HOW MY PURIFICATION RITUAL WAS FICTIONALIZED IN "CHANDA'S SECRETS"

Last post, I included a chapter from my comic adult novel The Phoenix Lottery that demonstrated how life interacts with imagination in the creation of fiction. (My actual experiences with a santerían purification ritual outside Guardalavaca, and at the duPont mansion in Varadero, had been posted, with pix, in the weeks prior.)

(BTW, if you'd like to buy a copy of the Phoenix Lottery, just post a comment and I'll see about getting you one. :))

I used that same real-life ritual to different effect in Chanda's Secrets, where it serves as the basis of a dramatic scene involving the spirit doctor Mrs. Gulubane -- which I post below.

FYI, there's a lot of overlap in santerían and subSaharan animist traditions, as santería (like voodoo) has its roots in Yoruban ritual magic. These religious practices originated in the ancient kingdom of Benin, now Nigeria, where many of the slaves were taken to the Americas. However, in addition to my Cuban experience with animism, I also used visits with spirit doctors in Botswana and Zimbabwe to create the Chanda scene. (Zimbabwe is said to have the most powerful spirit doctors on the continent -- I've heard that from friends in Bots as well as Malawi and Zambia. While in Bots, three spirit doctors -- a grandmother, mother, and child -- offered to take me to a ceremony in Zim if I'd drive them in the car I was in. Uh... no... I kind of wanted to be alive to write the book. Some readers of this blog have said I've lived through more than my share of nine lives, but I'm careful, really -- well, sort of -- and there are some things I just won't mess with. :) I have enormous respect for the power of spirit doctors to accomplish things -- either in the natural or spirit worlds.)

Anyway, enough chat. Here is an example of how an experience can trigger two very different imaginative retellings. It also demonstrates the complexity of answering readers who want to know how much of my novel are "true." (Skim over the last few post to the ones with pix from my ritual experience. To see Chanda's Secrets being made into a film -- a real spirit doctor was cast as MRs. gulubane -- check out my posts from South Africa in December.)

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FROM "CHANDA'S SECRETS" (Chanda's voice, a sixteen-year-old from a fictional country in subSahara)

