The stifling sun of Trinidad leaves me depleted. Even the avacodo tree in my garden is in sympathy - although it is the hurricane rather than the heat which has stolen its wares. The sea is as warm, but more cloudy; eggs are in short supply in Havana as the chickens were blown away; but life saunters on in the summer humidity and the fiesta continues unabated. The little house is high and catches the breeze coming in from the sea which lies lazily in the distance through the criss crossed lines of the precious, but intermittent supply lines of electricity. Sometimes there is no power all day, sometimes the day is full of it. On these days we catch the senors with the washing machine and wash away the dust and sweat from our clothes. My friend will have none of that. He has washed his clothes by had all his life and is most uncomfortable with anyone else getting involved.

Last night we visited the discotheque in the mountains. The pulsating beat throbs from deep in the bowels of the hill as we climb the road towards the tiny light which marks the spot. The rocks tremble and we gyrate amongst the dripping stalactites in the wonderous cavern and miss the dawn.

Por que?

Is it the man, the post revolutionary culture, the food shortages. Perhaps it is boredom, prehaps it is love. It has taken me 55,ooo words to tell the tale, yet the tale is yet to be told. I will wash my clothes by hand (goodbye nails, hello Omo) and sweep my floor with a broom. Hardship and romance. From one imperfect culture to another and experiences unknown. Food shortages and hurricane damage await me where money cannot buy that which doesn't exist, where freedom is redefined, where heat saps and listening ears betray dissent. Once more into the crushing embrace of the great Orc and the wide blue sky of the Carribean.

To the East

The internet costs 6 Cuban Convertible Pesos an hour - if you can find a town, an internet access card and a computer. (A convertible peso, cuc, is roughly $1. This is for tourists, but you can imagine that the average Cuban will be very keen to collect such purchasing power where an imported Chinese bicycle cost 300cuc and the average wage is the equivalent of $12 a month. The Cubans use local currency which is 1/26th of the cuc and good for basic food and transport. ) Sometimes you find an internet cafe, but they have run out of cards, sometimes you have a card, but the PC isn't working. Mostly you are in a place where the PC is a fabled creature. European sim cards don't work in Cuba thanks to the trade embargo, and hardly anyone is on the phone. Thus Merlin and I missed each other through a mixture of techno-loss and old fashioned madness.

Pedro and I moved on. From the prosperous town of Cienfuegos where 'paseo' (or strutting your stuff) happens every night along the elegant Malecon and the Chevys are gradually being replaced by Peugeot, Mercedes and Seat but nothing replaces the countless horsedrawn carts for everyday use. It is decreed here that vehicles must use lights at night, so a tin of gasoline is stuffed with a lighted rag and slung beneath the wooden cart. You can barely see the resulting flicker, but hey, job done.

Onwards to the east of the island and the exquisite valley of Vinares where nature has eroded the limestone cliffs and left a perfect and fertile valley amongst gigantic rock formations. Cathedrals of stalactites and stalagmites in the depths of ancient caves offer cool respite from the suffocating heat but the mangoes love it. They are swollen and sweet and we eat them greedily.

In every Cuban town there is a Casa de la Musica where old and young gather to drown in music and beer and rum. In Vinares the impossible has happenned and we have to resort to Russian Vodka! There seems to be no such thing as a shot - just buy by the bottle as usual. Walking home through the moonless unlit roads in a town where it is not necessary to show lights, where silent oxen and mules are tethered at the verges for night feeding, would be unthinkable without the aid of alchohol.

Finally it is La Havana again and we are forced to act like grown ups and eat in Chinatown and walk along the vast Malecon where mangoes do not drip from the trees and the fruit we have tasted will dry in our mouths as we part.

There are places in this world where the currency is pigs and sex, and I have been to them. I have been to places where I am ceremoniously given the only knife and fork in the street, where the water is undrinkable and the town has no name.

From Trinidad to Camarguey along roads off the map where the old chevy grinds to a halt along lines of volcanic eruptions which pass as roads round here. Money does not buy you a lift, even a pig is second choice. This is not prostitution, it is currency.

