Cuba: Day 5 - Part 2

The cobbled streets of Trinidad, Cuba

After regrouping in the square, it’s on to meet the Horse Whisperer, Julio Munoz.  Once an electrical engineer, he switched to running his colonial home filled with priceless antiques as a two-bedroom B&B when it was allowed in 1996.  Thanks to Spanish ancestors, he has a second Spanish passport, and he tells us that when he goes to Florida, you can’t get him out of Home Depot.  I think he brings goods back to fix up this wonderful old house.  He has plans for expanding the B&B now that that’s bingo!  It’s all part of the Cuban enigma:  living by the law, but stretching it, massaging it to achieve the desired result.  We see this time and time again.

Julio

allowed, and in spite of strange government laws that say you can have a business but you can’t build it up.  The way around that is to raise the ceiling, then split the resulting taller rooms horizontally, after which you cut the house in two, again horizontally, and you donate the upper part to your wife, which means she then has a house that she can rent out.  And
       But where does the Horse Whisperer part come in, you ask?  Well, he fell in love with photography and traveled the countryside taking pictures.  The only way to do that was by horseback.  Although the penalty for killing a horse in Cuba is 15-20 years in prison, they are often just left to starve to death when they get old.  Julio’s kind heart couldn’t stand that.  He started out with one horse, but now has seven that he’s rescued.  And he’s used Monty Roberts’ horse whisperer method to train them.  He  receives no pay for what he does.  He uses what he makes from the B&B to provide for his equine wards, affording them senior years that are dignified.  And often brings them into the house to greet guests!
       Julio is a practicing Catholic in a country that until recently touted itself as avowedly atheistic.  He is the last of his family in Cuba; all the rest have left.  But he has many friends. And a reputation that extends well beyond Trinidad, and even Cuba.  His very life is part of the Cuban enigma.

There were some other colorful characters in Trinidad.  The guy all dressed in gold, his face painted the identical color, who played at being a statue, just like the street actors back in Montmartre.  The man with the big cigar astride a donkey with a sign around its neck that said “For Rent/ Photos 0.50 CUC”.  Our ears, eyes and hearts full of wonders, we reluctantly get back on the bus for the trip back to Cienfuegos.

Tonight is our first of two free nights in Cuba.  It’s been a full day.  A small group of us decides to eat at the paladar near the hotel instead of foraying farther afield.  One of us, Patricia, is of limited mobility, but she’s determined to walk.  A young man with a pedicab sees her outside the hotel and insists upon taking us.  He’ll do it for free, he says.  But Patricia is stubbornly independent.  She only gives in when she wears out halfway there. Thank goodness he’s followed us.  He delivers us to the door and says he’ll come back for her after dinner.

Ismaël

     Cindy has made a reservation for the five of us here at Villa Lagarto.  A lovely setting built around a garden on the bay, but the menu is disappointing.  Well, the menu is fine except they’re all out of the rabbit and there’s no fish or seafood tonight, which means it’s pork or chicken.  Again.  Before the food comes, I spot Ismaël over at a table all by himself. I invite him over to ours and then spend the meal trying to hold a conversation with him in my rusty, spotty Spanish and playing interpreter between him and the rest of us English-speakers.  Through it all, he retains his light-up-the-room smile and good humor, which makes it all worthwhile.
       True to his word, the pedicab is there when we come out after dinner and speeds Patricia and I back to the hotel.  He says it’s free, that he has a grandmother of his own, but we pay him anyway, having asked Ismaël what a fair price would be.  It seems only right because it’s 11 pm, he has many miles to pedal to get home, and has to be back at work in town at 5 am tomorrow morning.
       We’ll get to sleep in a bit longer than he will, but still... it’s time for bed.