Pieces of Me, Pieces of Havana

Funny how some stories come about. In this one the main character has no name. Yet, that’s not by design, but because I never did learn this fellow’s name. All I remember is that he was as much a part of the urban landscape of my Havana as the famous El Morro lighthouse.  He was there as I manoeuvred my way through my late teens in the city of my birth.

Now, reader, picture this. I am seventeen or eighteen, tail end of the 80s. By now I have become a regular at the Casa de la Cultura de Plaza, an arts centre bang on the corner of Calzada and 8^th Street, in the modern(ish) borough of Vedado, Havama. Every (or every other) Tuesday evening, there is a jazz session run by the famous Cuban musician, Bobby Carcassés. A multi-instrumentalist by trade, Bobby is a one-man show. His stage presence is magnetic. Whether playing trumpet or banging away on conga drums, this guy renders the night its beating heart.

Casa de la Cultura de Plaza is also an institution. It is here that the first Jazz Plaza Internacional was held only a few years ago. The name itself conjures up memories: this is where I was converted to jazz by a friend of mine; a night when I went from hating the genre to falling in love with it, lost to the sound of Arturo Sandoval’s trumpet. This is where I have increasingly become less self-conscious of being part of the jazz tribe. This place is a sanctuary for a teenager who is beginning to doubt the political system in which he is growing up.

And then, there is him. Forgive me, reader, for I cannot provide a name. As I said before, I never did learn this fellow’s name. But he stands out. Especially, when he puts his flute to his lips.

Here we are, the jazz faithful, watching Carcassés move from trumpet to congas and from congas to bass. At some point, our friend strides on to the centre of the stage, flute in hand. A miniature of a man, he sports an unremarkable short-sleeved shirt (which he often wears, regardless of the weather). He mutters something under his breath, perhaps a few words of self-encouragement, perhaps a prayer.

We all have our ways of evidencing our existence in the world. Some of us have what could be termed “big stage presence”. Others have to create one if they are to be noticed. As the ultimate showman, Bobby Carcassés has no problem flaunting his skills as a musician. He looks like a giant under the theatre lights. On the other hand, our friend, the flute-player is a different kettle of fish.

His is the kind of performance you remember down the years. Even if you can’t see him (sometimes the venue is packed to the rafters and people stand in front of you), you know he is there. First, it’s the stumble. He hardly ever walks straight. The drink has put paid to any notion of him regaining an upright position and steady gait. He takes his spot, facing the mike, facing, the crowd, facing the world. And then, he blows.

When he blows, you forget about the rest of the band. In fact, you float in and out of a music-made haze. For the next four or five minutes (I’m certain he would like his solos to last longer, but Bobby rushes him to the other side of the stage) you no longer live in a physical world, but a deeply-spiritual, flute-driven one.

One night I spot him after the gig. He is nursing a pint, a very posh name for the Cuban perga. This is a tall, cardboard-made cup that can hold up to a pint and a half of lager. He is sitting, talking to other musicians. Every now and then someone comes over and pats him on the shoulder. Well done, mate! That was top! He smiles. A smile that accentuates the cracks on his face. Deep furrows running on either side of his nose. Crow’s feet branching out of the corners of his eyes. I, too, congratulate him. He grins. I mention that my father is a pianist. He asks me for his name. When I tell him, his eyes light up. I know Mario! He recalls sharing the stage with my father’s old band, Orquesta Astral once. His speech is slurred but still intelligible. Under the starry Cuban night two people, a generation apart, bridge the age gap through the power of music.

He stands to leave and keels over. I’ll take you home, I offer. At first he resists, but then, he can see the deep-seated sense of duty towards men like him reflected in my eyes. He puts his left arm around my shoulder and together we take off.

We walk a few hundred yards before he suddenly breaks into song. Actually, it’s more like a hum. It is a well-known bolero, and not one in which his instrument, the flute, is usually required. His voice sounds like a plaintive cry and it hardly cracks, which is strange, given the amount of drink he’s consumed. He is certainly no singer, but at least he can harmonise fairly well. At some point he turns his head towards me, expecting me to join him. Sorry, I don’t know the words, I mutter. I’m into jazz, I say. And I’m still a rocker at heart, I silently state in my head. It will be another two or three years before I re-discover my Cuban roots and rekindle my love for bolero.

We walk for what seems like a long time. I switch positions every couple of blocks. For some reason he feels heavier on my left side than he does on my right one. This is still my “skeletal” period, when being slim goes hand in hand with being a rock fan, so I am definitely no pumped-up Atlas attempting to hold up the celestial heavens. At some point, now walking on 17^th St, past L St, Malecón-bound he points to a door on our right. It’s an old block of flats, a couple of storeys high. It is a rundown, derelict building that houses more families than it has room for. The paint on the walls has long gone, the stairs have no banister and the stench of urine reigns supreme.

