Monday 12 March – Havana
Cold shower, cold cold cold, ahhhhh! Oooh, I’m tingling! Okay, bring on the city.
(But breakfast first. Spot tea-bags! Oh thank you sweet lord. Dunk bag, sip…ugh, choke, what, splutter! Peppermint tea. I wrestle with an explosion of foul language and manage to recover my composure by converting it into a low grumble.)
The city is amazing. We started the day by driving out of it to the fort across the bay – pirates were a real threat here, imagine if we had that today ‘if you see a suspected bomber on the tube, check for a peg leg, eye-patch and parrot before raising the alarm’. Sprang like a mountain goat across some sort of fortification (no wonder the pirates had it easy) to take photographs.
Then into Havana. Start at revolution square, where there’s a huge monument, very soviet style, a concrete finger jutting upwards to the heavens. Apparently Fidel has an office at the top - a continuation of the watchtower perhaps, the master keeping an eye on everyone? Revolution Square has a huge sculptural representation of the famous Korda photograph of Che. Less famous tourists have their photographs taken in front of it in a steady stream.
Next, the capital building, where tourists and locals get their pictures taken on the steps of the Capitol building by photographers using what look to be plate cameras from the Victorian era. Havana swirls about you as you walk through it.
Walked down Obispo street. Havana is amazing. Balconies are stuffed with plants, the Cubans love to eat and buy slices of pizza from one hole in the wall of a café, ice cream from another (in other parts of the city folk cook up snacks in their own homes and sell them from their front windows), paso carts sell crushed ice with syrup shot through it. Walked back up the street and, taking a photo of a cart hauling a double bass, bongos and the rest of the band, the double bass guy stops pushing his cart, gives a big grin and poses with the wife, asking nothing, expecting nothing and happy to be part of the holiday.
Then to the Floridita bar, where Earnest Hemmingway ‘discovered’ the daiquiri. I rediscovered it. It’s great. They have a statue of earnest there and you have your daiquiri and pose by the statue that’s leaning at the bar and the alcohol erases the touristy stuff but, who gives a damn, because you’re in Havana. Then a brief stop at Arms Square, where they have various tanks and stuff used in the revolution, including the boat that brought Fidel, Che and his mates back to Cuba to start the struggle all over again after it failed the first time. Signs say ‘do not stay in this area’, I hope that means ‘no loitering’ rather than ‘we have an old missile in the square and nobody’s ever been really sure if it’s disarmed’.
At lunch, finally cave in and buy a CD. Instead of a band we have flamenco dancers. Anyone who goes through that number of shoes in a week deserves all the support they can get. The flamenco performance is great, the food falls into the ‘interesting’ bracket.
Into the Old Town (ironically the newest looking bit of the city). Wow! Bit of a transformation. One day, the whole of the city will be like this and it will be a good thing because nobody should have to live in crumbling buildings (although they clear all the squatters out when they renovate the buildings) but the whole thing looks a bit Disneyland I suppose, possibly because the buildings are all renovated, are all pastel and when the Cubans get something new, they bloody well look after it – the Old Town is pristine.
There’s lots to see but one of the most affecting sights is a statue, a bronze statue, of a beggar. The self styled ‘Count of Paris’ was a beggar in the Old Town district who was so well regarded by the citizens that, when he died, they put up a statue to him!
In Old Town, the squares flower, the streets are cobbled. In one street, they have wooden cobbles! This is because some power-crazed monster a few hundred years ago thought that the stone cobbles were too noisy, so he had them replaced with wooden ones. On the other hand, anyone who’s ever run a repressive regime knows that you don’t cobble – the folk just rip them up and have ready-made stones to pelt the troops with. Wooden cobbles sound like a great idea. Maybe foam would be even better?
Further into the Old Town, past a micro-brewery where they not only brew their own beer, but bring it to your table in four foot high tubes, with a core of ice to keep it cool, and three taps set into the base – allowing you to pull your own pint! How cool is that – surely this has to come to England soon. The tubes hold four litres – ideal for lunch.
Old Town is very picturesque, the workmen restoring the buildings work on fitting wooden spiral staircases, inch perfect, in the buildings. Schoolchildren in smart uniforms crocodile their way through the square while a young woman sits, perfectly still, being shot for a fashion shoot, butterfly clips pulling her sweater crease free, a bloke holding a huge reflector panel hovering behind her.
In the evening we brave the streets for a walk to a nearby bar. No street lighting and in the pavement there are potholes that seem to have no bottom. If you stumble, it’s a toss up between ending up in A&E, or China. We get the bar we were aiming for and are told it’s closed for a private party, so it’s next door to the Melia Havana.
The Melia Havana is not very Cuban. It’s very, very swish. Plasma screens, two bars and I actually feel a little bit scruffy. This is good news, because our resort hotel next week is a Melia. Melia are, I think, a Spanish chain who work in partnership with the Cubans. This is Havana as it’s going to be in a few years time, when all the money arrives, takes root and flowers. Drink rum and then wander back to the hotel. Dodging potholes.
