For our final full day in Cuba, we decided to take it easy. The man behind the bar in the Casa del Ron summed up for us the entire ethos of being a tourist in Havana when he tried to get us to open the day’s batting with a mojito: “It’s very nice…” he swooned, making it sound so tempting. But he was so relaxed, unlike the hard-sell girls and boys on Obispo and down in Chinatown. Yes, it IS very nice, but this distorts the reality of existence here so much, it would be obscene to join in the game. Don’t forget, this team reports back to you what we find BEHIND the façade, and we always deliberately try NOT to be tourists, but to immerse in the local culture of the country we’re visiting. And that’s precisely why we’re not staying in a hotel here: we’re living life around the kitchen table and on the front doorstep onto the street with Sandra, Pablo, Luis and Lisandra. It would be ’very nice’ to sip Mojitos all day (and here I’m talking metaphorically, because they taste of mint from the garden, which isn’t quite to everybody’s palette, and I much prefer the Piña Colada…and, come to think of it, we haven’t even tried the Daquiris yet at El Floridita, but it would really go against the grain to walk in Hemmingway’s footsteps…) but life here is grim, unbelievably grim. Odaline de la Martinez once said in an interview that Cuba was Music. Period. Well, sort of. But it’s hardship too, and the music is just the blessed relief.
Simon was here almost exactly three years ago. And since then, it’s changed. Havana has rotted some more, there are fewer gringos on the streets, the jineteros are harder-selling, and the cycle rickshaws are an act of desperation. It’s not so much pulsating to the sound of Son and the beats of Salsa and Reggaeton, as lurching. And when Simon tried (admittedly in an act whiffing of desperation) to point out to Pablo that Raul and Fidel weren’t immortal and that Obama was willing to develop a healthy foreign policy towards Cuba, meaning that change was just around the corner, Pablo reacted with disdain. They always talk about change, but it has never happened. All his life he’s waited for the change, and now, it’s just too late.
So it was Sunday morning, and Simon went to the solemn mass in Havana Cathedral, complete with three priests, incense, twelve acolytes and a full nave. It was great (apart from the lamentable music, a shame in this of all places…) but of course the clergy here are controlled by the government, just as in the old days in Russia, and of course a high percentage of residents of the city are followers of Santeria rather than just Catholicism. But the priest worked hard in his lengthy sermon, and shook hands vigorously at the end. Later that night, our pair of weary travellers, longing for the journey home, feasted on swordfish and Morros y Christianos. Sandra cooks well indeed, and then Pablo came over to join the duo to put the world to rights. We have further, shocking discoveries to reveal. Let’s play a little game: Cuban What’s My Line. Place these three men in order of salary: taxi driver, street cleaner, doctor. Yes, you’ve guessed it correctly, of course the taxi driver is the richest, he makes a fortune driving around the rich gringos and he gets paid over 20cuc for an airport run. So who comes next? Yes, of course, it’s the street cleaner. So how much does the doctor earn? Wait for it… 500 pesos per month. We just did the maths, and that’s $250 per YEAR. Dollars, US. Per y.e.a.r. I don’t think we need to say any more. Over, and out!
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