Re: Cigar Thread
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A question i had that a canadian friend of mine wasn't able to answer:
Are you able to buy genuine cuban cigars in Canada?
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Yes... but not cheaply.
It's surprising, but the not having the embargo in Canada has actually hurt the real afficianados north of the border. It seems that their local shops will ONLY carry Cubans, because that's what 90% of the people in their shop want. They're just casual cigar smokers, and assume that cubans are the best, so that's all the shop will carry.
If you ask me, cubans aren't any better or worse than stuff that comes out of the Dominican, Nicaraugua, Ecuador, even some Costa Rican stuff... they're certainly different, but not really better. They've got a very unique taste profile that I can understand certain people enjoy, but why limit yourself to just one type of cigar when there's so many other great ones out there?
Add to that all the taxes, fakes, etc... I'm actually kinda happy that in the US we've been "forced" to enjoy so many other types of cigars.
Most of the cubans I've smoked I'd rank between 6/10 and 8/10... certainly above-average. But I've had some AWESOME smokes from other places (in fact, most of those are blends from two or three different countries).
Again, most of the mystique around cubans is that forbidden fruit thing... A casual smoker who smokes just one or two cigars per year is just caught up in the hype of them. Their reputation FAR out-reaches the actual level of their cigars.
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