Our visitor is Mrs. Gulubane. The local spirit doctor. She lives in the mopane hut across from the dump with her aging mama and a grown daughter, born without eyes.
Normally Mrs. Gulubane wears a cotton print dress, a kerchief, an old cardigan and a pair of rubber sandals. But tonight is a business call. She has on her otter-skin cap, her white robe with the crescent moons and stars, her red sash, and her necklace of animal teeth.
Our kitchen table and chairs have been pushed against the side walls. Mrs. Gulubane’s reed mat has been unrolled in the center of the room. When I come in, she’s sitting on it cross-legged. To her right is a whisk broom of yerbabuena stalks and a pot of water; to her left, a wicker basket and a handful of dried bones. This is how she presents herself on weekends at the bazaar, where she tells tourists their fortunes while her daughter hunches next to her weaving grass hats.
It’s fun watching Mrs. Gulubane play with the tourists. Most traditional doctors try to keep their customers happy. Not Mrs. Gulubane. When she’s in a bad mood, she’ll tell them that their wives are cheating with the neighbors, and their children will be ripped apart by wild dogs. If they want their money back, her daughter rips the bandages off her eye sockets and threatens to attack them with her cane. It’s amazing how fast tourists can run -- even when they’re loaded down with souvenirs and videocams.
Tonight, though, I’m not expecting fun. Here in the neighborhood, Mrs. Gulubane takes her rituals seriously. So do a lot of people -- even people who know better. No matter what sounds come out of her hut, nobody ever says a word. I don’t know how many people believe in her powers, but nobody wants to be at the end of her curse.
Mrs. Gulubane stays seated. “Good evening, Chanda.” The lamp light shines off her two gold teeth.
I bow my head in respect, but what I’m thinking is: why is she here?
She reads my mind. “There is bewitchment in this place. I have come to see what I can see.”
I look uncertainly at Mama. Why did she ask her here? She doesn’t believe in spirit doctors.
“It wasn’t your mama called me,” Mrs. Gulubane smiles. “I was sent for by a friend.”
“Good evening Chanda,” comes a voice from the corner behind me. I turn. It’s Mrs. Tafa. She closes the shutters.
Mrs. Gulubane indicates the floor in front of her mat. “Now that the family is together, shall we begin?”
Mama nods. She hands me her walking stick and takes my arm. I help her down and sit beside her. Soly and Iris squeeze between us. Mrs. Tafa sits a chair; I suppose she’s afraid if she sat on the floor she wouldn’t be able to get up again.
Mrs. Gulubane lowers the lamp-flame. Shadows dart up and down the walls. She takes an old shoe polish tin from her basket. Inside is a small quantity of greenish brown powder. She chants a prayer and rubs the powder between her fingers, sprinkling it into the pot of water. Then, stirring the water with the whisk brush, she dances about the room flicking a light spray into the corners, and over and under the windows and doorways.
I’m not sure what Mama is thinking, but Soly and Iris are frightened. “It’s all right,” I whisper. “It’s just a show.” Mrs. Gulubane stops in her tracks, tilts her ear toward us and growls at the air. Soly buries his head in my waist.
Mrs. Gulubane returns to the mat. She pulls an length of red skipping rope from her basket, folds it in two, and begins to whip herself. Strange noises rattle up her throat. Spittle flies from her lips. Her eyes roll into her head. “HI-E-YA!” She throws back her arms, stiffens, and slumps forward in a heap.
A moment of silence. Then she sits up slowly and reaches for the bones. They’re flat and worn, sliced from the ribs of a large animal. Mrs. Gulubane takes three in each hand. Chanting, she claps them together three times and lets them fall. She peers at the pattern they make. Something upsets her. She puts two of the bones aside. More chanting as she claps the remaining four and lets them fall. Her forehead knots tighter. She sets a second pair of bones aside and picks up the remaining two. A final chant. She claps them together. One breaks into three pieces in her hand. The fragments fall on the mat. She studies them closely, muttering heavily and shaking her head.
She looks up. Under the lamp-light, Mrs. Gulubane’s face contorts into the face of an old man. Her voice changes too. It’s low and guttural. She swallows air and belches words. “An evil wind is blowing from the north. There is a village. I see the letter ‘B’.”
A pause. “Tiro,” Mama says. Her voice is tired, resigned.
“Yes, Tiro. It is Tiro. Someone in Tiro wishes you harm.”
“Only one?” asks Mama. I look over. Is there mockery in her voice?
Mrs. Gulubane glares. “No. More than one,” she says. “But one above all others.” She moves the bones around, cocks her head and makes a deep whupping sound. “I see a crow. It hops on one claw.”
Mrs. Tafa’s breath seizes. “Lilian’s sister has a clubfoot,” she whispers from the corner.
Mrs. Gulubane claps her hands in triumph. “The bones are never wrong. This sister of yours,” she says to Mama, “she has visited your home?”
“She came for the burial of my child,” Mama replies. “And when I buried my late husband.”
“Death. She has come for death,” Mrs. Gulubane growls. “And to steal for her spells.”
“Lizbet?” Mrs. Tafa gasps.
Mrs. Gulubane nods darkly. “When she has left, what things have been missing?”
“Nothing,” Mama says.
“Nothing you remember. But maybe an old kerchief? An old hankie?”
“I don’t know.”
“The evil one is clever!” Mrs. Gulubane exclaims. “Each time she has come, she has taken a hankie, a kerchief, something so old it hasn’t been missed. And she has snipped a braid of your hair -- oh yes, each time a single braid -- while you lay sleeping. With these she has bewitched you. She has put a spell on your womb. Even as we speak, the demon is coiled in your belly.”
Without warning, Mrs. Gulubane lunges across the mat and punches her fist into Mama’s guts. Mama howls in pain. The spirit doctor twists her fist back. Wriggling from her grip is a snake. She throws it against the wall and attacks it with Mama’s walking stick.
The air is alive with magic. From every corner, animal noises blare, trumpet and squawk. Mrs. Gulubane spins about, striking the reptile. Finally she leaps upon it, grabs it by head and tail and ties it in a knot. She lifts the lifeless body above her head. Its shadow fills the wall.
“I have killed this demon,” she says. “But there will be others. The evil one has your hankies, your kerchiefs, your braids of hair, to make more spells. She has sewn the hankies into dollies, stitched on eyes and mouths, and filled them with cayenne. Therein the pain to your body. At night, she has singed your braids of hair. Therein the pain to your mind. Beware. You must retrieve what she’ has stolen or you and your children will surely die.”
We stare in dumb silence, as Mrs. Gulubane drops the snake into her pot, returns the pot, whisk brush and tin to her basket, and rolls up her mat. She tucks the mat under her arm, takes the basket, and makes her way out the door.
Mrs. Tafa rushes after her. “For your troubles.” She presses a few coins in Mrs. Gulubane’s free hand. “Tomorrow, I’ll have the family bring you two chickens for a sacrifice.”
Mrs. Gulubane nods and vanishes into the night.

