Dancing Bears

by Witold Szablowski

  “Is that enough?”

  “My wife works too. And I earn extra money as a bricklayer. When there’s no harvest, I can double or even triple my salary. Thirty dollars is plenty, isn’t it? Everyone has to do extra work here. My brother sells cheese by the highway. My brother-in-law sells gasoline on the side from his company truck. My aunt rears chickens and takes them to the market at Holguín. My wife writes official letters for people, and my father-in-law cuts people’s hair.”

  “Is there anything you’d change about your life?”

  “I’d exchange my wife—I’m bored with her. And my job. I’d rather do more bricklaying and less work with the sugarcane. But I can’t complain. My life’s pretty much okay. I can’t complain about the plantation. I met my wife, and my girlfriend, there. First my wife. She’s our bookkeeper. And recently I met Juana, a machetera from the women’s group. We produced a wall newspaper together for Fidel’s birthday. We went to Holguín together to fetch a comrade from Havana who came to give a talk on the significance of sugarcane production for the continuity of the revolution. Today, for the first time, we’re meeting in Holguín for a date.”

  “And what do you think about Fidel’s health?”

  “May he live to be one hundred and fifty!” says José enthusiastically. But soon after, he clams up.

  “What’s up with you?” I ask.

  “Oh, nothing . . . You know, sometimes it’s hard for me to make the break from home to the city. And I was just thinking,”—at this point he smiles mischievously—“when Fidel dies, we’re sure to have to do another wall newspaper.”

  The salsa queen: my fingernails for Fidel

  Bracelets, beads, shells, and scarves; artificial curls mixed with natural ones; huge earrings and great long fingernails. Ana, top salsa dancer and teacher, the most colorful person I’ve ever seen in my life, sits stiffly with her legs straight and her arm slightly bent to one side. Beside her sits her husband and partner, Oswaldo.

  Two hours ago they were standing by the road, cursing. They were on their way home from Varadero, where they’d been dancing at one of the hotels. In exchange for a lift they’ve invited me in for a mojito and a salsa demonstration.

  The boom box roars away as the room fills with sound. First come the drums, then the trumpets join in, and soon after Ibrahim Ferrer from the Buena Vista Social Club (whom my hosts apparently knew in person) sings about a love that’s tough but worth the sacrifice. Oswaldo takes a step forward, Ana retreats and shakes her head to say no. Disconcerted, he takes a step back. Then she goes forward. And so on, over and over, several times, to depict the fight between the lovers, whose problem is that they both want to make the first move. The music picks up speed, and so do the dancers. Finally, they embrace tightly as they reach the finale and the bravos. The guests applaud, including their son and his girlfriend, their daughter and her children, and several tourists.

  The demonstration was for potential clients of Ana’s Salsa School. A lesson costs ten pesos (fifty cents) per hour. All in a tiny room, which by day is the salsa academy and at night becomes their apartment. There’s a kettle, a phone, and an old fridge. On the walls and closets there are traditional Cuban dolls dressed like girls at a carnival.

  “I have music in my genes,” says Ana. “Before the war my grandfather was a famous jazz player and showman. His star turn was playing the drums. He performed all over the United States and Europe.”

  “What about your parents?”

  “My grandmother had eight children. My mother only had me. She made her career as a singer. A leading record label, Fania All Stars, signed a contract with her for ten albums ahead, so she wouldn’t go off to their competitors. We lived in a smart house in the suburbs. My mother divorced my father—she was very independent. She lived life to the full. And the older I got, the harder it was for me to come to terms with reality . . .”

  “Meaning?”

  “With inequality. With the fact that some people have billions, while others have nothing. With the fact that after lessons I could go for ice cream, but thousands of children didn’t even go to school. Until the revolution came. My mother was in despair. Her life was at an end. All the banquets and balls with rich entrepreneurs were over. But I felt the opposite. Even when Fidel took away our house and all our furniture, I believed he was doing the right thing.”

  “Do you really think so?”

