ANIVERSARIO
We arrived in charming, vivacious, Santiago de Chile by Viazul, the bus company set up by Fidel Castro a decade or so back to cater for the spoiled taste of the foreign tourist. While dilapidated neglect may elicit a certain charm in relation to Cuba’s fleet of 50s yank tanks, the same approach is pretty infuriating when it comes to enduring endless journeys on roads that resemble a nuclear test site, especially while paying bus fares that equate to a fortnight of Cuban wages. The trip begins with an anxious choice between ensuring that your luggage actually gets loaded underneath, and boarding as early as possible to have first chance at the Russian roulette game of finding a functioning seat. Even when you get a working model yourself, there is the risk that when the guy in front sits down, his chair will flop precipitously towards you until his head is closer to your crotch than any man has gone before. The climate control swings erratically between two settings; monsoonal Borneo jungle, and Arctic tundra. Viazul veterans can be seen boarding with blankets, scarves, gloves, a woolly hat and swimsuit. A bag to pee in is also recommended, given the state of the on-board toilets, which are usually locked anyway.
The drivers are a swarthy breed, built much like a bus themselves, who have concocted their own form of communication. As if Cuban Spanish were not already tricky enough for the hapless foreigner to understand, bus driver creole is delivered in a tone that sounds at once like shouting, vomiting and belching, while attempting to emphasise their Bay of Pigs superiority by competing for Jack Kennedy’s world record for words spoken in a minute. Even the simplest question is countered with a long, cryptic outburst, and I am yet to meet a non-Cuban passenger who has understood a single syllable uttered by these men.
The five hour journey stretched to seven and a half, so it was with some relief that the Bacardi rum museum sign came into focus, although we had no intention of visiting. It was late by the time we ventured out to find a meal, being warned by our home-stay host that we may want to consider returning before midnight, an unusual suggestion in a country where the best venues do not even open until 10. She looked around to ensure nobody was listening, even though we were standing in her own lounge room, and explained the next day would be the first anniversary of the death of El Comondante and perhaps everything would be closed – certainly nothing that resembled having a good time would be tolerated. Especially drinking of alcohol.
Photo Aniko Papp
The next day dawned with no apparent concession to the anniversary, and we set out to explore Cuba’s second largest city. One blessing of the 5 decade economic blockade has been protection from the architectural vandalism which wracked the Western world through the 60s and 70s, so most of their glorious Colonial and art-deco buildings survived the 20th century intact, if a little run down in some cases. Even the monstrous Soviet-style housing blocks were fortunately consigned to the outskirts of the towns.
Santiago exudes charm and liveability, with a tranquil pedestrian mall stretching over a kilometre from Plaza de Marti at the top of town all the way down to the docks inside the extensive harbour. Bars, restaurants, craft markets, and stately hotels line this attractive strip, which teams with the diverse kaleidoscope of Cuban life. There simply is no typical Cuban. The rich history of immigration, including its place as a slave trading centre has ensured that every size, shape, and colour of human is encountered, and from what I can tell there seems to be little discrimination based on looks. There is also a wild flamboyance of attire, and it never ceases to amaze me how the citizens of a country where wages are as low as $25 per month can dress with such flare. Where else do the schoolboys wear mustard yellow trousers and girls pleated miniskirts? It suspect that when they get to school, the head mistress gets out a tape measure to ensure that their skirts are cut far enough above the knee.
We ambled aimlessly down the mall, fell victim to the churos stall, and wound up at a harbour-side park which sported an enormous sculpture spelling out the name Cuba. At a nearby dock, I noticed a curious craft being boarded by dozens of local people, clearly headed for a relaxing day out. The ferry was flat on the bottom like a gigantic beer can raft, with a second storey constructed of little more than scaffolding, and a water-pipe frame above which had corrugated iron strapped onto it with fencing wire. Although imaginary news reports of mass drownings in the bay of Santiago immediately flashed to mind, the merry atmosphere aboard was somehow alluring. When some guy with a yellow T shirt suggested we join the trip, informing us that all it only costs a dollar and is leaving in five minutes, we jumped across the old tyre separating boat and jetty moments before it cast off with no idea where we were headed.
Mr Yellow T-shirt (MYT) became our impromptu guide, pointing out landmarks such as the cement factory and vast 17th century Moro fort perched high on a headland, built to guard against pirates. Ironically, it took so long to build that by the time it was finished, so were the days of the buccaneers. We also learned that our destination was a tiny island called Cayo Granma, and that there would be no ferry back to Santiago for another four hours. We sure hoped it would be an interesting place.
Photo Aniko Papp
Even more than the rest of Cuba, Cayo Granma seems to be in living in an idyllic time warp. Gaily painted cottages adorn the sparkling waterfront, tanned string beans of children frolic on tiny rowing boats, and everybody seems engaged in the pursuit of the fruits of the sea. I am not talking trawlers and long line fishing boats here. Every craft was powered by muscle and there was no net bigger than what can be thrown by one man.
We joined the happy stream of locals on a footpath which rings the cayo, a journey which takes no more than half an hour. As we were about to inspect a restaurant, MYT informed us that we would find a far superior establishment a little further on. We went with his advice, even as we correctly suspected that it was owned by his brother.