MY SANTERÍAN RITUAL IN FICTION

Hi there,

Over the last couple of weeks, I've written and showed pix from Cuba: of Varadero, the duPont estate, and my experience with santería. These have been mixed in with two excerpts from my first novel, The Phoenix Lottery. In those you read about our hero Junior (a literary version of me) as a troubled child in prerevolution Cuba. In this chapter, he's an adult returned to Varadero, now, after the revolution. I thought you might like to see how all the interests and experiences I talked about earlier, got turned into fiction.

The rituals mentioned at the end of the chapter, are taken from actual santerían practice.

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FROM "THE PHOENIX LOTTERY"

Junior checks into the Melia Las Americas, one of a dozen tourist hotels on what used to be the duPont estate. Without bothering to unpack, he wanders the few hundred yards to the mansion where his father had abandoned him these many years ago. It’s a museum and restaurant now.

He pays two dollars to the attendant and enters, his stomach alive with butterflies. He feels like Alice in Wonderland: everything is and is not as he thought he remembered it. The major pieces of furniture and the decor remain as Irenée duPont had left them, but they seem to have shrunk. The little four-year-old in his mind who remembers scooting under tables and hiding under chairs can’t imagine how he used to fit. And what are tourists doing here? They seem to be operating in a different dimension than himself. When they rub their hands across the carved mahogany sideboard and green ceramic tiles, they are touching ‘a piece of history’; he is re-experiencing his past, a version of it anyway.

“That’s the spot where we put up the Christmas tree and I saw the angel for the first time,” Junior marvels, looking to the north-east corner of the Grand Room, past the pipe organ and the archway to the library. He goes upstairs and into the master bedroom. “This is where Mrs. duPont used to sleep,” a guide says. “Mr. duPont enjoyed his whiskey. She made him sleep in the adjoining room over there so his snoring wouldn’t bother her.” How does the guide know that? Junior can’t remember anything of the sort, though he barely had met the old man. To him, Mr. duPont was this big person you didn’t bother and he’d give you a candy.

He makes his way to the winding staircase and up to the semi-enclosed rooftop bar. How had he managed to race up the steps in this cramped passageway without bouncing off the walls covered in bruises? What could he have been thinking getting underfoot of Sara and the other servants as they tried to carry trays of glasses up and down those tight circular stairs? No wonder they’d been upset.

And now he is in the bar.

Like the downstairs library, the bar is full of small tables. Downstairs the tables are covered in white linen, and Cubans waiters serve tourists gourmet meals prepared with fresh cream and other ingredients unavailable to their own families. Upstairs the tables are for casual use, crowds of tourists coming for the 2-for-1 Happy Hour and the same exquisite sunsets he had once enjoyed in private with his father.

Junior looks at the bar counter in the corner. That’s where The Pillow Lady terrified him nigh unto death. He goes to the small walkout on the south side and looks over the golf course where he’d seen his father race off in the cart. In Junior’s dreams, the child sees the golf course stretching into an infinite nightmare of sandtraps and jungle. To the adult seeing it under the midday sun, it is hard to imagine how it might ever have seemed fearful.