  “Of course. Ours is the only country where people are truly equal.”

  “But poor.”

  “There’s poverty everywhere. But equality only exists here, in our country. The revolution is the love of my life, second only to salsa. I dance for Fidel. I pin beautiful flowers in my hair and paint my fingernails for him. Look, the longest one I have is painted in the colors of the Cuban flag.”

  “Have you ever been abroad?”

  “Not until I turned sixty, when I went to dance at promotional events for the Buena Vista Social Club albums. It was a great experience—the plane journey, the smart hotels, the meetings with musicians. We danced in London, Vienna, and Zurich. The boys from Buena Vista are our friends. They arranged the trip. Ibrahim Ferrer used to spend hours at our apartment. Whenever he had a fight with his wife, he’d come over to our place with a bottle of rum, drink it all himself and stay for the night. Unfortunately, later on he earned a lot of money, bought a big house outside Havana, and pretended not to know us. And then he died.”

  “Money changes people,” adds Oswaldo. “We earn just the right amount—it’s enough to live on. We give plenty to the state—a license to run a business costs a few hundred pesos, equivalent to about fifteen dollars. We can’t afford to swap this apartment for anything bigger. This room is one hundred and thirty square feet. Not so long ago there were five of us living here. Luckily, the children moved out. It’s a good thing we don’t have to give them extra money.”

  “I gave birth to six children. This stallion here did that for me,” she laughs, pointing at her husband. “Every time, two weeks after the birth I was dancing again. Dancing is my entire life. Dancing and the revolution.”

  The German businessman: I’ll sell them anything

  By the road near Ciego de Ávila, a colonial gem full of horse-drawn cabs, stands a four-by-four. Raised on a jack, it has red registration plates, just like our Peugeot. Michael, a German of about sixty, is struggling with a punctured tire. He wasn’t provided with a spare wheel at the rental place. So I pick him up in my car and help him find a tire shop.

  Michael is pretending to be someone he’s not. Officially, he came as a tourist, to stay at a resort. Unofficially, he’s a businessman looking for contacts.

  “Cuba’s a blank page,” he explains. “The analysis says that after Castro’s death there might be a change of course to socialism with elements of the free market. Quarter capitalism. Apparently, the younger ministers and officers are exerting a lot of pressure on Raúl. They didn’t fight in the revolution and its ethos is alien to them. They just want to earn more money and improve their standard of living.”

  “And then what?”

  “If Cuba opens up to the world, you’ll be able to sell them anything. There’s a lack of clothing, cars, furniture, food. Whatever you import here, you’ll sell. Panties? You’ll sell ’em. Canned food? That too. Chairs? You’ll sell them. Teddy bears? Those too. They’re half a century behind the rest of the world! It’ll be real good business!”

  “So what are you doing here?”

  “I’m looking for someone who could be a rep for my firm. I’m taking down the details of black-market money changers, hotel con men, cigar sellers, and the like. That’s how my colleagues made contacts in Poland. I was there with them a few times.”

  “In Poland?”

  “Sure! Cuba generally reminds me of the late Communist era in Poland. The same dependencies between services and business. Lines outside the hard-currency shop
s and the ordinary stores. Lots of uncertainty, but with hope for a better future.”

  “So, what’s your biggest problem?”

  “Getting through to the services. If there ever is a transformation in Cuba, they’ll be behind it. Without them, it’ll be impossible to invest here. Each day I call up my wife and say I’m looking for the golden boys. I hope they’re bugging the goddamn phone. And that they’ll come forward of their own accord.”

  I have no way of verifying Michael’s stories. Believe him or not, I help him change the wheel that’s been fixed at the tire shop; then we say good-bye and I set off back to Varadero.

  A year after Fidel’s death

  McDonald’s has already signed a contract with the Cuban government—a year after Fidel’s death, it’s going to open its first restaurant in Havana. It’ll be on Cathedral Square, right at the heart of Old Havana. Their hit will be the McRevolution bun, with a dash of ketchup in the shape of a red star.

