Havana, Cuba

I think that when I imagined Havana I had a picture in my mind of men in cool hats. You know, jazz cats. Leaning against weathered buildings, they’d be the type of guys, wise and joyful, who winked at you just for the hell of it. In spite of the poverty that governs the city, in fact maybe even because of it, I thought that there’d be a certain style, a defiant flair to the people. Everybody, young, old, fat and skinny, would all be dead sexy.

Well, it wasn’t like that at all. The city itself looks like it’s been run over by tanks. Rubble is everywhere, and the majestic architecture, now torn and largely disregarded, gives the place a feeling of battered antiquity. Although chaotic and confusing, nothing happens quickly or with purpose in Havana, it’s as if some torpid cloud had settled permanently upon the place.

Neither Rachelle nor I speak any Spanish, and soon enough Havana began to feel like some surreal game show where the goal of all the other contestants was to take all of our money. The visible expression of poetry I anticipated in the humming arteries of the ruined city was quickly replaced by the feelings of anxiety I get when trying to have my computer fixed by speaking to a techie over the phone. It was a grind, and nothing resolved without a battle.

I suppose you get what you deserve, and as we were taking “a cheap holiday in other people’s misery, “it came at a cost. Needed yet resented, we were the unwelcome other who were lost in the time and space of a culture we didn’t understand. A multitude of humiliations, scams and difficulties took place, and it became exhausting and demoralizing.

Near the end of our trip Rachelle and I stumbled upon a small fairground. There were bumper cars, a little roller coaster, a merry-go-round and the like, and it felt like stepping into something kind. We went on all the rides, yelling alongside the children, and I felt somehow restored. As we were walking through the grounds we came upon a batting cage. A line-up of Cuban men and teens waited to take their turn and I joined in at the back. It had been years since I’d been in a batting cage, and I could tell from the looks I was getting– and all the words muttered but never explicitly understood– that I was considered a joke.

When I eventually got into the cage I hit every ball that the machine threw at me, the last one with such certainty and force that a little girl of 4 who had been watching, jumped into the air and yelled “Opa!” As I walked out of the batting cage the Cuban men, surprised, smiled at me and gave me the thumbs up, and for a moment I felt returned to myself, like I belonged.

And then later Rachelle showed me the video.

Sweet Lord, what I had imagined to be a heroic athletic assertion against great odds, you know, grace under pressure and all that, was actually the pitiful and frail sight of a small man in glasses and flip-flops awkwardly dropping his bat on a bunch of different pitches. Each “swing” was like the bat was too heavy for me and I could hold it no longer so I just let it fall. It was entirely “special,” but I guess it just shows you that we see in this world what we need to see, and when we most need to see it.