If it’s true that the world shapes us through the experiences it provides, Junior thinks, it’s equally true that we shape those experiences by the way in which we see them. What a terrifying thought. Whether because of age, position, time or background, what we see of events is necessarily limited; and yet we act on the basis of our impaired vision, bringing consequences upon ourselves that can never be erased.

Junior leaves unsettled and wanders back to the hotel for a nap, wondering what he will see when he visits Sara.



At seven-thirty, Junior takes a cab to Sara’s home at the corner of calle 42 and avenida 1. His visit is a surprise: she has no phone and there wasn’t time to write, the decision to come having been made the previous night. All the same, the letter he’d recently received indicated her door was always open.

The cab pulls up to a simple home of cement blocks with a corrugated tin roof. Wood shutters and door are open to let in the evening breeze. Next to the door, Sara and her daughter Elena sit on an improvised couch of orange crates and old car seats.

Sara hasn’t changed much. Her hair is almost as black, her skin almost as supple and her eyes absolutely as bright as in the days she managed the household staff at Xanadu. To Junior, however, she is another person altogether. This Sara is rather short. The four-year-old remembers a giant. On the other hand, she is now almost as old as the child once imagined.

What a life those years have seen. After the revolution, she continued at the estate, helping the government take inventory of the duPont belongings, then cleaning it once it became a restaurant. Retired for ten years, she remains active thanks to Santeriá. She is santera mayore, called upon by neighbours to recommend love potions, spells to ward off spirits and herbal remedies to alleviate the sick. As she likes to say, “If you have friends, you don’t need a sugar plantation.”

Nevertheless, life has been difficult, particularly in the wake of the Soviet Union’s collapse, and her husband’s death of cancer. Of her remaining family, one son died in a fishing accident and the second, jailed for offences relating to the black market, left the country when Castro opened the prisons for the 1980 ‘freedom flotilla’. Today he lives off Calle Ocho in Miami’s Little Havana, where he works as a short-order cook at ‘Versailles’. He sends her letters, but the money inside usually disappears in transit. Her two daughters remain in Cuba. The eldest lives with her husband in nearby Coliseo where she is an economist at the local sugar factory. Meantime, the baby of the family, Elena, works as a housekeeper at the Hotel Paradiso, earning far more in tips than she ever did as a teacher.

It was Elena who helped re-establish contact between her mother and Junior.


Calle 42 y Avenida 1
Varadero, Matanzas
Cuba
My dear little Edgar,
It is your old friend from Xanadu, Sara Pérez. My daughter Elena is giving this letter to a guest at the hotel where she works. I hope this guest will mail it to you when she returns to Canada and that it finds you well.
This week I read about your lottery in Granma. It had a very nice picture of you. You haven’t changed. The boy is in the man.
Do you still have Señora Resguardo? She used to keep you so safe from the Espíritu Intranquilo who gave you many problems here. I do not mean to trouble you, but the night I see your picture in the newspaper, I have a dream. You are lost and crying for help. I cast the shells. I fear you may need a more strong resguardo than when you were a boy for now I see three Espíritu Intranquilos surrounding you. And more troubles beside from those living.
Forgive me if I interfere, but your father was so kind for me and you were such a sunshine. I do not forget. If you ever find that you have need of me, my door is always open.
Sincerely,
Sara Maria Pérez Pérez


“So you have come, my little Edgar.” Sara introduces him to Elena. At Xanadu, he never knew that Sara had children. In fact, he never knew that Sara had a life.

He offers the women a bag filled with aspirins, cough syrup, chocolate, jam and other locally hard-to-come-by goods he’d picked up at the Duty Free shop at the airport. Sara takes the bag and, in return, offers him a plate of Moors and Christians. Junior accepts, though having stuffed himself at the hotel buffet the thought of black beans and rice makes him queasy. With a smile and a nod, Elena offers him her seat and goes inside to fix his plate. The moment she has gone, Sara says, “My little Edgar, my dream was correct? Yes? Or have you come to Varadero for a tan?”

“Please help me.”