The flute-player thanks me, dismisses me at the entrance and starts to climb up the stairs slowly. He looks so unsteady that I rush over and catch him just in time before he falls down. C’mon, I’ll take you to your room, I say. My voice surprises me. It sounds stern, reassuring and authoritative, despite my still-wet-behind-the-ears look. Luckily he lives on the first floor. His hunched form disappears in the darkness as soon as he opens the door. Uninvited, I step inside, too. My hands cannot detect the presence of a light switch. Don’t! He shouts. There’s no light switch, he adds. For a split second his inebriation fades and instead a moment of lucidity makes him bring two loose wires together on a nearby wall. I realise that in the same way I have been his reliable, human crutch on the way here, he has just saved me from getting electrocuted.

The light is so weak that we might as well go back to being in the dark. It beams from a single, bare, bulb in the middle of the room. Sorry, he slurs, as he scans my face. It’s very damp, he adds, as if any confirmation is needed. In the eerie half-light, ashen-coloured patches are dotted randomly on the walls.

Standing in the middle of his room, the flute-player looks less like a musician and more like an actor in a one-man show. His flat could not be a more fitting stage. The four-hob cooker that sits silently in a corner. The fridge, almost empty and, thus, rendered useless. The floor, riddled with stains. The bottles of rum under the sink, one next to the other, some full, some half-full.

How can you live like this? I ask him. I’m genuinely concerned. My late-adolescent self, although no longer a true believer, still clings a little onto Fidel’s socialist utopia. There should be help for you, I say, as I make (a futile, as it turns out) attempt to tidy up his room. There is a part of me that’s raging. Perhaps, because I have just seen this man playing his heart out on stage and now he stands here, looking lost like a Cuban version of King Lear.

My naiveté makes him laugh. Eventually his laughter transitions to hiccups-interrupted sobs. He pulls a chair and sits on it. I perch up on a tiny corner of the only couch in the room, avoiding the big stain covering much of it. I am the oldest of five children, he starts. My father was an alcoholic and my mother found it difficult to bring us all up. I married young myself but my wife couldn’t cope with my drinking problem. I spent more time in the bar at El Conejito restaurant than I did with her and our children. In the end, she got fed up and left me. My children only see me when I pay them a visit. They never come around. They’ve turned out OK, though.

I am overcome by an uncomfortable mix of feelings: anger, sadness and hopelessness. I leave after three quarters of an hour, aching with pain but relieved to be out of there. Before I go, I promise him I’ll do something. What I’ll do, not even I know. I just want to make things right. It’s only when I reach the bottom of the stairs that I notice the saltiness on my lips. I’ve been crying all along.

But, to my shame, as the days of my last year in college roll by, I begin to forget about the flute-player. I start university in the autumn. Suddenly there are fewer opportunities to go back to Bobby Carcassés’ jazz night. My time is taken up by coursework and countless assignments. It is four years before I return to the Casa de la Cultura de Plaza and it is not even for the same reason as before. By now I am an amateur actor and member of a theatre troupe that rehearses at the arts centre every week, not far from the space where the flute-player first cast his music-made, hazy, magic spell on me.

One day, many years after that night at the old man’s flat, I find myself behind the wheel in a hired car with my wife and two children in Havana. I happen to drive by the Casa de la Cultura de Plaza and unconsciously, I take the same route I did when I accompanied the flute-player home on that occasion. Past L St, I point to what is now a rubble-strewn, empty space in between two buildings (his came down some time ago. A hurricane did the job). I tell my spouse and offspring the old musician’s sad story. My daughter asks me what his name is. And I begin to laugh. Because reader, it is funny how some stories come about. In this one the main character still has no name.

Ariwo: where Afro-Cuba meets electronica

No wonder April was the cruellest month for T. S. Eliot. Just the temperature see-saw is enough to drive one bonkers. Perhaps the great poet, had he been alive, would have had a different view on the fourth month of the year, if only he had popped down to the Village Underground in Shoreditch to watch Ariwo on Monday 23^rd April as part of the La Línea Festival. The quartet-turned-quintet on the night (saxophonist Binker Golding was a special guest) produced one of the most exhilarating and rousing sets I have seen for a long time.

More than mere fusion, Ariwo specialises in a hitherto little-explored musical phenomenon: that of the crossover of electronica and Afro-Cuban beats. Except for the Cuban maverick Edesio Alejandro in mid-to-late 80s Havana, this territory still remains semi-virgin. The band’s emphasis on sound (hence the name Ariwo, which translates as “noise” from Yoruba) is evident all the way throughout their set, rendering the concert a deep sonic experience.

With personal biographies boasting both musical virtuosity and critical acclaim, Monday night was always going to feel special. What nobody could foresee was how special it became with each song being lapped up by an ever-hungry and knowledgeable audience. Gahambar’s trumpet-driven, looped groove transported me back to Havana’s carnival, floats parading up and down the Malecón, feet and hips moving endlessly and beer flowing freely. Caldera presented us with the sight of Yelfris, stalking the stage like a panther, trumpet in hand and ready to launch into a mano a mano with Hammadi Valdes on drums. To Earth showcased Binker Golding’s mastery on saxophone; his drifting riffs a cross between Ornette Coleman and Steve Coleman and yet distinctive in their own complexity. The track Alafin brought a rousing solo on congas by Orestes Noda, not just one of the finest Cuban musicians in his own right, but also an outstanding promoter of Cuban culture in the UK and Europe. And holding it all together, whilst at the same time providing some of the more spiritually enriching melodies on the decks I’ve heard for some time, was Iranian-born Pouya Ehsaei. No mean feat when you have some of the better jazz cats in the UK today challenging each other and upping the ante to the nth degree. Not all tracks were dance-friendly, though. There were a few eyes-shut, fists-clenched, much-welcome meditative moments, too.