  Or so the people of Havana are telling each other.

  II. Freedom

  For a bear, freedom is such a shock that you can’t just let it out of a cage and into the woods. You have to give it a few days to adapt. Freedom means new challenges. New sounds. New smells. New food. For them, freedom is one big adventure.

  Poland / United Kingdom: Lady Peron

  Victoria coach station, central London. It’s midnight, and the station has been taken over by people with nowhere to go: the homeless, the jobless, beggars, vagrants, and derelicts. A curious trio has gathered on the small seats in the waiting room—a plastered punk, a well-dressed guy, and an old woman with a shopping cart of the sort homeless people sometimes have. The woman is calmly making herself supper. The men have homed in on her like chicks surrounding a mother hen.

  “You’re our station granny!” the punk bellows at her. “You’re our station granny!”

  The woman stops slicing the bread to yell back, in Polish, “You brat, I’m not a granny! I’m only fifty-five! I am Lady Peron! It’s high time you got it right!” Peron is the Polish word for a station platform.

  But the youth has his own ideas. He stands up, rather unsteadily, and tries to give Granny a kiss. He gets a smack in the mouth, a backhander, with the palm open.

  “You’re a good granny,” he drools. “Just like the real thing. If you need comfort, she gives it to you. And if you need a smack in the gob, she can give you that too.”

  “Get lost, you brat, you drunk! I haven’t the strength to put up with you!” shouts the woman. “They’ll kill me here—they’ll do me in! I’ll jump off a bridge! Go buy me a lemon, would you? And a pound of sugar,” she says, quite calmly turning to the smart guy.

  The Lady’s kingdom

  Long, long ago, the Lady lived in an old cottage outside Pabianice, a town in central Poland, and her only knowledge of large train stations and foreign capital cities came from the newspapers. She would cut out the more interesting articles and pictures, and keep them as souvenirs. In those days her name was Alicja, just as it says on her ID card.

  She still has the clippings to this day. For instance, there’s one about the time the controversial, anti-EU politician Andrzej Lepper met Pope John Paul II. And there’s one about the London bus that was ripped apart by a terrorist bomb. When she cut them out, she can’t possibly have imagined that in the near future buses just like that one would be waking her up at night. Or that she herself would be accused of terrorism.

  In the days when she cut out the Lepper clipping, she was still living in the Polish countryside. She never made it to the traveling store in time. Everything had always been bought up before she could drag herself all the way there.

  She cut out the article about the bus when she was living at the station in Koluszki, where there’s a major railroad junction. But even then she had no idea how nicely it would all turn out.

  These days her estate is a rectangle two hundred by fifty yards in size—two acres. “Over there’s Victoria, here’s Coach, and there’s Green Line too, the one you arrive at from Poland,” she says, pointing, as if showing which type of crop grows where.

  Victoria is a large railroad station. Coach and Green Line are bus stations. For five months, she has been lady of the manor here. She has no roof over her head, so the rectangle between the stations is her home. She has no refrigerator, so the station supermarkets are her cold store. She has no money, but she takes handouts.

  The Lady at Koluszki station

  “How did you end up here, ma’am?” I ask.

  “Poverty drove me away from home,” she explains. “In Poland I wouldn’t have a cottage anymore. The laths were all rotten. The wind had damaged the rafters. Everything needed replacing. I applied to the local authority, but all they said was, ‘There’s nothing we can do.’ That tipped the balance, because I did have some money—a monthly allowance of five hundred zlotys (then about US$125). It was enough to live on. But I was freezing in my own cottage. When I realized that I might die of cold, I packed a bag, then a second one, and went to the station.”

  “What sort of station?”

  “The railroad station.”

  “And took the train to London?” I say in surprise.