Sara nods and holds his hands in her own. She rubs them; they are so cold. They sit in silence for a time, as the sun drops quickly and the night air fills with fireflies and the sounds of waves and neighbours. Then Sara says, “Your father -- he is still living?”

A discreet pause. “In a manner of speaking.”

Sara understands. “He was always a restless spirit.”

Junior begins to cry.

“He loved you very much.” Junior laughs, but Sara holds her ground. “It was in his eyes when he asked for your resguardo.” A pause. “And your mother? She is alive?”

Junior laughs again. “Oh yes.”

“Come.” She leads him inside where Elena has made his place at the table. As Junior eats by the light of seven candles, Sara tells him how frightened she had been when she cast his shells. Her fear carries weight, as Sara is blessed as an italera. For this gift she gives the glory to the orisha gods Changó, Oyá, her birth orisha Obatalá, and on this occasion Elegguá to whom she has called for guidance in divining future action.

Once Junior has wiped his plate with his last crust of bread, Sara claps her hands. “To work.” She takes one of three beaded necklaces hanging from a nail in the door frame. “You must wear this in Elegguá’s honour,” she says, putting the string of red and black beads around his neck.“Now take off your clothes.”

Junior strips to his underwear and stands in the centre of a circle Sara describes on the floor with a dozen rusty spikes, the rays of Chango. The old woman stands before him, eyes closed, concentrating on the sound of unheard drums. Her head begins to roll and her body sway as she chants prayers to Babalú-Ayé, orisha god of sickness, while whipping herself rhythmically with a red cord tied to a kitchen knife.

The candles on the table flicker. The outside six extinguish, while the centre glows more brightly than before, a curious orange surrounded by a rim of blue. And now Sara begins to moan, the moans transforming to animal howls, as her body is inhabited by something other. In a trance, she takes his right hand, sniffing it like a wild beast, gumming it til it drips saliva. In like manner, she snuffles up his arm, across his chest, and down to the tips of his left fingers.

A throaty laugh and suddenly she begins to speak in tongues, a rich mix of medieval Spanish, French and Yoruban. Elena translates. “The ability of the three Espíritu Intranquilos to cause you pain is increased by the actions of an evil man. He is a snake in the grass who holds sway over your mother.”

Junior gasps. “How could she know about Rudyard Gardenia?”

“She has sacrificed to Elegguá,” Elena whispers. “He is a trickster who punishes those who do wrong, and is eager to take up your case.”

Whoever, or whatever, is inside Sara has overheard. Excited grunts and gestures from the creature. Elena lights a cheap cigar and puts it in her mother’s hand. Sara puffs it with the lit end glowing in her mouth. More grunts. Smoke billows through the room, licking Junior’s pores. The cigar is replaced with a glass of rum. Sara downs half in a gulp. The other half she rolls thickly round her mouth, then sprays across Junior’s face and chest. Given all that’s happened in the last few months, he takes it in his stride.

More tongues, and more translation. “Elegguá will guide your hand as you rid yourself of this ‘Gardenia’. And rid yourself you must if you wish to deal with the spirits who haunt you.”

“But how can I touch him?”

Elena listens very hard, then says, “You must write his name with snake venom on a piece of paper. Glue the paper to snakeskin and cut to fit the inside of your shoes. Then walk, hard, on his name. As you do, the snake will be ground into the dirt.”

“Ground into the dirt,” Junior repeats, relishing each syllable.

The creature inside Sara leaps with glee, then crouches, spitting its dictation hard and fast.

“Next, you must rid your mother of the snake’s influence,” Elena rattles, barely keeping pace. “To do this, take two seven-hour black candles. Carve in the shape of a man and a woman. At midnight, set one inch apart and burn for an hour. On the second midnight, two inches apart and burn for an hour. On the third midnight, three, and so forth til the week is over, and the candles spent as that devil’s spell.”

The creature shrieks, collapsing on the floor. Instantly, the six dead candles burst back to life and all is as it was before.

Sara shakes herself back into her body and gets up. She smiles at Junior. “Elegguá will help?” she asks, wiping the dried spittle and rum from his body with a handful of fragrant leaves plucked from a basin of cool water drawn by Elena. Junior nods.

