Cuba Diary Snippets: May 20, 2013

After lunch, me, Oriana and Mike went to Casa de las Américas with Padrón.  It was absolutely fabulous.  Padrón knows everyone—literally.  There's a congreso on the Caribbean going on there—I should really try to go at least one day—I think Wednesday.  I got a chance to talk to Roberto [note: last name omitted]—it was awesome—just the fact that I used his NYT article in my history paper—and there I was, sitting in his office with him, talking to him—it was pretty amazing.  We were talking about the differences in racial identity in the US and the Caribbean—it was interesting what he had to say about the "one drop rule."  In the United States, "one drop" of black blood makes you black.  But in the Caribbean, "one drop" of white blood makes you not black.  He said what matters most in the Caribbean is appearance—the whiter you appear, the better off you are, and he said there is a lack of black pride in the Caribbean for that reason.  He quoted a passage in Cecilia Valdés where Cecilia's mother (or somebody) tells her "Pareces como una blanca!" Wow, you look white, (even though she was mulatta).  He criticized all the racial categories there are—"it makes it as if they are different than me" even though they're black.  Or would be considered black in a US context.  At first I was using the phase "gente de color" [people of color], but he corrected me and said people don't really say that anymore—he personally prefers to be called negro. Black.  He is a tall, handsome, dark-skinned man with dreadlocks.  He is quite striking—not that he's extraordinarily handsome, but he's a striking and arresting figure.  I wonder if he was skeptical of me because I'm light-skinned.  I was pretty taken with him, though—I hope he didn't think I was a weirdo.  Padrón gave me and Oriana free copies of the Casa de las Américas journals—several past editions.  He even wrote the intro to the Benedetti book that Oriana's mom made us promise that we would bring back and gave her a free copy.

Later we went to see the cannon shooting that happens once every night at 9 pm.  Before that we had dinner.  I feel a melancholy descending upon me. Maybe before dinner tomorrow night I'll go to the Hotel Cohiba for fast internet.  I need to write people.

(More pictures here, here, here, here, and here.)