Yes, Tom, maybe, April is the cruellest month. But it needn’t be. Especially when you have Ariwo to warm up the most inclement of spring nights.

© 2018

Pieces of Me, Pieces of Havana

Mid 90s, Havana. With a little help from Allen Ginsberg

Howl

(Cuban cover version of Allen Ginsberg’s original poem, with percussion, double bass, piano and horns)

That night I saw my generation reflected on the face of that 62-year-old German woman

dragging itself through the jineteros-filled streets at dawn, looking for an answer to the collapse of ideals

angel-looking girls looking for a heavenly connection to take them away in the machinery of night

who, poverty-affected and fidelismo-struck sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of the “wall”, minute dinghies across the water and the sound of timba in the background

who bared their – already semi-naked – bodies to José from Valencia, or François, from Quebec, staggering down poorly lit potholed roads.

who, having graduated from state-funded universities, hallucinated Paris, Madrid and Rome among wannabe western socialists scholars of marxism

who were expelled from these state-funded universities for crazy and obscene odes that turned the gun against its owner

who showed off their half-shaved thighs burning the eyes of salivating tourists fleeing from their so-called terror after the fall of the wall

who got busted by salivating coppers freshly arrived in Havana

who ate the fire offered in purgatoried hotels, expiating their sins before going to heaven, or room 1901

with broken condoms, limp cocks and hairy, shrunken balls

incomparable chevroned-lit neighbourhoods of shuddering, faltering lights, casting shadows on the sub-fauna between the 1830 restaurant and the La Punta fortress

who never knew kabbalah but sought visionary madrinas beaming in supernatural ecstasy on San Rafael, Colón and Águila

who jumped in tur cars on the impulse of a faux winter midnight-fuelled trip to Comodoro Hotel’s disco

who met a 62-year-old German woman vanishing into nowhere Zen, leaving a trail of unambiguous happiness behind, without noticing the happiness-smeared sword of Damocles following her across the ceiling

who had to pull out the sword of Damocles from the 62-year-old German woman’s body when she realised her paramour couldn’t tell the akkusativ from the dativ

II

What sea-facing statues bashed open the 62-year-old woman’s skull and ate up her brains and imagination?

Sat opposite me, facing me, laughing/crying/breaking/questioning/debating/pondering/challenging/demanding

Sag mir mal, warum?

And the weil hangs, hangs from the ceiling like the same sword of Damocles that has now been taken down and driven through her heart

There is no weil you say there cannot be as long as she doesn’t understand the pain stashed away under the stairways, out of the way of punters visiting the illegal paladar

There is no weil as long as she refuses to understand the incongruence of a twenty-two-year-old black male body and that of a Berlin Wall whose eyes are a thousandblind windows

Breakup on the roof, roof overlooking the city, city forced to sleep by scheduled powercuts but awakened by epiphanies and despairs

III

62-year-old German woman, I’m with you on San José Street where you’re madder than me

I’m with you in your incomprehension of my history which even I cannot understand either

I’m with you as the impromptu interpreter as warums and weils bounce from accuser to accused and back

I’m with you as you walk away, down the dark stairs, the sound of reggae music receding from your ears and increasing in mine

I’m with you as you reach your own casa particular and collapse in bed in the same way your “wall” collapsed seven years before

I’m with you as you wake up the next morning and look at yourself in the mirror, my generation reflected on your face

© 2018

Remembrance Day, Jazz and Sex

It was quite apposite, I thought as I walked away from the venue, that this concert was staged on Remembrance Day. Earlier on, just a stone’s throw from the theatre, I had watched the oldest procession in the country as part of the Annual Lord Mayor’s Parade.

If Remembrance Day is about acknowledging the sacrifices made by the fallen and injured to secure peace, what better way to honour them than through music? In my opinion, the most universal of all the art forms and the one that gives us the succour we need in our darkest hours.

That was exactly what Chucho Valdés and Gonzalo Rubalcaba served to a musically-hungry audience at the Barbican as part of the London Jazz Festival. Two world-strutting behemoths with a Grammy collection that would be the envy of any well-established pianist, this was probably one of the must-see shows of the ten-day event. On the one hand, seventy-six-year-old Chucho, a pioneer and trailblazer of modern Cuban jazz, who with his band Irakere not only broke the mould of what Latin jazz was supposed to sound like, but also created new rules along the way. On the other hand, smaller in stature, but definitely not in craft, virtuoso Rubalcaba, who redefined jazz for a late 80s, 90s both Cuban and international audience.