“Good.” Sara goes to a low box in the corner on which a black doll dressed in white sits behind a bowl filled with burnt coconut and cotton. The front of the box is open; within it are an arrangement of seashells filled with a variety of herbs. Junior realizes the box must be some sort of shrine. He watches as Sara takes a small neatly folded plastic bag from a stack at the right of the box, all retrieved by Elena from departed guests at The Paradiso, and mixes pinches of herbs within it.

“Seven herbs for seven despojos,” she says handing him the bag. “Bitter and sweet: escoba amarga, guairo, altamiso, canutillo blanco, cimmarrona, abrajo and yerbabueno -- your old favourite. One thimble in each bath will keep you safe from spirits. And keep a flavour of this in your clothes,” she winks at him, pressing a loose quantity of dried espartillo in his palm.

Elena interrupts to excuse herself. She’s expected to work at six in the morning and must get to sleep. Junior thanks her for the food and translation. Then he and Sara move to the front porch and talk about old times into the middle of the night.

When they say farewell, Sara gives him a hug. “It’s been too long since I have seen my little Edgar. You will come again?”

“Yes.”

Sara pauses, uncertain. “I may speak freely?” Junior nods. “They had their problems, your mother and father, I think.” Junior nods again. “There is something you should know. You will not believe me, but it is true. Your father was not perfect, but he was a good man. He loved your mother very much. He asked the babalawo for a spell to bring back her love.”

“I guess spells don’t always work.”

“No,” Sara says with a sad heart. “Sometimes the orishas are displeased.”

CUBA: OUTSIDE VARADERO

My first novel, the Phoenix Lottery, uses lots of other references to Varadero, besides the duPont mansion featured in the last two posts. Above is the lobby of the Melia Varadero. (Go back two posts to see the duPont mansion in the distance with a bunch of beach in the foreground. That shot was taken twenty years ago from the spot where this hotel would be built.)



Above is Playa Corales, where I snorkelled for the first time -- a bare-bones beach about a twenty minute taxi or moped outside the town. Corals come right up to the shore and then out about a hundred yards and extend for two miles. A round trip is about $20 by cab, or as I mentioned, you can moped. (Roads a little dicey.) There's a guy who'll look after your stuff for a dollar, like a hat check only for belongings, and you can absolutely trust him to make sure your stuff stays safe. If you go by cab, tell the driver how many hours you'll be there and he'll come back to pick you up on time. You can get roast chicken or lobster at a little outdoor grill. Heaven.

And these are twenty-year-old shots with a very old film camera inside the Caves of Bellamar, outside Matanzas, the capital of Matanzas province.

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The story is that the caves were discovered by a Chinese worker in the 1800s when they were building a railroad here. Apparently, he dropped an implement that accidentally fell through a hole in the rocks.



The caves are vast and go all the way out the to the ocean. Some places can make you claustrophobic, but the entrance is vast, deep and majestic. Imagine this as where the Phantom of the Opera would like to hide out.



So... next time, off to the eastern end of the island and my introduction to santería.

CUBA: IMAGINING VARADERO

As mentioned in my last post, Varadero features heavily in my first novel The Phoenix Lottery -- especially the duPont mansion. As an experiment, I'm posting the first chapter here. For photos of the setting you're reading about, check my last post. (Next post, some things to see off the beach. :)

*********

THE REUNION (From THE PHOENIX LOTTERY)

Varadero. December 15, 1958. Two weeks before the revolution triumphs.

Edgar and Kitty, along with four-year-old Junior and private secretary Emily Pristable, have arrived from Havana to celebrate Christmas and welcome in the New Year. But the main purpose of their visit is not relaxation. The couple hopes to use the holiday cheer to mend fences with Kitty’s parents, Henry and Althea Danderville.

Edgar had once been the Dandervilles’ darling. He’d met them at their Caledon estate, claiming himself a comrade of their late lamented son. They brought him to the drawing room where his three-hankie recollection of Joseph’s heroic death in battle earned him both a sherry and a job.

