Trinidad

Trinidad is beautiful.

I can't believe how lucky I got with the people I'm staying with here. I noticed one girl with red shorts in a huge crowd of jinteros at the bus station when I arrived, just this one somehow stood out. As soon as I had my backpack on, I was hit by a horde of people trying to lure me to stay with them. It felt like what I would imagine to be suddenly in the midst of a swarm of bees.

I had to shoo them all away, and kept saying "NO!" like I do with Zoe when she's being really bad (as most of you know is hardly *ever*). Then this girl with the red shorts suddenly appeared and asked if I would like to see her house. "YES!" I immediately followed her. I loved the place, I have a private room in the upstairs overlooking this lovely town with cobblestone streets and red tiled roofs, the sea just a few miles away, and the mountains on the other side. I have a private balcony where I watch people walking from house to house on the rooftops, doing laundry, and conversing.

I'm treated like a queen. The family brings an extravagant breakfast and dinner to my own table up on the balcony each morning and night. *AND* it turns out they have cousins living about a mile away from me in Portland. Holy Shit. I looked at the pile of photos they have of these cousins, and it's all areas where Zoe and I walk almost every day.

Destino.

I can't tell who lives/works where - there are so many people in and out of the houses. (It was like that in Havana too.) The first night I was here I ended up in someones house who was doctoring my foot (long story, for another time) and there were 3 kids in the house. He introduced me to one of them as his daughter, I asked if all of the kids were his, and he looked at me like I was crazy - like - "why on earth would you think I had more kids than just the one?" As if there weren't two other little boys running around in the house when I asked the question.

Also, in the house where I'm staying, there are people there all the time who suddenly appear in another house. I was sitting on my balcony this morning when the girl in the red shorts from the first day appeared in the house next door. She showed me a painting and asked if I'd like to see more - her brother is a painter and if I wanted to look at what he had in the house, I could buy something much cheaper than what he had in all of the little tourist shops around town. Turns out,it was in that house that I was looking into next door. (It's hard to describe house this works - but the houses aren't actually completely contained - so one woman (Rosemary) from my house tried to lead me over the roof to get into the other house. It looked like I would surely plunge to my death with a bad step (or at least to a couple broken bones) so I said no and opted to take the stairs and enter the house through the front door. I'm kind of old fashioned like that.

The house was filled with beautiful paintings. One of which I'd noticed the first day I got there through a window - but I didn't realize it was right there in the house next door. Holy Shit. Of course, I didn't buy it because I wouldn't dream of "Trading with the Enemy."

When I very first arrived in this town, I was a little turned off by how many tourists there are here. But, I'm having such good luck with the people I'm meeting, that I'm planning on staying a little longer here than I originally planned. It's really an amazing place, there's good reason so many tourists come here, and I'm doing alright staying away from them.

Okay - time ...

Yesterday I went to Santa Clara where Che Guevera is buried. It was *incredible*. Very emotional to be in the tomb with him and other revolutionaries buried there. Alex, a Cuban who took me there, didn't come in. Later he said he just couldn't because it was too emotional for him. I can imagine - it was very powerful. (More later - the setting and timing aren't quite right for it now.)

We also went to another revolutionary site where one of Batista's trains was attacked and derailed during the revolution. There are still 4 cars there, right by the train tracks. They seem to be in the same position as they might have been when the train derailed.

On the way back, we went on what turned out to be a bitch of a hike through the forest/jungle (Topes de Callientes) to get to a cascade. It rained that morning, so the trail was really slippery and muddy. I did *not* have the right shoes for it - I kept slipping and sliding. I did go for a swim in the pool by the cascade we hiked to - which was quite a shock to the system. Brrrr.

I went dancing later that night (though with horrible pains in my knee from twisting and sliding down the steep muddy trails - and with huge bloody blisters on my feet - ouch!) still ... the music in Cuba is too irresistible to consider skipping out on it. Though, the first night I got here, I did decide to stay in. However, I could still hear music from all over town right there in my bedroom and on my balcony.

I'm reading a book called "Havana Bay," which paints a great picture of Cuban culture, and one line in it that I love and keep thinking of as I walk through the pulsating streets goes something like "If Cuba were to sink into the sea, probably the water would percolate with sound."

Muchos Besos para todos.