(But breakfast first. Spot tea-bags! Oh thank you sweet lord. Dunk bag, sip…ugh, choke, what, splutter! Peppermint tea. I wrestle with an explosion of foul language and manage to recover my composure by converting it into a low grumble.)
The city is amazing. We started the day by driving out of it to the fort across the bay – pirates were a real threat here, imagine if we had that today ‘if you see a suspected bomber on the tube, check for a peg leg, eye-patch and parrot before raising the alarm’. Sprang like a mountain goat across some sort of fortification (no wonder the pirates had it easy) to take photographs.
Then into Havana. Start at revolution square, where there’s a huge monument, very soviet style, a concrete finger jutting upwards to the heavens. Apparently Fidel has an office at the top - a continuation of the watchtower perhaps, the master keeping an eye on everyone? Revolution Square has a huge sculptural representation of the famous Korda photograph of Che. Less famous tourists have their photographs taken in front of it in a steady stream.Next, the capital building, where tourists and locals get their pictures taken on the steps of the Capitol building by photographers using what look to be plate cameras from the Victorian era. Havana swirls about you as you walk through it.
Walked down Obispo street. Havana is amazing. Balconies are stuffed with plants, the Cubans love to eat and buy slices of pizza from one hole in the wall of a café, ice cream from another (in other parts of the city folk cook up snacks in their own homes and sell them from their front windows), paso carts sell crushed ice with syrup shot through it. Walked back up the street and, taking a photo of a cart hauling a double bass, bongos and the rest of the band, the double bass guy stops pushing his cart, gives a big grin and poses with the wife, asking nothing, expecting nothing and happy to be part of the holiday.Then to the Floridita bar, where Earnest Hemmingway ‘discovered’ the daiquiri. I rediscovered it. It’s great. They have a statue of earnest there and you have your daiquiri and pose by the statue that’s leaning at the bar and the alcohol erases the touristy stuff but, who gives a damn, because you’re in Havana. Then a brief stop at Arms Square, where they have various tanks and stuff used in the revolution, including the boat that brought Fidel, Che and his mates back to Cuba to start the struggle all over again after it failed the first time. Signs say ‘do not stay in this area’, I hope that means ‘no loitering’ rather than ‘we have an old missile in the square and nobody’s ever been really sure if it’s disarmed’.
At lunch, finally cave in and buy a CD. Instead of a band we have flamenco dancers. Anyone who goes through that number of shoes in a week deserves all the support they can get. The flamenco performance is great, the food falls into the ‘interesting’ bracket.
Into the Old Town (ironically the newest looking bit of the city). Wow! Bit of a transformation. One day, the whole of the city will be like this and it will be a good thing because nobody should have to live in crumbling buildings (although they clear all the squatters out when they renovate the buildings) but the whole thing looks a bit Disneyland I suppose, possibly because the buildings are all renovated, are all pastel and when the Cubans get something new, they bloody well look after it – the Old Town is pristine.
There’s lots to see but one of the most affecting sights is a statue, a bronze statue, of a beggar. The self styled ‘Count of Paris’ was a beggar in the Old Town district who was so well regarded by the citizens that, when he died, they put up a statue to him!
In Old Town, the squares flower, the streets are cobbled. In one street, they have wooden cobbles! This is because some power-crazed monster a few hundred years ago thought that the stone cobbles were too noisy, so he had them replaced with wooden ones. On the other hand, anyone who’s ever run a repressive regime knows that you don’t cobble – the folk just rip them up and have ready-made stones to pelt the troops with. Wooden cobbles sound like a great idea. Maybe foam would be even better?Further into the Old Town, past a micro-brewery where they not only brew their own beer, but bring it to your table in four foot high tubes, with a core of ice to keep it cool, and three taps set into the base – allowing you to pull your own pint! How cool is that – surely this has to come to England soon. The tubes hold four litres – ideal for lunch.
Old Town is very picturesque, the workmen restoring the buildings work on fitting wooden spiral staircases, inch perfect, in the buildings. Schoolchildren in smart uniforms crocodile their way through the square while a young woman sits, perfectly still, being shot for a fashion shoot, butterfly clips pulling her sweater crease free, a bloke holding a huge reflector panel hovering behind her.
In the evening we brave the streets for a walk to a nearby bar. No street lighting and in the pavement there are potholes that seem to have no bottom. If you stumble, it’s a toss up between ending up in A&E, or China. We get the bar we were aiming for and are told it’s closed for a private party, so it’s next door to the Melia Havana.
The Melia Havana is not very Cuban. It’s very, very swish. Plasma screens, two bars and I actually feel a little bit scruffy. This is good news, because our resort hotel next week is a Melia. Melia are, I think, a Spanish chain who work in partnership with the Cubans. This is Havana as it’s going to be in a few years time, when all the money arrives, takes root and flowers. Drink rum and then wander back to the hotel. Dodging potholes.
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