the great sorrow

that is silence

cuba, very interesting.
standing on a dark habana street, figures swirling by,trike cabs and belching handpainted behemoths. hard to believe that i could be there, freely, peacefully, safely, in this country that ‘we”ve been at war with almost our entire lives.

no advertising, no photographic images. only the face of che and inspiring rhetoric:
we will never stop struggling to turn our dreams into reality.
it did not feel like a cynical and bitter people passively waiting for the united colors of benetton.

in the mausoleum of the fighters for freedom, rows of grey marble doors, little enaled fotos: those cubans who went to angola in the 70s were not passive soviet puppets. they were the children of slaves voluntarily returning to their homeland to defeat a white invader with their lives. That defeat initiated the collapse of the apartheid system. i didn’t know that.

great architecture: colonial, deco, moderne. all filthy.
.
best musical moment: a cook who came out in his tocque to join the combo and just knocked us out with his big country cow- calling vocal style.marrrrrrracas. heard a lot of good stuff but if i never again hear cut 1 from buena vista social club it won’t be too long. it was a plague.
best conversation: with a capatilist gardner who had turned a vacant lot into a vegetable garden selling fresh food to the new restaurants
‘and what’s in YOUR garden now?” he asked me. how do you say ‘ winter rye ground cover’ in spanish?

lots of tourist sex: ugly old white men with tiny slim black girls in the bars.
middle aged gringo gals are more discreet but they are definately lapping up that virtuous black virility. socialist salsice.

my sister catherine’s cuban ‘friend’ showed up to be my host in habana and promptly started boning a big fat pig in our group. ugh.

Saul for now.