I ended up in Cuba after a simple decision.
“Rux, do you know I have 40 days off this year?”
“Do you want to go with me to Cuba?”
“Sure!”
Rux was collecting data for her thesis in dance anthropology; I was going to do absolutely nothing for one whole month. Or at least that was the plan, because I was informally assigned the role of camera operator,which I accepted joyfully in order to take part in interviews, meetings, shows and practices of (as it turned out) the greatest Rumberos in Havana and Matanzas.
This blog is not a travel story, it’s not a diary either nor is it a “look at me” type of Facebook album. It simply presents bits of the visual material we have recorded. The rest of it, certainly the most interesting and most valuable, as it is part of the research and the events developing around it, which tourists are unable to experience, we decided not to publish, for various reasons – they are either too personal or part of the film that will accompany Ruxi’s thesis. I also have to admit that there were many times when we chose not to take pictures and simply enjoy the moment.
So what’s this all about?
In fact it’s not about anything. It turned out quickly that being a tourist in Cuba is difficult and after a while unpleasant, so we abandoned this role after only two days, focusing instead on research, rumba and rum, Havana, sitting in the library – that was obviously Ruxi, while I was spending hours walking around the city. The pictures included here are mainly the result of these explorations.
This is my subjective, fragmentary record of – mainly – Havana, where we spent about three weeks, and which I want to share as to save it from the dust on my hard disk and also to illustrate Ruxi’s posts on http://grumpy-but-gorgeous.blogspot.com/.