Restaurant Marisco has as appealing an outlook as anyone could hope for, with a generous vista across the aquamarine bay to the steamy jungle-clad ranges beyond. We were shown a menu priced in the tourist currency (CUC), although we were damn sure that the rest of the merry-makers who enjoyed the same fare were paying in Nationales, costing a fraction of what we were up for. In any case, the beer was icy cold, view stupendous, and it seemed that if you are ever going to get fresh seafood this would be the place. In fact, I would never normally eat any kind of meat including fish but as one heads further away from Havana, vegetarianism becomes increasingly more problematic, and there is only a certain amount of pizza and spaghetti that one can handle. I ordered a fish, Aniko a lobster, and we settled into the routine malaise of having no clue what is going on. As long as the drinks kept coming, and we made it back to the ferry terminal before 5, all would be good with the world. MYT was by now employed as a waiter, and filled us in on the history of the island. This was the very place that Fidel Castro, with his rag-tag team of revolutionaries landed after a fabled and nearly fatal voyage from Florida in a clapped-out ferry called Granma. Hence the name of the island. It seemed as though we had made a very appropriate unplanned journey on the first anniversary of El Commondante’s demise. And how good was it that the no alcohol rule was so flagrantly flouted!
Half an hour had elapsed before a man, so scoured by the sun that his skin resembled an elephant’s arse, turned up in his row-boat with a bundle of still flapping, plate-sized pink fish hanging from a rope. The restauranteur met him on the relic that served as a jetty, relieved him of his load, and hurried back to the kitchen. The meal, when it finally arrived, was so superb that we quibbled only mildly when presented with an eye-watering bill – having been charged individually for all the condiments that are usually included in the price of a meal. And all the beer of course.
An agreeable stumble around the rest of the island brought us back to the main wharf with plenty of time to spare. Although I have not fished for years, given that I can’t bring myself to kill the poor little buggers, I still find it immensely relaxing to watch other guys sit dreamily gazing at azure water hoping that some creature of the deep might happen upon their bait. So, when a septuagenarian with a hip flask of rum, and teeth that protruded piranha-like from his mouth plonked himself on the bench rather too close beside me, I was not at all interested in his wide-eyed gaze. My attitude softened though when he congratulated Aniko for scolding a local litter bug, and the two of us got talking. My Spanish is only passable at the best of times, and I find a Cuban of his age immensely difficult to understand. However, it felt like experiencing a piece of history to talk with a man who, having spent his entire life on the island, could distinctly remember the day that the Granma landed. Mind you, from what he told me, it seems like shipwrecked is probably a more apt description. He must have thought that foreigners have pretty weird facial expressions, as gaping and tongue-licking at the corner of my mouth fought for supremacy, while I strained to decipher the garbled mess that he made of such a beautiful language. This man’s love for the revolution knew no bounds, and before long, he revealed that his own father had been murdered by the previous administration. Actually, it sounded as though Batista had personally pulled the trigger, though that seems unlikely so far away from Havana.
Having established that he had several grandchildren, we gifted Alberto a small cling-on koala key ring for them to play with. It was immediately obvious that the kids would not have a snowflake’s chance in hell of getting hold of the toy, so delighted was he to have received it. I had to show him several times how to operate the cuddly arms by squeezing the shoulders, and once he had mastered that skill, he beamed like moonshine, his enormous pearly teeth glinting in the afternoon sun. After twice arresting us from boarding a ferry bound for some other place, he joined us for the trip back to Santiago, babbling about the history of the environs. Far from commemorating Castro’s death by way of abstinence, the great man’s memory was constantly toasted, and between us we got through a good portion of the rum.
I explained to Alberto how commercial fishing has devastated the seafood stocks in my own country, to which he showed, in a very animated way, how the “foreigners” (ie people from Santiago) were doing exactly the same thing around his own island. I looked out to see a postcard perfect scene of twenty or so inflated tractor tyres floating in the harbour, each with an occupant angling with hand lines. The sky was lit crimson, gold, and vermilion as the sun disappeared behind the purple range in which Fidel had hidden in the years between his disastrous landing on Cayo Granma and his victorious tour to Havana following the fall of the Batista regime.
We were keen to shout our new friend a bite to eat, but were fresh out of tourist dough after our brush with MYT and his family, so explained we would need to find a pizza joint which charges in the stupendously more affordable Nationales. Alberto seemed to have his heart set on a place, and we followed him up the mall hoping like hell that our communication was clear and we would not have to wash the dishes or some other unpleasant task to compensate for our dinner. He brought us to a flash, air conditioned restaurant with starched white table cloths and wine glasses with cloth napkins placed decoratively within. While I went straight for the menu to check affordability, old Alberto was given the dressing-down of his life by a waitress who looked like a champion wrestler or Russian airline stewardess for carrying a bottle of plonk. We secreted the remnants of his rum in our bag and were allowed to sit down. Alberto proved true to his word as the prices were eminently affordable, but as usual in these places, we were subjected to another strange twist. At every other table in the joint, local people had been served with jugs of icy tap water, not a beer, wine or even juice in sight. However, as weak-bellied tourists, nobody including the staff thought this was a good option for us. We were sure not game to ask for anything stronger than lemonade after the rum incident, but even a bottle of mineral water required us to give money up front to a waiter, who sneaked out to a nearby shop to buy our drinks. We really could not fathom whether we were experiencing some kind of religious fundamentalism or whether there really was one establishment in town pursuing the alcohol free rule. We learned next day that it was the latter, and that their own bar was closed, hence the need to buy drinks outside.
After gorging ourselves on pizzas and paying the bill, which amounted to $2 for three people including tips, we parted company with our dear friend. We watched as he roamed off into an alley that has barely changed since his own birth, squeezing the shoulders of his toy koala in absolute delight.
Photo; Aniko Papp