Nick Fountain

At the time, Cuba's small businesses were basically tiny restaurants run out of people's homes or taxis or people renting rooms out of their houses.

And Raul said, let's expand what's allowed.

Let's let our small businesses hire outside of their families.

This wasn't like capitalism unleashed, though.

Ricardo says the government was still wary of the free market taking over.

It was around this time that Yasser, the guy in Havana who's been answering our questions via voice notes, really got into bikes.

He was in his 20s, he was working as a software engineer, and he had heard about all this bike stuff that was happening in the U.S.

and other places.

Things like dedicated bike lanes, city-run short-term bike rentals.

And he was like, we need to have that too.

And in 2016, President Obama visits Cuba, the first president since the communist revolution to visit the island.

Cuba was open for business.

Luxury fashion house Chanel just staged its very first show in the Cuban capital.

Fast and the Furious film there.

Up until this point, Cuba had oil from Venezuela and tourists from the U.S.

and elsewhere.

It was boomtastic.

Cuba still had state-owned industries.

It was still exporting sugar and cigars to fund its government.

And it was still getting help from its allies.