The two masters together

In addition to all this, the experience, at least to me, of watching these two colossi was akin to what I could only describe as an aural orgasm. Yes, this post is certainly X-rated, my dears, so do not let your little ones read it (smiley, with a wink). By the way, all puns are intended. Yep, it is that kind of post.

Where to start? Maybe with the teasing, long, foreplay-like meditation at the beginning. It was as sensuous as it was deft. Delicate notes, exploring, probing, feeling. It was Rubalcaba who broke away first, his Steinway gathering pace as a patient and calm Valdés kept back and watched.

What followed thereafter can only be described with the language of love, or sex, if you prefer. There were sprints and sudden stops, polyphonic dialogues the two masters lunged at and percussive, quick-fire, repetitive tapping. A Cuban montuno became a climax-inducing piece. A “zapateo” was given a full big band revamp… minus the big band. The sound was big, all-encompassing. I looked both to my left and to my right. I saw plenty of open mouths and eyes, bobbing heads and shaking shoulders. Those twenty fingers on stage, eliciting occasional gasps and sighs in the audience, every time they travelled up and down the ivories and hit the desired spot. Would we have been down on the aisles grooving it had the concert not been at 2:30pm? You bet.

And just when you thought the concert was over, the encore came. Even the ”Duke” would have approved of Chucho and Gonzalo’s take on Caravan. It was full of razzmatazz and panache. The final stage of copulation and the post-coital ciggie all at once (I threw the latter in for good measure, I don’t smoke. But I’m feeling generous.). A tumbao-heavy version with a thirty- or forty-second Manteca riff halfway through. This was not a battle, in the same way sex should never be one. This was collaboration, banter, care, tenderness, playfulness, a bit of rough and calmness (at the end). My only gripe? Where was my second part? Where was the interval and follow-up? Because as many of us know, when it comes to sex, sorry, music, second parts tend to be as good as, if not better than the first ones.

© 2017

Cubafonía by Daymé Arocena

Daymé Arocena’s outstanding second album, Cubafonía, can be summed up in two words: maturity and intensity. The former can be evidenced in her approach to song-writing and arranging. It is bold and with a take-no-prisoners attitude. Opener Eleggua combines multi-layered vocals with looped bass and horns. This is followed by a lively party number, La Rumba Soy Yo. Scatting her way through parts of the song, Daymé reminds the listener that she is a pretty good jazz singer in her own right.

The intensity is found throughout the record, mainly in the first six tracks.  Lo Que Fue builds up slowly, starting with Daymé’s signature low rasp and ending with a Cuban descarga. Maybe Tomorrow (sung in English) deals with hope. Infectious Negra Caridad is a throwback to Cuba’s 1940s and 50s big band golden era. That a 24-year-old can hold her own belting tunes that the great late Celia Cruz took years to master, speaks volumes about Arocena’s standing in the Cuban musical scene at the moment.

The largest island of the Caribbean has always been a hotbed of creativity. However, for the last twenty-odd years the sounds coming out of my country of birth are more boundary-breaking and genre-defying than ever. Daymé joins Roberto Fonseca, Yusa, Danay Suárez and Telmary in the search for an identity which, although still recognisably Cuban, is not afraid to draw from other influences. A good example of this is Cómo, a ballad that would not be out of place in a record by Jill Scott. Performed confidently in both English and Spanish, the track shows off Arocena’s softer and more reflective side.

Special mention to Ángel, a minimalist composition (pared back percussion and piano) in which Daymé demonstrates a total vocal control. And also to the closer, Valentine (in which the chanteuse goes from English to French, to Spanish), a cute changüi number.

Cubafonía is a must-have for any jazz/Latin music aficionado. On the strength of this outing, I can only see a brighter future for Daymé Arocena.



© 2017

Next Post: “One-Minute Cycle Diaries”, to be published on Saturday 29^th April at 6pm (GMT)

Let's Talk About...

… cuteness. But not in an attractive, pleasantly pretty way. That definition we know. That definition is the cat-falling, hundred-laughs-a-minute, regular You Tube dose to which we submit during our working day (oops, sorry, for turning you in. Didn’t mean that).

No, the cuteness I want to discuss tonight is not that one pertaining to little toddlers giving you the two fingers (or the middle one, in the States). Let’s talk about the other cuteness. The one with a sinister – albeit unintended – connotation and detrimental effects.

After my first ten years living here in Blighty, I realised that I had acquired an unasked-for trait: that of looking at my own country and its population through British eyes. It was a strange sensation. One minute you were still the Cuban in London, the next, you were back in Havana, looking at your birthplace through foreign eyes. There was no warning or rehearsal. The transition was swift and unexpected.

This is where the “cuteness” factor kicked in. I began to notice how “cute” we, Cubans, looked to non-Cubans (now, from my resident-in-Britain vantage point). My reaction was a mix of amusement and irritation. The latter was born out of a frustrated attempt to explain our way of life to foreigners (regardless of where, on the political spectrum, they sat) through a non-romanticised, more reality-based lenses. The former came about after listening to some of the “comrades” and “free-marketeers”. Occasionally both amusement and irritation got mixed up, resulting in a concoction I would term amuse-ritation (sue me, Oxford dictionary, I dare you).

