Cuba is a place of parallel worlds and parallel currencies.

Crumbling buildings with peeling paint that Cubans call home stand side-by-side with painstakingly restored, artfully colorful edifices where only those with access to foreign currency can afford to stay.

The 1940s- and ’50s-era jalopies held together by who-knows-what drive past post offices equipped with sleek public computer terminals offering e-mail access.

Closed off from the United States in many ways, Cubans open themselves up to each other every hour of the day. With air conditioners and clothes dryers a luxury, they throw open windows.

They air their clean laundry to the world. With limited access to cable TV that keeps people in other climate-controlled worlds indoors, neighbors talk — from window to open window. They mingle on front steps after work, where they earn salaries that allow them to buy necessities at government-rationed prices — but not much else.

In every neighborhood, children hit the streets to play sports — volleyball, soccer, but mostly baseball — with whatever facsimile of equipment that will allow them to play a game.

With few able or allowed to buy cars, they travel pressed together in public buses. Or, they climb into horse-drawn carts in the city’s outskirts.

Tribune reporter Karen Branch-Brioso and photographer Chris Urso spent last week in Cuba.

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