Jane Wooldridge (Miami Herald) writes that Miami-based Havana Air will be become the first airline to offer real-time online booking for flights to Cuba when it launches its new booking engine January 1, 2016. 

The move is the latest effort to claim market share in the burgeoning battle over air travel between the U.S. and Cuba, following an announcement last week that the two countries planned to resume regularly scheduled commercial flights.

Last week, American Airlines — which has long operated charters to Cuba – announced it had reached an agreement with the island governent to establish regular service, pending approval by the U.S. Department of Transportation. Silver Airways, JetBlue and United have also expressed interest in offering scheduled flights.

The flights bookable on Havana Air’s website, havanaair.com, will be the 85-plus charter flights the company currently operates each month. Travelers will also be able to handle…

Jamaica’s Yohan Lee explains how climate change needs to be kept under two degrees to save his island and its inhabitants in this article for businessGreen. Here’s an excerpt, follow the link above for the original report.

Derrick Douglas had never known it so bad.

“For this particular period between 2014 and 2015, I think no one expected that sort of harsh drought that we experienced. We [farmers] were not aware that it would be so devastating,” he said.

Douglas, 55, became a farmer after being a teacher for several years, in hope of earning more from his efforts. He cultivates a variety of crops and ground provisions, including scotch bonnet peppers, lettuce, pak choi, carrots, yams and cocoa – on a farm in McNie District in the ‘garden parish’ of St. Ann.

The unpredictability of rainfall has made farming procedures more expensive. Drought conditions have eased but another…

A country and a religion felt the painful death of Max Beauvoir in September of this year. Beauvoir was a Vodou priest who had been elevated to level of Ati, the supreme leader of the religion. Elected by a unanimous vote on Thursday, the new Ati will be Alcenat Zamor, Lilith Dorsey announced in this reports for Patheos.com.

The induction ceremony for Zamor will take place on March 7, 2016 in Place des Gonaives. His term will run for seven years and metropolehaiti.com reports that he has promised to carry on the work of Beauvoir and also called for unity among his people.

Alcenat Zamor is 60 years of age and hails from the town of Gros Morne. He has been a practicing Vodou priest for 42 years. Some are calling Zamor a visionary, and some are saying no one will be able to replace Max Beauvoir.

When the New Year begins, it will bring two events together in January related to the noted Harlem Renaissance author, anthropologist and folklorist Zora Neale Hurston — her 125th Birthday and a new play on Hurston’s life, friends and folklore, Adrienne Moore reports for TC Palm.com.

“I’ve LIVED” will introduce guests at The Sunrise Theatre with new stories, a review of her written work and her love of Fort Pierce.

Written by local playwright Brenda Cooper, the story of Hurston’s life comes alive as Cooper and a cast of local actors present Zora in this drama production, scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 2 at 7 p.m. at The Sunrise.

Tickets are $25 per person and are available at the downtown Box Office on South Second Street or by phone at 772-461-4775 or online at boxoffice@sunrisetheatre.com.

Tickets are also available by contacting Brenda Cooper directly at 772-332-1220.

Hurston arrived in Fort…

NPR’s Morning Edition focused on Tego Calderón’s brand of reggaeton in “Puerto Rican Hip-Hop Icon Tego Calderon Mixes Prose and Politics.” Read the following short description by Jasmine Garsd, with a link to the interview below:

When the Morning Edition team arrived in Puerto Rico to report our series on the island’s difficult situation, one of the first things we noticed was, strangely enough, the sound of the coquis — tiny frogs whose mating chant goes on throughout the night. In fact, the sound of music — whether by the coquis, from stores, or blaring from passing cars — accompanied us continually. The island seems to always keep moving to the sound of various beats.

It would be too easy to arrive at a location as a journalist and shuttle from one story to the next — crime, unemployment, exodus. But Puerto Rico kept reminding us at every turn that…