I’ve been having some really bizarre dreams lately, very little of which I can place and trace back to the days events. One particularly vivid one started off, I think, in Preston Park where I was with Ruby, Deva, Alice and Holly. Holly was devastated with a family bereavement (I hope I haven’t foreseen anything), and Ruby was wearing a red dress, and the grass was very green. Low metal railings were also quite dominant. You know those 5-minute shorts you get on C4 at 6.55pm or something, well I was suddenly in one, except it was an arcade game and I had to collect 4 ‘foot tokens’. I started the game with a head start it seems, by already having ‘Left Foot’ and ‘Right Scratchy Foot’. God knows the relevance of scratchy. I had to collect 2 more in 5 minutes by walking around the plush suburbs of Havana. I found ‘Water Foot’ and had only to find ‘Badger Foot’. The thing that made it difficult was that flying overhead creating an oppressive cloud of fear was a rubbish truck occupied by an unseen menace. I knew the menace was green and there was a high chance of it being some type of T-Rex manifestation. I cowered under canopies like Frodo and Sam in the Dead Marshes. My own dream-Nazghul sending my mind into a terrified freefall. A brief moment allowed me to escape from my hiding place and I was about to collect Badger Foot when my time ran out and a sinister narrator said something like “And now you will never know the true identity of the flying menace”.
If anybody would like to translate this for me it would be appreciated. Its probably because of the damn Ice Cream though.
We got the local bus to our project sites in the suburb town of Guanabacoa. All the way I had a mad woman in front of me constantly wetting a flannel and damping her face, wringing it out the window, and spitting (some of which flew back onto my chest). She kept saying Cunda (bad word, similar to the English) and mouthing off about the Chinese. But then who likes a bus full of normal people anyway? Guanabacoa has an incredibly rich history, most of which we went through in the 4-hour Spanish marathon. In fact, I would go as far as to use the word PALEMCEST to describe Guanabacoa. It certainly is. We had a local man take us around and show us 5 empty sites that we could work with. His name was Cameron Diaz. I wish I had known at the beginning of the day because it would have made every moment funnier. The town was quiet, taxis replaced by horse and cart, lots of street socialising and a lot of pride. People here are proud to call themselves Guanabacoan, making a clear distinction from Havana. The problem being that the pride only lies with the history and not with the present. Unemployment is high and what little money the government spends on restoration stays in central Havana. Hence our place in the grand scheme. Tricky Mickey. Apparently whatever we propose will be then handed to the government for close scrutiny and probable rejection.
In the evening I gorged on a whole tub of chocolate Ice cream and was frowned upon by Sheila and Alice (maid Marion) for not sharing. Ruth chased me round the house with a spoon and a pot of peanut butter for a possible sugary combo. This is not technically tomfoolery but I should have shared because the powers that be made me spend most of the next day hugging the toilet bowl dry-heaving, and cold-sweating into the night. Maybe it wasn’t the ice cream though because Ruth, James and Bonzo have all since had the same. Alice came to the rescue though. Possibly the best Cuban maid in the world she brought me a little bowl of soup and some ice for my head. So I just lay there and let everything be done for me. Perfect, it’s like being sick at primary school and spending the whole day on the sofa under a duvet watching TV.
The next day we had to give a presentation on Guanabacoa. My contribution was nil because I had my head in the toilet whilst the others stayed up till the early hours creating a bi-lingual slide show. It started as a relaxed event and we had the presence of 2 new architects - the one-eyed Orlando, an elderly fellow with a brillo-pad beard, and Yassir – a pot bellied, unusual looking man who has a mostly kind face, betrayed by the occasional mischievous grin. The main man is Mario, the artist formally known as Flavio, who saunters in to the meeting when he likes, slumps down and dictates, in an unnecessarily loud voice. I felt very on edge, many heated discussions were taking place about what to do in Guanabacoa and Mario was causing the tempo + volume to escalate. Because it was all in Spanish I would get the odd fragment but couldn’t figure out if we were arguing or agreeing. I thought of Ellie because she too would have hated the atmosphere there. In contrast to me nervously rocking on the chair and biting my lip, I imagine Ellie would have grabbed handfuls of hair, and ran away, exasperated and mouthing apologies to everyone in the convent. It was disorientating, and made eventually more irritating because we were in fact agreeing. Mario just hadn’t waited till the presentation was over. Power-trippy architects get everywhere. However I like his Latin face. He is the most Latin person I have ever seen and for that reason I will absolve him of all verbal aggression.
The next day we were given a walking tour of Old Havana by Orlando and our other comrade – Carlos. He has the most beautiful eyes of any person I have ever seen and from tip of the nose to base of chin is the spitting image of Bruce Willis. They have the same extended upper lip that seems to be begging for moustache occupation but you know it would look wrong – and if you’ve seen the film BANDITS you would agree. We also looked at some buildings, crumbly like Stilton. We went into a sort-of Apothecary shop, and bought honey. I could imagine little wizards going in there to add to their spell ingredients. In the upper reaches there was a tinny walkway that could only be accessed by a dwarf to fill the shelves. If I were a dwarf I’d hand in my CV immediately.
In the evening we met Bruce Willis at a Jazz Club he recommended. The entrance was a couple of English phone-boxes welded together. Strange. Jazz Jazz Jazz. I know its good and I was in awe of their improvising but it was lost on me. My head was like a funnel and whilst bits of the cacophony were captured and travelled into my brain, the rest was lost in the ether. Looking around, I felt quite out of the loop. A beautiful woman with skin like galaxy chocolate took to the stage and used her amazing voice as an instrument, complementing the trumpet notes. Some strange bloke near us pulled out drum sticks and started tapping away in the shadows then slowly, ever so slowly crept closer and closer to the stage, still tapping away. He was eventually noticed by the band who reluctantly let him on the stage to jam. It was really awkward because he was drunk but he was good. He moved so slowly, like a musical sloth, weaving past the double bass and the bongos to stand behind the drummer expectantly, still tapping. Not knowing what to do the drummer got up and let the man have his turn. It was fine but the nature by which he approached the stage and moved thereon in was uncomfortable. Like a drunken uncle at a wedding – no don’t sing Lady In Red!
We also went to see a French film in Spanish subtitles. This bilingual feast would have been challenging at the best of times but it was also a really shit plot.
Today we learnt that in some blocks in central Habana there can be more than 1000 people living. that is a lot. the buildings are only 2 or 3 stories high. so when you see old ladies sitting on the doorstep watching the world go by, they arent infact just chilling and socialising, waiting for someone like me to consider them photographic. they are waiting THEIR TURN to have a sleep on the matress. its insane how overcrowded it is. people have to take it in turns to sleep and eat!
Finally: to any Wheel of Time readers out there: Robert Jordan has died, without publishing the last books. The outcome of Tarmon Gaidon (the last battle) may never be known. What a sod. Who does that, it’s so selfish. JK Rowling would never have done that. She’d definitely wait.
PHOTOS
Phone Call
Larissa´s Arm
ManDogPhoneLead
