datamusicata

Welcome back to part two of my Cuban Saga with Tom Robbins, world famous author and raconteur. When we last left our intrepid duo, we were being herded onto a Russian Aeroflot Jet bound for sunnier climes...exotic and illegal Havana, Cuba.

As Tom and I entered the plane, I couldn’t help but notice that it wasn’t the clean, slick jets that all american carriers used in 1975. Since the advent of Mad and Inept King George, it’s different, but back then, the USA was a properous and respected country.

The bouquet, as we entered the passenger area, was grim. Think passenger tunnel under the freeway, just not quite as damp. Cigarette butts littered the floor along with mysterious little pieces of paper...almost confetti, but not as festive by a long shot.

The flight attendants were nice ladies, strong like bulls and just as solid. They were wearing industrial strength hose that encased their hirsute olympian calves and thighs like giant sausages...with hair. I have to tell you, hair under stockings is not a good look. I don’t think it’s going to catch on.

We found our seats and as there was no no smoking section, we soon disappeared in a cloud of foul communistic tobacco smoke, which did not abate for the entire trip. Sometimes I think that I can still smell it in what is left of my hair.

The food on the jet was almost passable, except for the hair in it. Maybe I’m just squeamish, but I really don’t like hair in my food. It feels weird in my mouth. Or else it brings up memories of my misspent bachelor days.

But Tom and I were absorbing the ambiance and storing it up, both of us knowing it would show up in future songs and stories, so we didn’t actually talk too much on the flight. We just kept looking around and drinking our communist breakfast vodka, which isn’t too bad, even with watery orange juice.

When we finally landed in Cuba, we were expecting a quiet little airport and no notice of the arrival of our plane or its passengers, but we were in for a big surprize.

As we taxied up to the gate, I couldn’t help but notice the ten thousand or so people who were gathered at the gates, the observation decks and even the roofs of the terminal. The doors opened and as we poured out the crowd went ballistic. It was like when the Beatles came to Kennedy Airport.

At the time I had thick dark curly hair and a full beard. I was wearing jeans, a white shirt and a baseball hat that read KSFO in big white letters above the brim. As I stepped out of the plane, ten thousand Cuban voices went up in a loud cheer. So I took my hat off in a grand gesture and waved to them all. They went crazy. I thought to myself, “This is a nice greeting. Why don’t we do this at our airports? It would make travelers feel so wonderfully warm and fuzzy after a grueling flight.”

Tom followed me out and joined in the grand gesturing. Then we marched off to passport control and customs, the other side of which was jammed with even more Cuban people smiling and waving at us. Everytime I took my hat off in a toreador wave, the crowds cheered again. It was heady stuff, I must say. I could hardly stop myself from doing it again and again to see if it would work again...and it ALWAYS did. I must have done it a dozen times, always with the same cheering result.

After we waded through the customs maze, we found our way to baggage claim, also jammed with festive, welcoming Cubans. A wonderful, little old woman wandered up to me and with a question in her voice said, “Juan?” “No, I’m James,” I said to her disappointment. And throughout the wait for our bags, Cubans kept coming up to me and asking me if I was this or that fellow and I had to keep disappointing everyone.

Finally someone who spoke english explained to me that this very day was the first day that Fidel was allowing the Cubans who had fled his revolution back into the country with no penalties. So the plane had been filled with returning Cuban refugees and because of my colouring (and silly posturing), they thought I must be one of them.

The last thing I remember before we boarded the van for El Tropico Hotel (about forty kilometers from Havana), was that same little old lady sadly asking me for the third time if I was “Juan?” Then we were off to our beach cabana and three weeks in communist Cuba. The very first legal United States citizens to visit since the Bay of Pigs, but with a much warmer welcome.