  “Not as quickly as that,” laughs the Lady. “First I slept at the station in Piotrków, then at Koluszki. But it wasn’t too bad in Poland, because I slept in the waiting room. Not like here, on a bench or on the sidewalk. The only thing I didn’t like in Poland was that the station bums drink methylated spirits. And they make a dreadful stink, because they piss and crap and smoke cigarettes. Those people are the dregs of society, as low as you can get. If they’re going to drink, they should drink wine or vodka. That’s what civilized people do.”

  The Lady has a bit of a thing about etiquette. Although everyone, old and young, calls each other by their first name at Victoria station, she doesn’t let them do it to her. There has to be respect!

  “But did you just come straight to London from the station at Koluszki?” I ask, still in the dark.

  “No, first there was Strasbourg. Meaning what, you ask? Come on, they’re closing.”

  Indeed, the clock has struck one, and Coach is closing for the night. The Lady dutifully gathers up her bits of bread and wraps her Podlaski meat paste (given to her by a Pole) in plastic. “There’s no talking to these fellows in the yellow coats,” she explains, slowly getting up. “How much grief they’ve given me, how many tears I’ve shed! Twice I’ve been in the hospital thanks to them! I want to tell the whole of England about it. They manhandle me and throw me out. I tumble over, and they’re after me. But I’m a cripple—I’m quite incapable of working!”

  I help her to push her cart. Slowly we emerge into the street.

  “We’re going over there. Nowadays I sleep in that doorway,” she says, pointing out an office block, fifty yards from the station. “First I slept behind the bus shelter. But it’s windy there. My lower back, my lumbago, is making itself felt, because I’ve caught a chill sleeping on concrete.”

  There’s justice in Strasbourg

  “Fifteen acres and a good many square feet of land. That’s dandy—don’t you think?” asks the Lady, to be sure.

  That’s how much land the neighbors stole from her mother. “Daddy had left us,” she explains. “If he’d been living with us, they’d never have taken it. But as it was, there was no farmer, so no one to defend it. My mother was an even worse cripple than I am. She’d prop her leg on a low stool and just sit there—she couldn’t stand. I used to wait on her. When I was younger I could manage better, but now that I’m older I’ve gone downhill. She died a few years ago.”

  After her mother’s death, as she tells the story, her neighbors started to have designs on her land and her cottage. They wanted to send her to a shelter. “‘Over my dead body,’ I said to myself!” says the Lady, getting emotional. “I read in the paper that Strasbourg is the
seat of justice. That Strasbourg helps people who are cheated by the Polish state. So I bought a ticket, and off I went to Strasbourg.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Quite normally. I boarded the bus and off I went. I thought they might give me a place to live there. I wanted to live there, because it’s a warm country. And I wanted to sue for that piece of land.”

  “Weren’t you afraid?”

  “I was dreadfully afraid! Before then, the farthest I’d ever been was to Lódź. And to my job in Pabianice. I was a machine knitter—I made the linings for gloves. It’s hard work, because you do it standing up. And once I started getting an allowance instead, I never went outside my village at all. It’s a godforsaken place! But in those days I was afraid to go anywhere, because a person’s greatest fear is when he goes away for the first time. So in those days I used to think, ‘Should I go or not? Unless I meet a Pole, I won’t be able to communicate there!’ And that’s just what happened. I was crying like a baby in the street. A girl and her boyfriend stopped. She took me by the arm and showed me the way to the great big tribunal. And there, one of those men who stand in the doorway said, ‘Why did you come here? People don’t come to us! They write!’”

  “What about the people in your village? What did they say?”

  “When I told them I was going to Strasbourg to appeal, they laughed and tapped at their foreheads. They said I’d never get anything sorted out. And they were right about that, because I failed to fix anything at all.”

  “So was it worth going there?”

  “Yes, because I saw how easy it all is. Everywhere people helped me, drove me, asked me what I needed. And I thought, maybe it’s always like this; maybe wherever I go, someone’s always going to help a cripple. And one time I was standing at the station when a gentleman came by and gave me two euros. I only had to hold out my hand, and people started giving me money, just like that! I thought, ‘I should go back there one day.’”