Bright and enterprising, Edgar rose quickly through the ranks. Then, betrayal! Elopment with their daughter Kitty! Imagine! And her a Havergill debutante!

The Dandervilles sought to have the marriage annulled, but Kitty proudly announced herself pregnant. Swallowing hard, Althea contacted her second-cousin, Irénée duPont, the French-born American industrialist. Within the week, he had the young couple out-of-sight-out-of-mind in Cuba, where Edgar was put to work on family interests in Havana. Oh the howls and recrimation, when Kitty’s pregnancy evaporated in the hot Cuban sun. Even the birth of grandson Junior, some years later, failed to melt the northern cold front.

This visit may change all that. Winter is increasingly hard on the Danderville bones, and for once the invitation to Christmas in Cuba has been accepted. Edgar is determined the breach be healed -- no Havana apartment for his in-laws. Rather, leaving nothing to chance, he has arranged for the family to stay at Xanadu, the private retreat of Irénée duPont.

The redoubtable duPont, now a fierce eighty-four, is vacationing in the south of France and is only too happy to give Edgar the keys to his estate. Edgar, after all, has served with distinction for the past eight years: he’s a young man with a future, a ‘comer’ and drinking companion to boot. As for Althea, she and that Danderville fellow of hers raise damn fine horses on their Caledon estate. Definitely our sort.

***

When Irénée duPont arrived at Varadero in 1928, the little fishing village was an outlying section of Cárdenas, a city once renowned as “The Holland of the Americas”. Created out of swamp by French, American and British interests, Cárdenas was the first Cuban city to have electric lights and the second to be serviced by a railroad. While these amenities spoke to its power as a centre for sugar and coffee, its attractions were more than economic. The endless, unspoiled beauty of its Varadero beaches brought tourists by steamer and sailboat as early as 1872. In fact, Varadero was the first beach to see Europeans dressed in lightweight bathing attire. Unfortunately, Cárdenas had unravelled when nationalists razed its plantations and destroyed its rail links at the close of the nineteenth century. From that point it had been in progressive decline, its people mired in poverty, its magnificent architecture ravaged by neglect, and its tourism reduced to a faint sea-breeze.

A French-born American industrialist, duPont was a visionary who saw an opportunity to recapture the lost glory of the area, or at least of its beaches. A philanthropist of the old school, he financed a purification plant which delivered potable water to the area, underwrote the village school which provided free education to the peninsula’s children, and paid to rebuild the local church, the Iglesia Católica de Santa Elvira, when it was decimated by a cyclone in 1933. He also invested over $1.5 million to create his spectacular Xanadu retreat.

Set on 512 hectares of land on the east end of the Varadero peninsula, Xanada features an airstrip, a yacht harbour, a nine-hole golf course and a stunning three-story Spanish colonial-style mansion. The mansion, perched atop the San Bernadino butte, boasts impossibly high ceilings, green tile roof set against white stucco walls and a parade of elegant mahogany-framed windows and balconies. Surpassing these in magnificence is its piece de resistance, an expansive semi-enclosed rooftop bar which commands a breathtaking view of the powdery white sand beach along the peninsula’s north coast, as well as a suggestion of the distant village.

DuPont’s extravagance caught the attention of the world’s politicians, entertainers and mobsters. Varadero began to change. While duPont maintained his Xanadu mansion at a discreet remove from other habitation, he sold off snippets of land at its west border to members of America’s social elite. Soon luxurious pied-a-terres of white stucco and terra cotta tile dotted the shoreline. Film stars like Cary Grant could be seen jogging along the brilliant sand, while gangsters like Al Capone grilled lobster on their marble beach front patios. Offshore, Hemingway indulged his passion for deep-sea fishing, while regattas and a dizzying spin of lavish private parties provided endless recreation for the socially inclined.

Varadero has never looked back. By 1958, it is in full Renaissance. Its name alone conjures Latin rhythms, romance and intrigue. It is Heaven with a twist; Paradise straight up. Small wonder, then, that Edgar and Kitty have chosen it as the fairy tale backdrop for their planned reconciliation with the Dandervilles. But life, in the form of witchcraft and revolution, is about to provide the couple with something quite other than a fairy tale ending.