In between working as a free-lance interpreter, translator and tour guide for a few years in Cuba and becoming an (in)voluntary immigrant in London, I amassed enough experience to formulate a hypothesis as to why we, Cubans, are so “cute” to foreign eyes. Not to all foreign eyes, I hasten to add. There are people who "get" us from the word go. The, again, these are the people who are not interested in "cute" locals, regardless of the country they visit. Any note of sarcasm you find in this article is completely intentional.

So, why do so many visitors to Cuba find us cute?

-         Because we’re not just cute, but “so fucking cute” (you have to say this in the same voice as Thom Yorke in Radiohead’s “Creep”)

-         Because of the way we pile up in cars (especially American cars). Eight, nine, ten; they always seem to grow extra seats, these cars. Never mind that the temperature is infernally hot and some people pass out during the journey. The whole situation is so “cute”.

-         Because of the way we walk in the middle of the road at a leisure pace, shaking our money-makers (both men and women, by the way. Money-makers know no gender boundaries in “cute” Cuba). Never mind that the reason for walking in the middle of the street is because of the risk of being buried under a derelict building, pieces of which are usually found… on the same road.

-         Because of the way we use our horns liberally when we drive. Hesitate behind the wheel for a split second when the light changes to green and the driver behind you (usually a bloke) will let you know in no time that you have to move off. On the same note, American cars have a funny beep. It’s so “cute” that it makes me cry.

-         Because of the way men leer at women. Women of all ages, from middle-aged to pre-pubescent (unacceptable, in my opinion). But, then, again, who am I to say it is not OK to look at an eleven-, or at a twelve-year-old lasciviously? I’m just a Cuban and Cuban men are doing what Cuban men do: be “cute” to foreigners.

-         Because of the way ”parqueadores” insist on telling you how to park your car, even when they themselves do not know how to drive (see previous post).

-         Because of the way we sound as if we are doing you, customer, a favour most of the time, when all we are doing is our job.

-         Because of the way children laugh. Once, back in the 90s, I took a British couple around the city on a sightseeing tour. That night, sitting on El Malecón, under a starry night and with a full moon on the sky, we discussed various topics. A group of Cuban children played nearby. Did you know, the man said to me, that in London children don’t laugh? My face must have shown puzzlement because he pressed on with his comment. Nope, children don’t laugh. And you can’t see the moon either, added his wife. You can’t see a full moon like this. Imagine my surprise a few months ago and many years after that meeting, when I saw a strawberry moon… in London. As for laughing children, well, at the time of writing my son is cracking up upstairs and has done so for the most part of his eighteen years. Must be the Cuban genes!

-         Because of the way we are, one minute, complaining about the state of the country, and the next minute, we are praising El Comandante. The fact that we fail to join the dots make us “cuter” than “cute”.

-         Because of the way our machismo is the in-your-face type. All hand-waving and crotch-grabbing. What would normally get a ticking-off from feminists everywhere in the western world gets a free pass in Cuba because Cuban men are so “cute”. Even when they hit their wives/girlfriends/partners.

-         Because of the fact we insist on carrying on living in dilapidated Instagram-perfect, old buildings (not that we can do anything about it). Those faces poking out of buildings that look as if they have just been subjected to an air strike are photo-cute.

-         Because of the way the “internet zombies” (copyright, moi) gather near hotels and tourist hotspots, holding their arms aloft, hoping to get an Etecsa signal to update their Facebook status or watch the latest reggaeton video.

"Cute" people galore

All this and a lot more are the reasons why we, Cubans, are “cute”. Or as Thom Yorke would probably say, so “fucking cute”.

© 2016

Photo by the blog author

Next Post: “Thoughts in Progress”, to be published on Saturday 1^st October at 6pm (GMT)

Thoughts in Progress

Ricardo’s stall (not his real name and not his stall either) is nestled at the end of a short row of stands. Tourist-friendly merchandise covers most of the display tables leaving him a tiny space for his chair. After trying to flog me a few necklaces and bracelets, he realises that I am the “other” type of Cuban and strikes up a conversation with me instead.

We are standing almost in the shadow of the Morro Castle, a picture-perfect image of colonial Havana. Built by the Spaniards in the 16^th century to protect the city, the fortress is now a must-see tourist attraction for those wanting to get acquainted with Cuban history. Especially the part about how the capital fell to the invading British army in 1762. Between the castle and Ricardo’s stall there is a moat, 15-to-20-foot-deep, which has never ceased to scare me. The scenery is as picturesque as they come but the seller’s mind is troubled by more serious matters.

“This is not my stall. The artist who makes all these crafts is somewhere else now. But we are thinking of closing this shop down.” The reason is simple: at 300 Cuban pesos for the space, 280 for the licence to operate and 250 for insurance, Ricardo and his friend need to make at least 20 CUC (more about this later) per day to keep afloat. In reality they are making only 5 or 6 CUC, if lucky. Although strategically placed near the entrance to the castle and therefore a tourist magnet in their own right, the rest of the stall-holders tell me a similar story.

