audio
HAVANA
After a toque de santo ceremony at the Museo de los Orishas, we walked back through Habana Vieja. Overtired from the intense observation I'd done at the hours-long ceremony, I recorded these sounds to listen to later when I could pay more attention.
During dinner at La California, I had my first encounter with the single song I heard most often while in Cuba: "La gozadera," by Gente de Zona featuring Marc Anthony. Read more about this song on the blog.
"Sigueme y te sigo" (Follow Me and I'll Follow You) by Daddy Yankee. We heard a lot of reggaeton in passing.
In our constant, fruitless search for ice cream, one night we heard this band playing for the open-air seating at a restaurant. (This track is also an example of where my record keeping fell through: while I remember vividly the location and variables of this encounter, I don't know the date or time.)
After the 6 de enero parade finished in Plaza Vieja, we waited around another hour for a concert to start. With amps, electric guitars, and an electric keyboard as well as various types of Afro Cuban drums, the band put a different spin on orisha songs. They began with Elegua, who always opens ceremonies, as he's an orisha of dualities: doorways, youth and old age, night and day.
A distant, indistinct trumpeter played outside a restaurant as we walked near Parque Central; I was too late to catch more than a taste of his music, but I'm glad I waited through the pause because the band started up again.
IN OUR NEIGHBORHOOD
Only on the first occasion did I find the rain in Cuba a refreshing break from the constant heat and humidity; as the rain continued over several days, crescendoing here on the tin roof of Alina's terrace, it began to lose its charm. Our impression was that Cubans don't like rain too much, because it fills the old streets with landmine puddles and increases sickness. Our inital American delight in a cooling rain shower amused them.
Walking around my first afternoon in Cuba, I was still desperate to capture everything I could. This audio profile of the streets near our hostels doesn't contain any special information, but its newness and richness captured my fascination. As time went on and I became more accustomed to the street noise, I had to work harder to pay attention to it.
One early morning as we left our area of Centro Havana for the Prado and the Parque Central, we could hear roosters crowing. I looked, but wasn't able to see any; they could have been anywhere in the numerous hidden internal spaces that are almost invisible from the street.
Another early morning trek out of the neighborhood yielded this unintelligible gem: women singing, their location and song unknown, at least to me.
OUTSIDE HAVANA
An enormous, brightly painted mural on a natural rock wall outside Vinales pays homage to prehistory. I wandered around the sloping, grassy hill, watching two small gold and black birds whip around the heads of the tourists.
In the Kurhotel Escambray outside Trinidad, I had another encounter with "La gozadera," which was playing in the hotel bar.
We took a guided hike through Parque Guanayara, about an hour's ride by truck from the hotel. The path started out in a coffee field shaded by banana trees; we later passed pools and waterfalls, which you can hear here.
I hung back from the group to record the sounds of these birds I could neither see nor name.
We ended the hike at a restaurant and hostel; outside were royal palms on which a large black bird perched, making this ear-catching sound. Our guide called it a Cuban crow.