The End at the Beginning: Havana

Hogar del Veterano-Havana

In 1960 Esteban lived in Havana. He turned 100 years old that year, on December 26, the day of San Esteban, in the Hogar del Veteranos. 

A day after riding into Havana, Lazaro and I arrived early at the Hogar. This is where Miguel interviewed Esteban for two years before publishing the book that we celebrate. The building is well kept. It looks freshly painted and landscaped.  I mention this to Lazaro.  "Yeah. Now." he said. "I came to check it out a couple of weeks ago. The place looked like shit. This is the new paint job and landscaping. The director is very happy. You'll meet her." 

A crowd of Reporters cluster outside. Camera people fidget with their equipment. The old veteranos, dressed in green shirts and brown pants, wander around. Those who can. Many simply sit in their folding chairs or wheelchairs along the walls of the entrance room. Some short of limbs. Some with tired looks on their faces. Others smiling broadly at Lazaro. All of them long on time. Not too worried that we are, true to form, running late.

Miguel arrives and everyone is part of the welcoming committee. 

We hug. "You're done with your wild project?" he asks in English. 

"I hope that this is just the beginning of an even wilder future for the Camiono," I respond.

"I hope so too," he says.

We walk inside together, signing the guest book at the door.

 On a bench inside are pictures of Esteban and Miguel together, when the latter had hair. The pictures were framed for the occasion, meant to be nailed into the wall of the entrance hall after we leave. One picture is of Esteban standing next to the tree where the two met for the first time. 

Miguel and I work our way to the front of the room, microphones and all the eyes aimed at us. Miguel starts and lauds the project and, grabbing my left arm, says, “And this man, who is extremely forceful and robust, we have to thank him.” 

After the applause, he looks and with a short bow, passes, “la palabra,” the word, to me. I rambled.

“This is where it all started over fifty years ago,” I say as cameras whirr. This event will be televised on Cuban TV this evening. “This is where an individual’s life became a metaphor for struggle and liberation. This is where Miguel Barnet and Esteban Montejo met, talked and became friends. The rest, as they say, is history. 

    “When I started my walk, I knew that I was undertaking an adventure. Tracing the steps of the last living Cuban Cimarron. Walking through sugar fields, into caves, through fields that used to vibrate under the hoofs of Mambí horses. Seeing Cuba “por dentro.” Tracing the steps of a man immortalized by this man, whose work has received international recognition because of it captures what it means to be Cuban.” I place my hand on Miguel’s shoulder. “When I started the walk, it was as much an intellectual endeavor as a physical one. I wanted to link the biography of Esteban with the geography of Cuba. Remember that he was Cuban before there was a Cuba. He was one of the thousands of warrior midwives who helped Cuban be born.  In so doing, he became Cuban. So I wanted to make a trail that commemorated this incredibly significant life that represents the hundreds of thousand lives that have not been captured in literature.

“But in the process, I learned much about myself and about Esteban. What he saw. What he must have felt running for his life, unsure where the running would lead.  I realized how much like Esteban we all are, really. We are all born, linked to a place, a geography. We adopt that geography as part of our identity. What other option do we have? Our lives, our biographies are shaped by the specific historical period that welcomes us. We don’t choose it, necessarily. Sometimes, like in my case, others chose it for us, the period and the place from which we’ll draw our identity.  But I learned too that others may choose our path but it is still us that has to walk it. And anytime we set foot to path, we can choose where it will take us. We have to own our path. We need to move in this world with purpose, a purpose that we establish, even if not the one foreseen by those who would choose our path. We need to leave a trace on this planet. This journey, the traces that we leave, make us who we are. Esteban Montejo lived a heroic life. Many of you have as well. Esteban had Miguel to make him famous, but his life was his life, with or without Miguel. You have lived a life for Cuba that I can only respect and admire. You share with Esteban a love for independence, a love for Cuba. I have my role in Esteban’s life as well now.  Walking the path, I also realized that I am Cuban, but I am not as Cuban as you.” 

Some veteranos and Miguel say, “No! That’s not true.” 

“No, it is true and its ok,” I continue. “And that is just. That is right. And that is true. And what is true,” I say looking at Miguel, “can’t be sad.” 