This situation is not atypical. Since the younger Castro brother, Raúl, “freed” the economy a couple of years ago, laid off thousands of state workers and began the slow dismantling of the governmental monopoly, there has been a steady increase of private businesses on the island. Why the quotation marks for “freed”? Because all Raúl did was legitimise what had been going on for decades.

For any Cuban it is not a secret that it has always been the black market that has run the economy in our country for years on end. All the Cuban government can do is play catch-up. In the 80s, whilst we were still under the patronage of the former USSR, Cubans began to trade dollars with foreigners (mainly overseas students), which was considered illegal (strangely, possession of dollars was not illegal, but trading in them was. Never mind, I know a guy who did eight years in jail for having 20 cents of a dollar in his pocket. Eight years, 20 cents.). The government, then, legalised dollars in the early 90s. Already in ’92 and ’93 there were people in Havana renting a spare room out to foreigners or turning a kitchen into a private restaurant. That was against the law, but as long as you gave the local bobbie his share and kept the president of the CDR (Committees for the Defence of the Revolution) happy, no one bat an eyelid. The legalisation of private restaurants and casas particulares years later followed the same trend. The black market sets the pace, the government has to, then, swallow its pride and follow suit.

End of the working day, but, for how long?

The difference now is that the message from Raúl and his gang is confusing. Shifting workers off the state payroll, hoping that they will use their own initiative, might sound revolutionary to some (especially those I call the “plastic socialist” brigade), but the reality is more complicated. Take Juan (again, not his real name): he is part of a new breed of entrepreneurs, in his case, the famous parqueadores (literally, parking attendants) who render Havana an auburn hue with their red bibs. These are the people – mainly men – who look after your car for a fee. They do not park it (the parking bit is misleading), but guide you in the process of parking it (please, do not laugh), keep an eye on it whil you nip down to the shops, or in my case, stay a few nights at a hotel. Juan is an OAP who has done pretty much every job there is out there to do: welder, teacher, fisherman, builder, interior decorator (a profession that deserves its own post on this blog, so hard to explain it is in a Cuban context). What led him to become a parking attendant, I ask him? “My pension is not enough. I get about 240 Cuban pesos a month and that goes in the first week when I get the food on my ration card. Before becoming a parqueador, I made ends meet by walking someone’s dog, or cleaning cars. Being a parking attendant means that I can at least take home a couple of CUCs every day.”  Juan is seventy-nine, going on eighty. When I ask him what kind of car he would like to drive if given the chance, he answers, a perspicacious half-smile lifting up one of the corners of his heavily wrinkled mouth:  “I can’t drive”.

In order to understand why a seventy-nine-year-old man prefers to sit or stand outside a hotel in a blazing heat of 35-37 degrees and 90% humidity, you need to understand first the money system in Cuba. The official currency is still the Cuban peso, which has to compete with the “convertible peso”, which is the currency used to buy in tourist shops. A Cuban convertible peso is worth 25 Cuban pesos. Which means that Juan’s pension is about 10 convertible pesos (one sterling pound is worth 1.26 CUCs at the current rate. Yes, even in Cuba Brexit affected me). Because the rice, black beans, oil and other products he buys on his ration card are not enough to last him the whole month, he has to go to the convertible-peso shops where everything is more expensive. A bottle of oil will set him back 2.90 CUC (if he can find it). As a parqueador, Juan pays the government 200 Cuban pesos per month for the permit to operate. Whatever he makes after paying off, is his. The fees he and his mates set vary according to the person whose car they are guarding. In my case, I cough up 5 CUC per day because I drive a tourist car (down from 6 CUC per day. Oh, yes, I bartered).

Cyclical government bulletins update the Cuban population on the private businesses that are allowed to operate. What these regular updates do not tell people is the hurdles they must overcome in order to make their business commercially viable. Take hairdressing, for instance. With frequent shortages of shampoo and conditioner in shops, many Cubans started using “mules” to provide them with the goods they needed. The “mules” were mainly, although not specifically, people who lived in the US, especially in Florida. The government got wind of this and closed the loophole. What they did not do was to think of an alternative way to make it fair for hairdressing salons to acquire the products they needed. The consequence? A black market within the black market. Whereas before, shampoos, conditioners, combs, hair gels and other cosmetic goods were being traded (albeit at exorbitant prices), now they are being hoarded, waiting for the highest bidder (at even more exorbitant prices). The result? Many hairdressing salons and barber shops are closing down.

I put these questions to Elena (not her real name). Elena is staying at the same four-star hotel in Varadero (a beach resort, in the province of Matanzas, a couple of hours east of Havana) I am. Elena is a buyer/seller for a hotel chain. Her husband is a high-ranked tour guide and they have a primary-school-age daughter. Although only three or four years younger than me, Elena is from my same generation and, like me,  graduated as a teacher. "I could not carry on teaching. I did it for a couple of years and when the first opportunity to work in tourism arose, I did not look back. I do not regret it. There is no respect for teachers in this country anymore." All I can do is nod in agreement. When I was little, the teaching profession had a big reputation. By the time I finished my degree (three or four years before Elena), education in Cuba was in crisis. The exodus of teachers leaving for more dollar-generating jobs such as hotel porters or public relations reached its peak in the mid-to-late 90s and has never recovered.

