Fara Armenteros, UPECI
HAVANA, June - My neighbor Clemente wanted to show his granddaughters the
neighborhood where he had grown up in Old Havana. He didn't tell his daughter
where they were going; he just signaled the girls and off they went.
He wanted to show them the church he used to attend on Sundays and the
fabric shop where he worked at his first job. Most of all, he wanted to sit at
an open-air cafe, with the colored awnings and the umbrellas on the tables.
Sometime later, they returned.
"Father, you're back early. That was a short outing. How did it go?"
"All right."
"Then why the long faces?"
"After I shower and eat, I'll tell you."
Later, sitting in front of the TV set, Clemente told his daughter they had
gone to Old Havana, to the neighborhood where he had grown up, and the place
looked terrible. The house where he had lived and the shop where he had worked
had both collapsed. People in the neighborhood have to lug water home because
they no longer have running water.
The old man told his daughter that there are some pretty places, even a pet
grooming parlor for those who can pay in dollars for the service. He said he and
the girls had done a lot of walking until they sat down at an open-air cafe near
the waterfront.
"It's a good thing I looked at the menu before ordering, because
everything they sold was in dollars. The girls couldn't understand. Luckily, a
lady offered to trade me three dollars for 60 Cuban pesos. Of course, we did the
trade on the sly, made sure the police didn't see us."
He told his daughter he bought three soft drinks and two ice creams.
"We didn't even sit down to enjoy them. I don't remember the colors on
the awnings. We just took off."
Clemente doesn't like to ask his sister Teresa, who lives in the U. S., for
anything, because he doesn't know when he might really need a medicine, for
example, and he doesn't like to impose, but he said next time she calls he's
going to ask her to send him 20 dollars when she can.
"I want to take my granddaughters to see the Christ of Havana, and
Morro Castle [both across the bay from the city proper] and the only way is with
dollars."
"Father, you like to dream. Come back to earth."
"But it's not a dream. That's all here, in my country. Besides on
television..."
His daughter interrupted, scolding him for wanting to believe everything he
sees on television.
"What am I going to do," said Clemente. "It's my only
comfort. I have to eat what I see on television, I have to enjoy what they show
on television; it's like you always say..."
"Virtual reality," interrupted the girls in unison.
And Clemente muttered, "Precisely."
Versión
original en español
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