buy them on the black market, because there isn’t even an aspirin in the pharmacy.”

If the elderly person put on a table what they can buy with the total amount of their monthly retirement, the space that these products would occupy would be small. A pound of pork, which is already close to 1,000 pesos in the most important agricultural markets on the Island, a couple of pounds of beans that would add up to 600, a liter of oil that is also close to 1,000, a leg of onion that exceeds 500 and some tomato sauce and a package of pasta would finish off the purchase.

The conversations in front of the branch revolve around this reduced basket and also other issues that hit retirees hard: lack of cash, power outages and the fear that the blackout will arrive just before getting paid. “Supposedly the system works without power, but no one believes that,” says Letty. The long blackouts paralyze ATMs, digital connections, transfers and electronic collections, leaving banks converted into places where everything is done by hand.

The conversation is stark, without slogans. The bank’s clients get involved in issues that Cuban parliamentarians approach with caution. Unlike the discussions between delegates, always more subordinated to politics than to the billboard, the retirees waiting to collect are scathing, critical, they do not believe the promises of improvement in the short or medium term.

People fan themselves with the receipts and old calendars that are handed out at the counter. A man offers a tiny bar of caramel peanuts for 80 pesos, but no one buys. “How can I afford to buy a sweet if it costs me my grandson’s daily snack for school?” asks a woman, without waiting for an answer. The comment floats in the air along with the noise of an old engine: an ailing Chevrolet passes by leaving a trail of blue smoke, as if reminding everyone that even the economic crisis has its smell.

“The whole of Cuba has become a queue,” says Sergio, with his cane between his legs. An endless line where you wait for something that never arrives: the promised salary, your daily bread, the current that leaves and returns without warning. In the first days of October, the price of imported rice increased by 15% in just one month, and beans, oil and bread rose in similar proportions. “They raise our pension and prices rise faster. It’s like running after a bus that doesn’t stop,” says the man, watching the bank clock strike eleven and sweat soaks his shirt.

Shortly before noon, a voice announces from the door: “The system is down!” A murmur of resignation spreads through the queue. Nobody moves. Some take out their cell phones without data, others fan faster. “Come back tomorrow,” says one of the employees before closing the window. Sergio gets up with effort, looks at the Bandec poster and smiles wryly. “The only thing that rises in this country is the temperature,” he says, as he walks away with his cane hitting the pavement.