“We all have our role to play. I am Cuban but I am also ‘Americano’ a ‘gringo Cubano,’ as one of my Remedios friends called me. Esteban was Cuban and a slave. We all have to recognize how history shapes our biography. How to live a meaningful life in the time that is given us--that is our responsibility. The life of Esteban has helped me link my life to your history. And for this I thank him. And I thank Miguel. And I thank you, the veterans of Cuba and the stories of your lives, stories just as powerful and meaningful as Esteban’s story, because your stories link you to this land, at this time in history. To this revolutionary project, a project, one of my young guides reminded me, that is a beautiful project to pursue. Your life has been defined by your love of your geography and you have given meaning to the hills and valleys of our country. Thank you, thank you Miguel, and thank you Esteban, wherever you are. For a few weeks you have lent me your machete, and that is all that I’ve needed.”

Day 12: Cienfuegos

 Cienfuegos

After a quick shower, I meet Orlando in the courtyard again.  We walk across the Parque Marti to a local restaurant for lunch. A nice space facing the park, carved out of a central courtyard of an old house. Some kind of net covering the open-air mutes the sunlight and its heat.  The cast iron tables and chairs give it a lean, clean look. 

The president of the Benny More museum, who I met at the Casino Congo in Lajas, also happens to be eating lunch. 

He approaches, shakes hands, and reiterated his interest in the Camino. “I think that if we can make it known, it will help us all,” he says.   

He introduces me to his guest, a representative from Cubanacan, a Cuban travel agency.  “This project should be a tourist itinerary,” he says to her after explaining a bit with my help.  

She listens patiently and nods.  

“Sounds fascinating but, so you know, we go where we know we can have good results,” she says, meaning that Cubanacan will take tourists where they can spend money. “Where we can get a good response from the locals. Where the locals can offer something unique.”  

The museum director interrupts. “There is nothing more unique that what Grenier just did.” 

“Yes. Agreed,” she says. “And we’ll be on board as soon as it becomes economically feasible.” The word in Spanish is “rentable.” As soon as we can make money on the deal, we’ll be there, she assures.  

Day 12: Palmira-Cienfuegos

Palmira—Cienfuegos

 

A dozen stars persevere in the cloudless cobalt blue sky. Asley and Yorgani, waited below as I clanged and bounced my way down the spiral staircase at six a.m.  I recognize Yorgani from the welcome as the one they call “El Enano.” – “the midget.” 

“So, you know the way, Enano.” 

He laughs. I don’t think strangers usually call him by his nickname. Our flashlights lead the way down the street. 

“Never been all the way to Cienfuegos por dentro but we can figure it out. Put your backpack on this bike. We’ll take turns pushing it.” 

I hoist it on top of the bicycle seat and take first push. 

“Ok,” I ask, “so what’s the plan?” 

The plan is to work our way through the cane fields and back roads for about twelve kilometers until we hit the main road into Cienfuegos at Canta Rana.  There, my buddy, Orlando, waits and I would become the responsibility of the Cienfuegos city contingent.  Whether I would go back into the bush to enter the city or walk in down the main drag was yet to be determined.  All that I know was that I will walk into Cienfuegos today. The final push.

Day 11 (cont.): Palmira

Palmira

The square of Palmira is a spacious, gleaming public space. It has few trees so it is not a place to go for shade but its soft pastel color in the bright blue day made the heat bearable.  We skirted the plaza heading past the bici taxis and the cafes and bars and restaurants and kiosks and line of consumers waiting their turn, down to the first Cabildo, la Sociedad de Cristo Babalu Aye/San Lazaro, a long, freshly painted pink stucco building at the end of the street with red and white wooden posts supporting the equally long front porch.  The director knocks on the white door. I stand a few feet back.  Felipe Capote Sevilla, the president of the sociedad answer.  The museum director warned me that he was not the most sociable of men, taciturn and serious looking but not to let that bother me. 

“He’s that way with everybody,” she said.

Day 11: Palmira. Where Orishas live

Day 11: Palmira. Where Orishas Live.

The car stops in front of the museum, a beautiful 19^th Century building with a cozy and verdant central courtyard. The director comes out through one of the doors, big smile on her tall dark frame.  After the perfunctory peck on the cheek, she gives me a tour, explaining the exhibits, while an assistant hovers nearby in case she needed support. 

The museum contains exhibit of the cruel hardware that deformed the bodies and identity of the slaves during the 19^th Century.  Manacles, cruel collars with spikes, unforgiving shackles for the ankles.  These are the torture tools which awaited Esteban after his apprehension the first time he escaped.