Sunday, March 8th, 2015

This morning we did more walking around the city, this time in the poorer neighborhoods. There were people sitting on the steps to their homes, watching the world go by, others were picking up their monthly ration of food that comes in a crate at the bodega, and others were leisurely walking down the street. No one seemed in a hurry. There was no shortage of smiles and friendly greetings. “Hola, mi amor. De donde eres?”

The food crates are distributed to everyone, no matter what their need. The crates contain vegetables, chicken, cooking oil and rice—enough to last much of the month.

Amircal surprised us with a bunch of flowers for each of the women in our group. He said he was honoring the women because today is the International Day of the Woman. Latin America follows this custom faithfully, year after year. I even remembered being honored on the Day of the Woman while I was in Ecuador in the Peace Corps over forty years ago. Latinos take this day quite seriously.

We wound our way to an alley that was like entering a magical cave, leading us into another world dedicated to African music, art, and dance— with a special emphasis on La Santeria, a fusion of African religious practices and Catholicism. When the African slaves came over to the new world on the ships, they brought their beliefs in deities and beings from the spirit world and combined them with Catholic saints. The result was called Orishas. Each Orisha had its own characteristics and own special powers. Although the slaves came from several countries in central Africa, they all adopted the Nigerian language called Yoruba.

 We watched more Rumba dancing with an array of percussion instruments in the back ground, including hollow bamboo pipe, sticks hitting bigger sticks, homemade metal shapes that looked like cowbells, bead-covered gourds, and congo drums.

In the afternoon we visited another section of Havana, called Vedado, with wide streets, large trees and big houses. Next to the former American embassy, now inhabited by the Swiss embassy, a plaza was built specifically for demonstrations related to the Elian Gonzalez fiasco in 1999. Elian’s mother died on route with him to the US. The Cuban American community tried to keep Elian in the US instead of sending him back to Cuba to be with his father. The Cubans demonstrated in the plaza every day for the return of Elian to his homeland. I suspect the Elian Gonzalez issue was a metaphor for something much bigger about reuniting all Cubans.

In Vedado, we saw mansions that had been abandoned by the wealthy Cubans who left the island to live in the States after Castro took over. Many of the estates were taken over by the state and used for subsidized apartments or renovated and turned into offices, like the Unesco office building below.

Amircal said Havana owed much of it’s extreme wealth to the American and Italian mafia that had control of the city until the socialist revolution when they were kicked out of the country, the casinos were closed and gambling became illegal.  He went on to say that with the exodus of many of the wealthy Cubans and Americans in 1959, 73% of the country’s Treasury went with them.

Rodrigo, the owner of the guiding company we are using, is of Chilean origin on both sides. His father worked on agrarian reform for the Allende government. When Allende was overthrown in the coup d’etat, his family fled to Cuba to begin a new life under Castro. Rodrigo has inherited the family’s social consciousness. He has committed himself to improving his beloved country.

In 1993 Raul Castro, the more practical of the two brothers, allowed people to start private businesses. (People like to say “While Fidel is the leader of the country with his inspiring speeches, Raul is the real boss.”) Rodrigo started the guiding business so he could help inform all the visitors about his country— it’s heart and soul, not just show them the sights and take them to night clubs.  He has used his entrepreneurial skills to initiate several social projects. For example, he has co-founded an organization that converted a movie theater into a community center where teenagers who are without jobs and without a sense of purpose can learn their traditional Afro-Cuban music and dances and perform for the public. Our group had the pleasure of watching them perform. Still photos can’t do justice to the lively dancing and music we saw.

By the late afternoon the four stranded students arrived, happy to at last be in Cuba with the rest of us. It’s time to introduce you to this diverse group of students and nonstudents, nearly all Spanish-speaking, and all with a keen interest in experiencing Cuba first-hand before it undergoes the inevitable changes that will come with the new trade agreements between Obama and Raul Castro.

 

The students:

 

Well, mi amor, time to end. The internet connection is over. Hasta la proxima vez, mi querido.