FOOTNOTE

And so back for 2 nights in Havana, where we stayed in the delightful Florida hotel – a touch of luxury after 3 weeks of casas particulares – to ruminate and recover. I had my hair cut by an ex NCO of the Cuban intelligence services. Magda bought presents for everyone she could think of. I bought a biography of José Martí. We went to a performance by a group that claimed to be the Buena Vista Social Club – there were two who were old enough to have been in the original group! We had an entertaining evening however, and when the singer went round the tables to get people to join in we found out that the family at the next table were from… CHILE! In all, a country of contradictions with much that is admirable marred by the bureaucracy and economic/administrative ineptitude which tend to mark obsessively socialist states. A people yearning for more freedom to do things and manage their own lives, but with expectations of the end of the embargo which are likely to be disappointed. If they want to enter the real world and receive all the goodies available in other countries then they must work to produce and export in order to earn exchange with which to pay for them. It would be sad indeed if the beautiful dream of Castro’s Cuba should be handed over to capitalist investors to do as they please. There is a will to resist that fate, but it will take an astute and determined leadership. The big question is: who will replace Raúl Castro when he retires in 2016? To close, a selection of scenes from Havana: