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Overview
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781450203661 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | iUniverse, Incorporated |
| Publication date: | 04/23/2010 |
| Pages: | 392 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.81(d) |
About the Author
Diplomat for thirty years and spent three years as
British ambassador in Cuba. He now teaches international relations at Boston University. Hare and his wife,
Lynda, have six children and live in Marblehead, Massachusetts.
Read an Excerpt
Moncada
A Cuban StoryBy Paul Webster Hare
iUniverse, Inc.
Copyright © 2010 PAUL WEBSTER HAREAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4502-0366-1
Chapter One
Tuesday July 20 FELIPE
Moncada will mean nothing to you. That is, unless you're Cuban, and if you're on our island I know you won't be reading this story. So I should explain to the rest of you that Moncada is one of the first words I learned. It was not like the words "Mama" or "Papa," which I could say from the start. When I say learned, I mean I was taught to say the word "Moncada." I was told that Moncada was not just for me but for everyone. That is maybe why I feel uncomfortable when I write "I." It's not I or me that Moncada has to be learned for. You see that compañero Humberto taught me well.
But no one in Cuba will care now about my schooling. This story? Well, maybe. I should explain that I have written only part of it. Like Moncada, the story is not supposed to be about me. There are, I know, too many "I"s in it, and my Cuban friends have added more. They wanted to write so you might understand a little of the story of Cuba and Moncada. It is only about one week in our lives, but we all wanted to tell it. It is about us and our home.
Mateo-who has written some of this as well-asked me to include everything. So I am starting with the mundane. I assumed it would always be that way. It's slow for most stories to start with pieces of ordinary life, but that is the truth. It is what I did for years before the days around Moncada that year, before somehow things began to move more quickly. I should say that July is Moncada time, when all Cubans have to celebrate, and we were never to forget the actions of all who took part in 1953.
It was not every day that I went to the agromercado, but that was not because it was hard to get there. It was not one of those interminable Havana journeys. I had plenty of time to stroll over from work. But the prices at the agro were really beyond what I liked to pay. Mama was afraid whenever I said I was going to shop there, so I never told her. "Felipe, it's dangerous for you to go over there; you know that these markets are not for people like us." But I went anyway, just to give myself a choice. I liked to plan what I would buy, but you never knew what the market would have. The fruit and vegetables moved quickly even though the prices were high, because money always materialized for the right guava. The stall owners had their favorite customers, and so they held their stuff back. Some of the private restaurant owners with their tourist currencies came early just in case the red peppers had arrived. The music also annoyed me at the agromercado-all they ever played was rap or hip-hop. It was something that took away Cuba and made the world seem closer.
The steps leading to the market were littered with cigarette butts and the debris from a day of Cuban feet looking to buy. In fact that's not true, because many of them just came to look and to see what was left on the ground. I don't know who ever swept it. Armando said he gave a peso to one of the muchachos from the barrio every week to give it a brush. But I didn't believe him. Dogs ran across the shafts of sharp sunlight. One was barking at the owner of the first stall where you could buy used plastic bags for one peso each. The dog had chewed one and was looking for the next. Flowers were droopily nodding to the earth. Armando's was one stall I always looked for. Armando used to be a doctor, a physician who specialized in blood diseases at the institute near where I worked.
"Armando, how can you see that pig's blood and not think you should be using a microscope, not an axe?"
"Felipe, I'm old enough to know that microscopes don't fill bellies in this country. And by the way, I've got just the pork belly for you and your mama." But today I saw that his cut meat was all gone. He had some bony legs hung up behind him and was down to his last three yuccas. Armando was offering them with a few brown limes. Yes, I really remember those details, because you see I am a scientist. Rotting vegetables were thrown onto the floor by the better off. Others who knew their means were busy going through the piles of soft yucca. The flies were startled as someone pulled out an edible piece to carry away.
Bobby, an old black man with no teeth, squatted on a stool with his gray weasel-like dog, George, slumped at his feet. Bobby's boxing hero was George Foreman, but the dog's ribs protruded as George's never did. The man dropped his cigar ash on it without seeing. A kitten skulked around cautiously sniffing some rotting meat.
Bobby had plenty to say. "There's some good mutton that just arrived. Don't buy Armando's pig. Even by his standards, it stinks. That porker, boy, served at the bahía-get my joke, hombre?-you know, pigs, as the Yanquis say."
It was the twentieth of July, and that was always the end of our CUCs for the month. We have lots of coins and notes in Cuba, but the CUC notes are the ones that matter; certainly the ones that matter at the agromercado. I carried my bag of yucca, rice, and pork back to the CBM where I worked. That's the Molecular Biology Center, a part of the "polo" center of Cuban biotechnology in Havana.
