Cuba surfers ride the waves on donated boards

By Esteban Israel HAVANA (Reuters) - Not long ago, Cuban surfers made surfboards by molding insulation foam from refrigerators with a cheese grater. Now they ride the waves on second-hand surfboards donated by surfers in other countries, whose solidarity is keeping afloat one of the least known tribes in the surfing universe. "Cuba is one of the last places not surfed in the world. It's probably like Bali was in the late 1960s," said Bob Samin, a 49-year-old Australian engineer who promotes surfing on the island. Surfing, which does not have the official support other sports receive in Cuba, survives thanks to the tenacity of a handful of fanatics who learned the sport by imitating what they saw in foreign magazines. Without money and with little contact with the outside world, the 100 or so surfers in Cuba shared the few... [read full story]