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Cuban Rum, Cuban Cocktails and Cuban Dancing!
Day 50 - Part 2, Havana
We were invited into a beautiful and sizable apartment, spotlessly clean, deliciously comfortable and proudly decorated with a veritable trove of family mementos and interesting nick-nacks. Part of this apartment was to be our accommodation for our time in Havana.
Again, another aside is necessary to explain accommodation arrangements in Cuba. There are 2 main types of accommodation in Cuba, hotels and Casas Particulares ("Casas" for short).. "Hotels" actually covers a wide arrange of standard, but most are at least partly state owned and relatively expensive. Casas, on the other hand, are the only choice for reasonably budget accommodation, but, in my opinion, they are an infinitely better place to stay.
As a communist country, the opportunities for private enterprise are very limited and strictly controlled. However, after lots of pressure, the government has made a few concessions, and Casas are one example. With very strict rules (in order to control how much they can make) Cubans are able to rent out one or two rooms of their homes to tourists. Due to stiff competition, the standards of Casas are very high and they are fantastic as they allow you to basically live within a Cuban home and to meet locals in a fairly intimate way.
The rooms we had in Nelson's apartment were fantastic; spacious, spotlessly clean and very, very comfortable. also, Nelson was fantastically friendly and helpful, keen to help us plan our trip with his encyclopedic knowledge of everything related to Cuba and it's tourism.
In fact, he gave us so much information (along with free Cuba Libres - the classic Rum & Coke cocktail, using the last of his rum, which Parki promptly spilled) that it was dark by the time we'd finished all the planning! However, this wasn't a problem as we were able to use his patented "Magic Map" to find nearby eateries, drinkeries and other suitable entertainment for our time in Havana.
Once we'd finally got out of Nelson's apartment that evening, we chose the innocently named "House of Friendship" to take our first Cuban meal and drinks...little did we know that it would be our introduction with a bang to Cuban entertainment.
When we got to the "House of Friendship", such an impressively ornate building that we first mistook it for an important government building or stately museum, we were told that there was a 5 CUC cover charge because of the entertainment, but it included a free drink. Intrigued by the "entertainment" we were happy to pay and were led to a table at the front of collection of tables in front of an open-air stage. The stage was empty at the time, but instruments sat promisingly and as we ate a delicious meal (we were later to find this a rare word to describe Cuban food) an excited crowd began to build up.
Noticing that everyone around us seemed to be buying bottles of rum and mixers for their tables, rather than individual drinks, we did likewise. We were very happy to find that a bottle of good Cuban rum only cost CUC 10!
The entertainment started with an excellent concert band, led by a powerful singer, dressed in white with a large white cowboy hat placed proudly on his head. They played a great mix of Cuban music styles then suddenly,.a group of flamboyantly dressed dancers burst onto the stage to accompany the strong beats and rhythms. Over the next hour or so the dancers changed costumes and styles a number of times and it was a great evening, until the dancers started coming out into the audience to pick partners (victims) to dance with them on the stage...
The Cubans have an unfair advantage with dancing, particularly if its Salsa; they're either born with it in their blood or they're taught it at nursery school, either way, the patented Englishman's beer shuffle just doesn't cut the mustard. So, I was pretty petrified when one of the girls grabbed me and pulled me to the stage...I didn't have a clue what to do! Luckily, as a well trained dancer, she kept us moving and maintained a giant plastic smile as I struggled to keep moving to the beat while not kicking her...
It wasn't so bad for the girls as although Parki and Reema know about as much Salsa as me, a girl can get away (to a certain extent) by just following the guy's lead. So, when it was their turn to be grabbed by male dancers, they managed to appear somewhat capable by following their partners.
After the show had finished, the dance floor opened to a free for all and it turned into a fun salsa club. The table of people in front of us were incredible dancers, which we attributed to their Cuban blood. However, we soon got chatting to them and it turned out that they were actually Salsa teachers and they began to give us an impromptu lesson, definitely very much needed! And after a while, they offered to give us proper lessons the next day, which sounded like fun, so we swapped addresses before the music switched to more European dance music.
All in all, it was a great evening and a proper introduction to Havana; we really knew that we were in Cuba!
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