My companion is a joy. So generous and thoughtful. He will give a stranger his last drop of water- or should I say beer, because it was days before I had water. The driver consumes the best part of a bottle of rum on the journey and you quickly see why no-one really cares. Here there is heat and rum and your amigos. You smoke and drink and laugh because there is nothing else. No books. No nothing. My most revered posession is a dictionary. The dictionary which represents my fantastic wealth and unfathomable freedom to traverse this planet and speak to the people in any language I choose. I am in love with Cuba, but now my eyes are opening.

They roasted coffee beans in the mountains for me, picked mangoes and swaddled me in real heartbreaking human love about which few of us know anything at all. It was the greatest priviledge.

Onwards to Santa Lucia and days on the bleached sand making love in the surf. Onwards again to Santa Clara and the mountains and waterfalls where you swim alone in the cool ponds. Mangoes and fruits I have never before seen are our food. Onwards to Cienfuegos where my amigo entered a theatre for the first time. Unless you have connections abroad you cannot even afford the measly 1 peso to just look around. China is moving in and the struggle gets harder for those who protect their principals and live according to their own values.

Cuba at last

I think we are on the slowest connection in the universe, so no chance of a picture today.

Yes, I turned up two hours before the flight at Gatwick and bought a ticket at a reduced rate (not reduced enough for my liking, but you can't have it all).

I arrived in Havana after a somewhat bumpy ride in a near empty aircraft.Coming in to land was the thought provoking sight of a half burnt commercial airliner poking into the trees beyond the airport. Obviously we are not in a hurry to clear up this misfortune. Undaunted, I randomly found somewhere to stay - after blagging it on my visa form which I miraculously had to fill out myself (!) and found a bus to Trinidad where I eventually discovered my peculiar friend in all his rastafarian glory. Trinidad feels a bit like home. Food, weather, people - all as lovely as as I remember. I am staying (somewhat unofficially) with a friend of the dreadlocked one. Unfortunately no English so I am keeping very fit with massive use of semaphore and all related sign language. 'We' are renovating Trinidad for Fidel and our tongues remain firmly in our cheek. The mountains beckon.

Call of the wild

The call is stronger now and I have to go back to Cuba. I tell myself it is choice of course, but there is no choice at all - and no excuse either. Long have I worked for money. Long have I worked my heart to believe in what I do. Long has the pull to freedom been pushed aside.
Life is a conspiracy. Like saboteurs the whispers in the back of my mind have been undermining my best intentions. It seems that my best intentions were either not good enough, or utterly misplaced because I have just cast my whole past behind me and am preparing for take off and pizza at 3 pesos a time.

And then came the monk

Did I find him, or did he find me? It does not matter because now he is family and together we work to free Tibet so that he can return in safety.
Not that you can click your fingers and free a country. But if everything you do, and every thought you have is concentrated on one thing. If every conversation includes the object or your passion, then the ripples of your thought spread far.
In November 2007 Tibet was a shuttered and oppressed country. In March 2008 it has a voice on the world stage. Thousands of people have worked in a myriad or ways to achieve this. I am proud to be one of them.

Rebiya changes my life

One day a small woman came to Cardiff. She did not speak English but that did not stop her. She does not speak German or Swedish or any language other then her own, yet she travels the world looking for help to free her people from oppression. Her country is almost unknown - East Turkisthan - and her people are almost unheard of. They are Uighurs. But they are drowning, suffocating and suffering under the heavy hand of the Chinese army.

Even now I do not know how best to help her. But I know I will try.

www.uighurs-uk.blogspot.com

The First Post

It has to start in Cuba. Many things start in Cuba. Socialismo, Cuban style, is worth a second glance if not a good hard look. Fidel is ailing and dare we think of change in a country where you will have free education all your life, free healthcare, enough food for the healthiest appetite and a wonderful sense of community. Cuba has the greatest sense of community I have come across in the world. It is honest and true and inclusive. Shall we trade all this for consumerism? It's a one way ticket. I do not want to see yet another country with yet another faceless shopping mall dominating the skyline. People working for money instead of doing something they believe in. Is there a middle way?
I will return.