Lightning and guitars
Trip Start
Nov 03, 2004
1
53
165
Trip End
Nov 23, 2006
Trinidad,
Cuba
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Knowing we were traveling south to Trinidad Oscar had already made
arrangements for our accommodation through his co-operative. We
drove by taxi through endless fields of sugar cane along a deserted
six lane highway. Every ten minutes or so you would see another
vehicle - not many people have a car, and even less can afford the
gas to run it.
Trinidad is reputedly the best preserved colonial town in Cuba. It
sits on the southern coast about half way along the island
Lightning and guitars
. Thestreets are narrow and cobbled and erratically labeled. The houses
have the same face with shuttered, glassless, marble silled windows,
surrounded by birdcage grills jutting into the pavements and wooden
paneled doors. Some faces are better made over than others but they
all share the blemish of telephone and power cables slung and draped
uncaringly across the facade. Our room was an extension of the
original house, upstairs, swathed in luxuriant vines, decked out in
1950s enameled bed frames and heavy lace counterpanes. We were a
great disappointment to Therese because we were not interested in
sitting in her backyard eating but wanted to experience the food in
the restaurants and paladores.
The heat was oppressive. Very little is achieved during daylight.
Within a day we had developed the local habit of walking the long
way to anywhere as long as that maximised the shade available on the
route. You travel everywhere with an umbrella and a fan. The early
evening is when you stop learning and observing and start living
Cuba. The stifling humidity will have been broken with a ferocious
downpour, the thunder and lightning of which will continue long
after the rain has ceased. The ancient stormwater drains will have
no chance of coping with the deluge and lake-sized puddles will
linger cooling the air a little. People begin to appear on their
stoops in wooden rocking chairs chatting and swapping their days.
Children and dogs play in the birdcages of the windows. The music
starts. In every bar in town groups of Cubanos festooned with
bongos, flutes, maracas, basses, fiddles, guitars started the
hypnotic, sultry salsa. Gringos watch entranced as ancient couples
dance with a native oneness with the rhythm and the familiarity of a
shared lifetime - unhurried, sensuous, joyful, beautiful. Gringos
who've had lessons dance like they might pop a piercing. Mojitos
and Cuba Libres are de rigueur. Everyone can forgive awful Spanish,
tables are shared, locals coax visitors up to dance, bonhomie (with
the rum) flows.
Our first evening the downpour came late. One minute we were
enjoying a drink at the outdoor tables, the next everyone was
scattering for cover. We sat on the tile verandah of the Casa de la
Musica listening to the musicians play and watching the lightning
flashing across the grumbling sky long after the rain had ceased.
In Trinidad we rented a scooter. Oh, the freedom of 100ccs of raw
power! We roared off to a perfect, white sand, topaz watered, palm
tree dotted, beach where cheerful locals (indulging in their
unofficial jobs) watched our scooter and delivered pizza and
drinks. There was almost no tide impact on the water level and it
was warm, warm, warm. We lazed away a happy day, dipping in and out
of the sea and reading junk fiction, before roaring back to town for
more rum and salsa.