That much is hinted when I switch the telly on that night. Havana has had to import 1,200 teachers from the provinces for the new academic year. Many of this personnel had already retired from the profession ten, twenty, or even thirty years ago. The measure smacks of a temporary and not well-thought out one. Rather than making a teacher's salary more valuable, these new recruits will be given more "ideological training" to deal with Cuba's current situation. Basically, they will be taught socialist drivel. Elena tells me that at her daughter's school the headteacher is a former teaching assistant who was not able to train as a teacher, nor (as it turns out) as a headteacher. Some of her daughter's teachers leave without giving notice, as soon as they land a job at one of the big hotels springing up in the Cuban capital.

The consequences of all these changes in practical terms are scary. First off, there is a young population who did not live under Fidel fully. Like him or hate him (and I have been highly critical of him for many years), Fidel had the smooth-talking, avuncular-looking charisma to convince people of what he was saying, even if what was coming out of his mouth contradicted what was happening in the country. Raúl is not the same. All he has is the support of the military (he was in charge of it for many decades). It is the military nowadays that administers major commercial enterprises, from tourism to construction. Once Fidel is gone (and Raúl will surely follow him shortly after. He is no spring chicken), there will be a vacuum left behind which will be hard to fill. Second reason to be alarmed is that many of our youngsters are not aware of the US blockade and its damaging impact on our economy. Not as in "not knowing what the blockade is". Of course they are aware of it from a propaganda-rich perspective. However, when it comes to analysing its effects on our exports/imports, their lack of understanding is astounding. I am not one to blame all of Cuba's ills on the embargo, but it is true that the American Congress decision to isolate Cuba economically all those decades ago has cost us hundreds of millions, if not billions of much-needed cash. But then, when I make this argument to a couple of twenty-somethings on separate occasions, they answer in almost the same way  even though they are not related. Who is to say that if the embargo comes down and trade relations are re-established with other countries, the revenue from this exchange will not be wasted? That's the third factor: mistrust. There is a lack of trust in the Cuban government because corruption and lack of transparency and accountability have been allowed to go unchecked for far too long. No one knows anything about anything.All you get is shoulder-shrugging and answers along the way of "You were born here, bro. Don't play the British card on me now. You know the saying: no one can topple this, but no one can fix it either". Conclusion: no one cares.

When talking to both Ricardo, Elena and Juan I cannot stop thinking of that famous Monty Python sketch, the 100-yard-race for people with no sense of direction. Apposite it is, as well, since the Rio de Janeiro Olympic fest is on. The sad truth is, however, that Raúl starting gun’s shot has failed to produce much merriment. The runners have all scattered in different directions but no one is laughing.



© 2016

Photo taken by the blog author

Next Post: “Let’s Talk About…”, to be published on Wednesday 28^th September at 6pm (GMT)

Pieces of Me, Pieces of Havana

All cities have a unique trait. An element that sets them apart from the rest. This is not a tourist-friendly attraction to be found in a glossy brochure at a travel agency on the high road of an upmarket gentrified neighbourhood. No, this is a quirk that only becomes obvious once one has spent time living in that city. For instance, for me, after living almost 20 years in London, the salient feature of the British capital is its brain-wrecking, confusing urban grid: myriad winding one-way roads and sudden cul-de-sacs. Whilst many visitors look forward to taking a selfie at Buckingham Palace, I like nothing more than getting lost in London’s unrivalled metropolitan labyrinth, whether walking or cycling.

Havana’s unique trait is, on the other hand, its white sheets. Or rather, used to be.

As a child growing up in the Cuban capital, I became accustomed to the sight of white sheets hanging from balconies, especially on Saturdays when most people did their washing. Their ubiquity even merited a mention in what turned out to be Havana’s unofficial anthem in the early 90s, “Sábanas Blancas” (literally, “White Sheets”, by the singer songwriter Gerardo Alfonso). Thus, it was this childhood-era sight I sought out with a mix of nostalgia and eagerness recently when I went back for a two-week visit. Yet, something had happened in the intervening years since I last had been here. The bedding item had almost disappeared from clotheslines. Replacing it on balconies were either Barcelona or Real Madrid shirts amongst other foreign “invaders”. Forget Camp Nou or the Bernabeu, Spain’s La Liga was being played on the rooftops of Havana, with the likes of Messi and Ronaldo jostling for space amongst torn jeans, off-colour shirts and pocked vests.

I had already been exposed to these newly-formed soccer alliances at the aeroport on arrival. A stifling and humid August spouted its all-enveloping raging fire on my face as we came out of customs reminding me that it had been nineteen years since I had last been exposed to this kind of heat. There, it seemed to say, this is for you, just in case you had forgotten.

