On the Malecón seafront, with the sound of an old saxophone in the air, sat a man with a different kind of face.
Not foreign — different. Calm. Not searching, not begging, not hustling. He drank water from a flask made of recycled materials and looked at the ocean as if it could answer a question long since resolved.
"Hey, amigo, café?" called out a local man, his face lively, jeans worn. "One dollar, just a dollar!"
The Mozaic resident looked up and nodded.
"Alright. One coffee. No sugar."
The Cuban, used to bargaining and games, paused in surprise. Usually, tourists balk at the word "dollar" — they haggle, they hesitate. This man just agreed, calmly, like he wasn't bound by price.
When the coffee was ready, the Mozaic resident pulled out a gray card with a holographic triangle from his jacket.
"What's that?" the seller frowned. "We only take dollars. No crypto crap."
"It's not crypto. It's a Mozaic ID."
"So what am I supposed to do with that?"
The resident tapped the screen:
Name: Rafael Dunen
Social Raiting: 740
Contribution this year: 312 hours
Sector: Education & Urban Planning
Exchange Program: Caribbean Goodwill / recognized by Havana Bank
He clicked "Transfer Compensation," and the seller saw a notification:
"1.80 CUC received to your card. Exchange through MozaEx is commission-free."
"So what are you, some kind of volunteer from the future?" the Cuban smirked.
"I just live in a system where coffee isn't earned through profit — it's the result of trust."
"You mean you never work for money?"
"Only when the system around me isn't ready to recognize value in another way. Then I play along. But inside — I'm not for sale."
The Cuban raised an eyebrow.
"And how do you get food, housing, vacations?"
"I give. I contribute. I participate.
My life is a network I weave myself into.
At first small threads. Then deeper. And now — I'm in Dominica for the weekend.
And you're here.
Not because I'm better — but because we chose to build differently."
"Hmm..." The seller paused. "Here, if you don't catch a dollar, you don't eat tomorrow."
"And for us — if you help no one, you can't look in the mirror tomorrow."
They both fell silent.
One holding a cup.
The other with the notification that he just served Havana's first Mozaic customer.
The saxophone kept playing.
The ocean breeze carried the scent of change.