There is of course the presence of American tourists. With the US embargo all but lifted, they are now permitted to travel to Cuba, albeit only in official tour groups. At the airport, a huge crowd waits an excessively long time for their luggage. We wait an hour and a half for ours.
In town though, I have yet to see the anticipated flood of arrivals that prompted Stuart and me to put Cuba at the very top of this year's holiday list.
Out and about.
Dancing in the street.
Not quite the street but out in the park. I sit on a stone bench with the locals while Stuart goes off to get tickets to Saturday's ballet. Music blares out into the park from loudspeakers. The dancing is at times frenzied and spontaneous, at times tepid and not too exciting.
The streets seem dirtier. And in some cases, smellier. Increased construction work may be a contributor but the trash is more along the lines of the odd shoe and discarded food variety than general construction rubble.
On the food and beverage front, there is a marked shift in the level of sophistication. There are more eating options. I've already had, in the last three days, two exceptionally good meals.
Most telling is a newish (two years old) cheese and wine bar across the street from Hotel Raquel. It's called Casa del Queso- El Marriage.
Indira brings me a cheese platter and a plate of jamon Serrano for Stuart. I ask her if locals come for cheese and wine. She says it's the young professionals and university students who come.
The cheese platter includes bread and a glass of Chilean wine, all for CUC$7.50. There's Blanco, Azul, Caribe, Atlantico, and Mozzarellal. The cheeses are all made in Cuba except the Parmesan which, like the jamon, is from Spain. The jamon costs CUC$8 and a glass of wine is CUC$1.50.
Locals generally use the moneda nacional, the Cuban Peso. But where most tourists go, only the Convertible Cuban Currency or CUC is acceptable. One CUC is roughly equivalent to a Euro.
Next door is a bar, still in the process of being fitted out, La Reliquia. It doesn't look or sound like all the other bars here. The crowd is young, well-dressed. The music smoother, if that's the right word to describe it.
The hotel is a hive of activity.
I'd love to be part of this reconstruction, this rebirth. There are workers and scaffolding everywhere. I can imagine the challenges faced by the GM of this hotel. So many little things to do- the restaurant staff to be trained, unimaginable problems uncovered while buttressing up crumbling walls, archways, staircases, the lift.
A camera crew is setting up in the lobby. A video man walks through the restaurant, filming us at breakfast.
Soon, a crowd of tourists wielding cameras and cell phones troop in, clicking away at the beautiful stained glass roof, the marble columns, the steel-cage lift.
Stuart and I smile and offer our best angle to the cameras as we work the temperamental lift. On our third day in town, we're now part of the local landscape. Even the workers know us. Holas and smiles all around as we head to our room.
I'm redecorating.
I move furniture around in our room. I can't help it. I do it all the time. Housekeeping will have a shock!
Stuart and I are not very adventurous when it comes to hotels. We had initially booked four different hotels for the nine days we'd be in Havana. But having found a hotel with a good bed, fluffy white towels, and a bathroom that works- hot water, a shower floor that drains, a toilet that flushes- we immediately chicken out of two other hotels and decide to stay where we are.
The bars: Floridita and Monserrate.
One of our most awaited moments is the bar scene. No shortage of musical talent here. The band in Floridita is fun, cheerful, has three pretty blond girls. But the band at Monserrate is the one I can't wait to see and hear again. Santiago y Habana. Six years ago, we walked to the bar nightly to party with this band. They were brilliant. I imagined that these days, they'd be famous.
They're not. They seem tired and slightly beaten down. Their music is still good but their enthusiasm seems to have waned. They're very late starting- except for the guy who plays the trumpet who was there early and kept worriedly looking out for the rest of the band to turn up.
The break after a brief first set seems to go on forever. The band leader keeps replenishing drinks for the band- again except for the trumpeter- from a gin bottle secreted behind the drums. We leave, feeling let down.
The sound of Havana.
In the morning, I'm once again awakened by high-pitched children's voices from the school across the street. Uno dos, tres cuatro, cinco seis..!
Morning exercises out on the roof deck. It sounds like fun. After a restful night's sleep, I'm thinking maybe I'll join them. After breakfast.
There is a uniqueness to the street noise here. More than the music, the drum beat, there is the sound of people's voices. They talk to each other in the street. They hug and kiss. They shout and play and call out to each other, to the children, to their dogs.
The citizenry has recently been allowed cell phones. Will Havana streets soon go quiet? Will children stop playing street games? Will people stop looking to see if their friends are around? It's bound to happen.
But maybe Havana is different. None of Cuba's invaders has managed to rub out its uniqueness. Not the Spanish, not the British, not the Americans.
Let's see what the iPhone does.
