Waiting for Snow in Havana (34 page)

Authors: Carlos Eire

BOOK: Waiting for Snow in Havana

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On that Sunday, Pepito made more money than he had in his entire life, changing currency for the family that had supported him for so long. He was doing everyone a favor, and everyone felt obliged to let him take his percentage.

I am back in that line again, getting close to the money changers. I see Pepito coming towards us, walking briskly. I've never seen him move so fast. He's walking all over Havana in his white suit, changing bills and coins for everyone he knowsâfor a fee, of course. On this day he's lost nothing and gained much.

My hero, Pepito.

I see another hero of the day, my grandfather Amador. He has lost a lot and is weeping, but he hasn't lost everything. For years, he's been stashing away jars of silver coins inside his living room wall. Yes, he opened holes in his wall, put the jars in, one by one, sealed up the wall with plaster, and repainted it. He had lost it all in 1929 and no longer entrusted all of his savings to banks.

He has a wall full of silver on the day the currency changes. He stares at the wall and thinks of the hidden silver that he will mine, little by little, until the day he drops dead. He knows that silver always buys you more stuff than your neighbor, if your neighbor doesn't happen to have any. Even in a Communist paradise. He knows instinctively that ration cards are a scam, just another way of making unfairness seem fair.

Almost everything is rationed now. Every now and then the stores get a huge shipment of rice, or black beans, or beef, or whatever, and the word spreads like wildfire. Everyone rushes down to the store and stands in line forever. Sometimes if the line is too long, by the time your turn is near, they run out of the beans, or the garbanzos, or the chickens, or whatever.

But the greatest scam of all is the black market. People sell you their rations for more than they paid for them, or trade them for whatever they need more. And there are plenty of people like my grandfather, who have silver to mine, or whatever. There is always some whatever in rationing and in Revolutions.

I've been standing in line a lot these past few months. I stand in line with old people, housewives, children, bankers, lawyers, doctors, and former capitalists. Aulet, the man with his own zoo, has to stand in line, too. You have to show up in person, with your card, and stand in line, or you don't get your food.

Everyone has to stand in line, except the leaders of the Revolution. No one ever sees them or their servants standing in line. Yes, they have servants.

Medicines are disappearing too. And clothing. And appliances. And cars. And hardware. And toys. Everything is disappearing.

No more comic books. No more American films. No more American television programs. No more ice-cream man. No more shaved-ice man. No more fruit man. No more vegetable man. No more coal man. No more
guarapo
man. No more Jamaican pastry man, and no pastry man song.

“Pastelesâ¦pastelitosâ¦Pasteeeles, paaasteliitosâ¦Frecos, fresquitosâ¦Dulcesâ¦buenitos.”
Pastries, little pastries, fresh and sweet and goodâ¦

I am standing on my porch, listening to his
pregÃ³n
âhis selling chant. Man, oh man, that tall, tall Jamaican has the best pastries I have ever eaten. He comes around the neighborhood about once a week, on foot, lugging a huge metal container. Always at evening time, after dinner. His bin is a marvel of engineering. I think he built it himself. It's full of little doors that open and drawers that pull out to reveal special surprises. Jamaican guy works the doors and drawers with flair, then holds up the pastry with a pair of tongs for you to examine. You can tell by the way he handles them that he loves his pastries. He is as reverent as a priest at the altar, and even more graceful.

I love the chocolate eclairs that are the same color as his arms. And I love the way he speaks Spanish.

But now there is no more pastry man.

No more avocado man either.

I can hear him still. The avocado man has one of the prettiest chants I've ever heard.

Aguacate maduro, aguacate. Aguaaacate maaaduuuuro, aaaaguuuuaaacaaateee!
Avocados, ripe avocados.

We have some good counter-jingles for that guy.

Aguacate maduro, peo seguro.
Ripe avocados, fart for sureâ¦

Aguacate verdoso, peo apestoso.
Greenish avocados, stinky fartsâ¦

Aguacate amarilloso, peo ruidoso.
Yellowish avocados, noisy fartsâ¦

And so on. We have dozens of them. Even my dad has pitched in with a few counter-jingles of his own.

Aguacate podrido, peo mordido.
Rotten avocados, a fart bitten into.

One of his crown jewels.

And there are those damn Pioneers marching again, droning on with their stupid slogans. I think of the avocado man and our counter-chants. Good thing we've had plenty of practice at such things. Stupid Pioneers, reminding us that it is all gone, gone, gone.

A lifetime of memories gone in less than a year. An entire culture pulled up by the roots. It is a Revolution, after all.

The priests have vanished too, along with the monks and the nuns. All religious orders have been banished from Cuba. Gone are the Jesuits who had educated Fidel and my father and grandfather and great-grandfather. Gone are the Dominicans, and the Franciscans, and the Carmelites, and the Christian Brothers, and the Ursulines. Gone are the Italian priests who lived across the street from us. All foreign clergy have been expelled from the island.

I am standing in the front parlor of the priests' house. It is a dark room, the windows shrouded in dark velvet curtains. A confessional booth looms large at the foot of the stairs. These priests are pretty nice, for priests. My mom has sent me to have a chat with the older one because I'm starting to worry about death too much, like everyone in my father's family. He tells me I have nothing to fear, that death is the doorway to something much better, and that, anyway, it is so, so far away for me. He admits that he is much closer to death than me because he's old, but he isn't the least bit scared. He says that when you get to be his age, it doesn't scare you much at all, especially if you've tried to be a good person. I went home feeling so much better.

The younger guy is also very nice. Sometimes he comes over to our house with his tape recorder and asks all of us kids to talk into the microphone and send messages to people in Italy.

“Go ahead and say something. Italians can understand Spanish.” And he shows us how close the two languages are by speaking Italian into the microphone himself. Amazing! We can understand him.

So we speak into the microphone and are all surprised when he plays back the tape. Our voices all sound so high-pitched. We accuse one another of sounding like girls. And the priest laughs a lot at the way in which we all seem so offended by one another's accusations.

Every now and then the Italian priests would set up a movie projector outdoors, with a large screen, and show movies for the whole neighborhood.
The Teahouse of the August Moon
was the worst of them all, but we kids had so much fun that night sticking our arms and hands right in front of the projector's lens and making the grown-ups scream at us. Especially when Manuel gave everyone the finger. A giant finger on the screen, blotting out Glenn Ford. I think I heard the priests laugh, in the darkness.

But they are crying, those priests, on the day they say good-bye to us.