The real reason I went to the market was because it was Tuesday and I knew I could get a lift home on Yoel's bike. Yoel delivered bread to the CBM; you know, the free stuff we all got from the government. It had been like that for at least a couple of years now. Yoel, the kid from our block in Cerro, loved to ride that bike. He said he could use the van, but that wasn't cool. Filling the sidecar of the bike with bread was cool, and that was what made delivering worthwhile.
It was 4:30, and Yoel would be around, so I went to pick up the stuff I'd bought in the market from the fridge in the cryogenics lab. I waited in the parking lot where the drivers with nothing to do were washing the official Ladas. The rest were chatting and smoking under a palma real. I remember that the director, Carlitos, had just got a new blue Peugeot that week. It had been a day like 1,565 others since I had gone to work there, and the grass outside still needed cutting. Yoel came out of the lobby, brushing his long hair out of his eyes, with a quick step and a clipboard like one of those bicycle courier riders I had seen in the movies in New York City.
"You're the only one in Havana who's in a hurry, amigo," I said.
"Not true, Felipe. Just you tell them they've got eggs at the bodega. I'd have been trampled in the rush."
The sidecar of the bike was never empty. The bike wasn't Yoel's; it "belonged" to Mauricio of the bakery in Marianao. Yoel had already picked up four others, and the sidecar was groaning under their weight.
"We have a great evening planned," said Yoel.
"Oh, yeah? So what's planned?" I asked, forgetting his old joke.
"Exactly nothing, amigo. That's the point. Havana's always best when you don't arrange anything. Before that we have a little business to attend to. I've got to stop by Margarita's to drop off this sandwich. And there are some new pens that just arrived from that tourist clinic in Siboney and new shampoo for Mirta."
Yoel climbed on the bike and revved up the engine. He started chatting to his passengers. "Okay, Fernando, how many fillings is this ride worth? My dad's been offered liposuction by a doctor whose car he fixed," said Yoel, turning to the dentist crouching in the sidecar.
Fernando, the dentist, looked gloomy. "It's been a bad day." Everyone knew not to ask why, because that would have been the end of any conversation. Yoel, his eyes darting to the front and the sidecar, his hair tied back for the ride, made the stops in the same order he had done for months. Fernando was taken to a bar where I guess he found someone who would listen; Hugo, the carpenter, to his game of dominoes. Zilda was taken back home to her aunt's or niece's or grandmother's; whatever she called them. "How many times did she say 'mi amor' today?" I asked Yoel when she had left us in Marianao.
"Sixteen. Is that a record?"
My backpack contained my vegetables, rice, and pork, my plastic lunch box, and several pieces of bread I had taken from colleagues at the CBM in return for a few old pesos, the notes I was paid in and I pretended were money.
Yoel parked the bike down the alleyway behind Calle Jalisco. He left the key under the stone, and Mauricio would pick it up in half an hour. It was protected by a wooden gate with chains and two large dogs kept by our neighbor. The bike hadn't been stolen for over three months, but I put that down to Mama sitting at the window most of the day where she could see the wooden gate. She didn't miss anything, and I think most people knew that. Yoel kissed the saddle and headed off. His kids were calling for him down Jalisco.
I walked up the stairs. Doctor Águila on the first floor was polishing an old brass plate that showed him as an MD cum laude from the University of Havana. He had qualified at Havana University Medical School in 1956 but now spent his time fixing video recorders and TVs. "Hey, Doctor Águila. How's the reconstructive surgery?"
Águila knew the joke. "I had the latest Nintendo in yesterday. Took me twenty minutes, Felipe. They can't fool me, these Orientals. How's your love life, young man?"
"When I know half as much as you do about that, Doctor, I'll figure it out."
As usual Mama was sitting at the window. As usual her face lit up and she greeted me with a kiss.
"Mi amor, just wait until I tell you what happened to me. You'll never believe it. But what's new? How much bread did you get today? I know Rafa was disappointed yesterday. That boy could eat two loaves a day. Just like you were, Felipito." It had been a good day for bread but not exceptional.
"I think Rafa will be okay with it. He might even give some to Tico." Rafa and Tico are my brothers. Rafa is my real brother. Ernesto is much younger and is called Quartico, or Tico, because he was only something like a quarter brother.
So there you have the family and Jalisco, our home. The television programming hadn't started, but the box was turned on, making it the usual center of attention. Celia, our mestizo, looked up and whined expectantly as she sensed that bread might be appearing. Mama was just about to tell me about her day when Pepe, my uncle, his vest hanging loosely over his jeans, got up from lounging on the bench by the wall. Pepe's muscles were well covered, but his arms were as wide as his smile. He shoved the beer crate back under the bench where it served as the fourth leg. The shaking of his body threw beads of sweat to the floor. "Hey, Felipe, What's up?"