I had not. In the same way I had not forgotten the hustle-bustle of Terminal 3 at the José Martí aeroport. The welcome hugs and goodbye kisses: from parents to offspring, from sibling to sibling, from lover to lover. In the middle of this display of human affection the logos of Fly Emirates and Qatar Airways stood out conspicuously.

Driving just after midnight to our hotel in old Havana gave me the chance to experience once more the city’s nocturnal fauna: the late-night revellers for whom any day of the week (it was Thursday-cum-Friday) was party-day, the gay corner on 23^rd Avenue and L Street as densely populated as it ever was, the seawall, Malecón, decked with drunkards, wannabe singers howling themselves hoarse, prostitutes and couples waiting for their in-laws to go to bed so that they could get some action. The Havana carnival was supposed to kick off the next evening, which meant that some of the main thoroughfares were closed. The detours I took through poorly-lit, back roads prompted me to keep one eye on the pothole-filled streets and another one up on the never-ending clotheslines, festooned from balcony to balcony with myriad garments. But alas, very few white sheets.

The sunrise caught me looking out of our hotel window at a Havana slowly waking up from its deep sleep. Some of the sounds were the same: horn-tooting, kiss-blowing, name-calling. Some of the sights were also familiar: the water-carrier pulling his heavy burden up a hilly road and spilling the precious liquid in the process, the American car-cum-taxi squeezing more passengers in than a normal vehicle, the peanut vendor weaving his way through the still traffic at a red light, paper cones firmly held in his hand. Up in the distance, like a small symbol of surrender (to whom? To what? To the might of Barça or Real, perhaps?) I spotted a yellowed item of bedding which had probably seen better days. As childhood mementoes go, this was one I savoured in the moment. A keepsake to remind me of Havana’s unique trait: the sight of a white sheet hanging from a balcony.

© 2016

Photo by the blog author

Next Post; “Thoughts in Progress”, to be published on Saturday 24^th September at 6pm (GMT)

Dramatis Personae of a Previous Life in Havana

I can only imagine how carefully you applied make-up on your bruise. How long it took you to work around the edges of your battered eye. I can only imagine it. For I never saw you doing it. By the time I had come back from school, got changed into plain clothes and sprinted up to the third floor of my bloc of flats, you had mutated. The damage had been done and you had “moved on”. By the time the dominoes table had been set and you, your mother-in-law, one of your brothers-in-law and his wife had perched up together, you had put on the other face. “Nothing to see here. Shit happens. I caused the shit to happen. It was my fault. I’m the shit that makes the shit happen”. He was not there. He had already left for his beat, starched copper’s uniform, duty weapon in holster, probably whistling on his way down the stairs, José José or Emanuel (he was a romantic, after all); feeling like a man.

You, left behind. You, x-months pregnant. You, sitting around the dominoes table, smiling, laughing even, the corners of your mouth rising like the temperature outside in the sultry Havana heat. The others, reassuringly seeing calm after the storm.

I saw rictus.

Even at that young age, I could tell the truth behind the acting. It was a slow process, though. You set the stage for your one-act, one-actress play, but I never believed your silence-enforcing monologue. It was a performance-within-a-performance. I knew you had no choice but join this bruise-concealing farce, this confidence-destroying mise en scène. You were on your own, family-less, home-less, friend-less, a Cuban Easterner, palestina, looked down upon by habaneros. Habaneros like me.

We were the spectators. On the third floor, we were the audience during all the years you stayed in that house. That third floor was the observatory. To the outside world, never to the inside. The inside world was off-limits. It was known what was going on but… well, “shit happens.” That third floor was the balcony, the perfect site for the telescope that was missing but not needed. Around us the houses and apartments whose white-sheet-decked derelict rooftops cried out surrender. Surrender to the inevitability and the inevitable. Did anyone else see him raising his hand? Did anyone guess what was going to happen straight after? Did anyone notice the ever-growing bump, imperceptible still but noticeable once they came close to you? Did anyone care?

Every time you threatened to leave, every time, he laughed. I know, not because I saw him but because I heard him. The sarcasm-filled adverb. Destination? I did not need to see your face to know that in your head you saw a future of endless make-up-applying hours. The barrel of his duty weapon rammed down your throat as your pregnancy bulge kept him at arm’s length was evidence. The twelve-year-old secondary school girl he chased, groomed and started a relationship with was evidence. His own mother’s bruised arms the only time she very mildly dared to defend you were the evidence.

You did not seek help. In fact, you stood up for him. Some people said you had it coming. After all, you came from Oriente. What were you doing here? They asked. Correction: we asked. Also, why did you not leave him? Some others pointed at his outstanding attitude and behaviour in the community. Of course, sometimes he went a bit over the top.

I never asked you. I do not know if I would, were I to run into you now. After all, even you were aware that no matter how carefully you applied your make-up, we could still see your battered eye.

© 2016

Next Post: “Saturday Evenings: Stay In, Sit Up and Switch On”, to be published on Saturday 30^th January at 6pm (GMT)