Article published on 16/08/2025
Silvestri's song somewhat describes the figure of one of the most debated and beloved characters of all time, Ernesto Guevara de la Serna, a giant who would hand himself over to history with a name of only three letters: "CHE". Talking about Cuba without considering its history is a pointless exercise, perhaps because it is the only place in the world where the choices and consequences that have accompanied it for nearly fifty years are alive more than ever and can be felt everywhere, especially on the skin of its people.
At the first awakening, just observing the environment around us is enough to realize that we have finally arrived at our destination. A chandelier of such ugliness that it cannot be described, an air conditioner from the former Soviet Union, naturally the bed, a wardrobe, some shelves, and useless objects thrown there by chance. The sheets are clean and hygiene is above expectations. The first afternoon is dedicated to Old Havana, a World Heritage site. Fantastic colonial-style buildings, museums galore, cobblestone alleys, and wooden flooring in an international and joyful atmosphere. Almost all bars have a patio where, among tropical plants, people eat, drink, play music, and above all, dance.
The first great thrill is when we arrive at the place I had known about for a long time: La Bodeguita del Medio. Behind the bartender hangs a small frame with handwritten words by Ernest Hemingway, which gave this bar and another nearby worldwide fame and success: "My mojito at La Bodeguita… my daiquiri at La Floridita." While La Bodeguita has wooden chairs and tables and several rooms covered in countless writings on the walls, La Floridita is more sober; you can sit next to the life-sized bronze statue of Hemingway and look at photos showing him with Hollywood stars, with his wife, or with Fidel.
The Malecón (seafront) is truly spectacular. There are no rock barriers, and during hurricanes, the Atlantic waves slap the imposing buildings lining the street.
In Cojímar, a suburb of Havana, the town that inspired the story that won Hemingway the Nobel Prize, The Old Man and the Sea. There is a castle on the harbor and a pier from which Hemingway set out for fishing trips with his boat, El Pilar. We look for the famous old man's house and find it. Gregorio Fuentes, the fisherman who went out to sea with Hemingway, unfortunately did not wait for us. He died a few years ago, a centenarian. It seems that for a small fee, he enjoyed chatting with travelers about the adventures and misadventures that happened to him and his illustrious friend.
Then we head towards another suburb, San Francisco de Paula, where Finca La Vigía still shines, the estate that was Hemingway's home on the city's outskirts. He lived and wrote here until 1960 when he moved to Idaho, where he ended a life nothing short of adventurous.
The Museum of the Revolution is an immense building with interiors decorated by New Yorker Tiffany. We are welcomed by the bust of Christopher Columbus, the ever-present José Martí, poet and patriot who inspired the Castro revolution, and a detailed reconstruction of the latter, aided by documents and photographs. In front of the building is the SAU-100 tank used by Fidel in 1961 to foil the American attack on the Bay of Pigs. On the opposite side of the building is the Granma Pavilion, a glass structure built to house the Granma, the motorboat that transported the future rulers of the island from Mexico to Cuba. One of the sacred places of Cuban communism, equivalent to Mao's mausoleum in Beijing.