"Night shift again, huh?" I said to Pepe. "Does that mean you don't have the police bike now?"
"Afraid not, but I guess when I sign in they'll produce one. They've found this Russian guy here who stayed on and knows how to mend those old clutches. He's a genius if you ask me. Anyway, compared to the events of the rest of the day, that's no big deal. Donna's gone back to her mother in Sancti Spíritus. Took Luis too. So I guess I don't have a wife any longer," said Pepe. Then another thought seemed to make him really concerned. "Don't know what I'll do about my tattoo now. Cost me forty CUCs; my two loves, Donna and Harley D, together."
"The tattoo may be a problem, Pepe, but she'll come back, just like she did in May," I said hopefully. I knew this meant another family row.
Pepe seemed more serious than usual. "Donna's losing it, Felipe. I think she misses that girlfriend who's gone off to Mexico. Did a teaching conference visit or something. Isn't that what your outfit at CBM is up to? Anyway, Donna talks no sense anymore. The next thing she'll claim is that there was another woman."
"More like plenty of other women, if you ask me," I said, not caring if Pepe heard. I went inside to find the sitting areas of the apartment empty.
Once I was home Mama would take a nap. It was always like that. I asked her what was unbelievable about her day. She said she saw a dog give birth in the street to six puppies. It was a nice event because it took a long time and attracted a crowd. "My life gives me so much just sitting here," she said.
I was never sure what Cuba gave me. I'm sorry, I mean the Revolution. I know what I was expected to give the Revolution. But I'd long ago given up talking about it. Mama wasn't one for great philosophy. Neither was I but I've tried to put together my way of looking at life, and I like to write a bit about it. You don't want to start yawning somewhere reading this. I can understand that, because I really would like this story to be read. Thinking, of course, is free, but some thinking can get you into trouble. Because once the thoughts are there, they breathe out and so others can read you. That's what I had done, and with it came the trouble I got into. I'll come to that. It will help you understand how I felt those days before Moncada.
The Revolution is not something Cubans think about all the time. The Revolution is our life after all, and in those days it was no different for me. I don't want to sound ungrateful. But the Revolution didn't give me anything because I was part of it. It was inside me, not outside. It was part of me like my genes, like the buildings I saw from the window every day. That is the way we are, and I cannot imagine being without a revolution. Since the triumph, everything changed. I didn't see anything beyond all that. I don't mean I didn't see the rice, the sugar, or the bits of chicken. Cuba gave me a rule book, a past. It gave me a route map for my life. But there was no destination. I received my education, but it was a debt and not a gift. It created an obligation. I was trained to read and study what the Revolution did for me. I was chosen to be a biologist. I did okay at the university. It was fine, you know. Food for us all during the studies, girls, free time. I never thought that would be the best time of my life. It was supposed to get better, but no one told me that, so maybe I shouldn't have believed it. They told me they were building up biotech as the next big thing for the Revolution. I was excited by plants and animals, and my professor, called Tavarez, had written that in one experiment I had shown maturity beyond my years. Tavarez knew Carlitos. You remember Carlitos with the new Peugeot. Well, he said he would give me a chance to shine if I worked hard. I was so excited, coming to CBM as a hand-picked star.
My first day at CBM Carlitos asked me to come for a chat, "Havana is beautiful because of the Revolution. It is the best place to live in the whole world, and the only place where the people's brains are being used to the good of the Revolution. And the Comandante wants science to be used for everyone's benefit. It is an enormous privilege for you to be at the Centro. And remember, Felipe, stay out of the sun, it's not just bad for your skin." I noticed that his face was very pale for a Cuban, but I think he was giving me another message.
After a month Carlitos told me something else and made me feel special.
"Felipe, you have been chosen for your scientific skills but also for your revolutionary firmness. You will be trained to be grateful every minute for what the Revolution is giving you. You will not betray the Revolution because you have been tested."
Then Carlitos shut the door of his office, and there was a silence while he wiped his glasses. "Felipe, what happened to your father will not be held against you. There are many outstanding servants of the Revolution whose families are gusanos." I said nothing. I think that is what Carlitos expected. "Felipe, you will never be complete. You will need to prove yourself every day to the Revolution. It will be a lifelong learning process, and revolutionaries must be prepared every day to face down the enemy. Threats are all around us, and you can take nothing for granted. Our science is highly valued by our enemies." Carlitos examined his lenses again and opened the door.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Moncada by Paul Webster Hare Copyright © 2010 by PAUL WEBSTER HARE. Excerpted by permission.
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