***

The Dandervilles arrive fresh from a Miami stopover on a private plane arranged by Edgar. This is only the second time they’ve been to Cuba. It’s also the first time they’ve seen grandson Junior since Kitty flew him up to Toronto’s Sick Children’s Hospital for neurological tests when he was still an infant. The atmosphere is electric. Fortunately, the Dandervilles have had a good flight.

“Kitty, Kitty, Kitty. My own, dear Kitty,” says Althea, emerging from a formal embrace on the tarmac. “You ought to have told me the good news immediately, my dear.”

“What good news?” Kitty enquires.

“That you’re in the family way, my precious. That your Junior will soon be having himself a little playmate.”

“ I’m not!” Kitty splutters.

“Oh but you can’t fool me, with those pudgy cheeks and thick waist.”

Kitty bursts into tears. “Mama, you know what the doctors said!”

“Oh my angel, forgive me. However could I be so cruel? Why, then, it must be the happy marriage that has you so nicely fleshed out. As for the problem ‘down there’, please don’t cry. I’m sure with a little prayer the good Lord will see fit to bless you with another wee one. What do doctors know anyway? In the meantime, if I may be permitted a word of advice, mind the sweets. A mother worries.”

With that, Althea sails off to the waiting convertible, her perfect hourglass form encased in a tasteful linen ensemble, her pale skin shaded from the sun by white gloves, an enormous soft-brimmed picture hat and a large floral-print umbrella carried by her doting husband, Henry.

Junior is waiting for them on the front steps of the mansion. Emily has dressed him in a blue blazer, grey wool shorts, knee-high socks and a polka dot bow tie. He is four, but confronted by Granny D. he quickly regresses.

“Aren’t we the proper little man?” Althea enthuses with what she presumes to be grandmotherly affection. She turns to Kitty. “Why he’s cute as a button.” Extending her hand to Junior she says, “Would you like to shake Granny’s hand?”

Junior shakes his head, thumb stuck firmly in mouth.

“But it’s your Granny Danderville,” Kitty encourages. “You remember your Granny Danderville, don’t you?”

Junior shakes his head and hides behind Emily’s skirts. His pants itch. He scratches his bum.

“He’s just making a bit strange,” says Emily, placing a comforting hand on the boy’s shoulder.

“Some things never change,” Althea replies darkly. She remembers well the five-minute encounter with Junior she and Henry had endured at Sick Kids’. The boy had not only refused to look at them, he’d kept his hands clamped over his eyes. They’d tried coaxing a peek. No luck. Not to be denied by a tadpole, Althea had pried the screaming boy’s hands from his face finger by finger. But the stubborn beast, undaunted, had kept his eyes squinched tight shut. Not even a bribe of chocolate could tempt the creature to open them.

“Not to worry,” Althea brightens, “lots of peculiar children grow up to be normal.”

“Would you like to play horsy, Junior?” Henry asks, dropping to all fours.

“Henry, please! That’s what servants are for.”

The company passes through the foyer and enters the main reception area. Tension is instantly relieved with a chorus of appreciative ‘ooo’s and ‘ahhh’s; servants have decorated a sixteen-foot pine tree flown in from New England for the occasion. The boughs bend beneath the weight of crystal icicles, colourful balls of eggshell porcelain, seasonal figurines, and large cones gilded with gold leaf. Atop the tree is a large Christmas angel with a glittering halo and a flowing robe of real ermine studded with jewels.

Junior has been in awe of the angel since he first laid eyes on her. He’s so proud to show her off that he forgets he’s shy. “Look at the angel! Her hat is as wide as Granny’s.”

“It’s called a halo, dear,” Kitty intervenes with a nervous smile.

“I want a halo!”

The adults smile indulgently, but Junior is not to be patronized. He has found his vocation. “When I grow up,” he announces proudly, “I’m going to be a Christmas angel. And I’m going to wear a beautiful dress and have a big halo and long, golden hair, and fly around giving presents to poor people. Everybody will want to kiss me.” He begins to dance around as he imagines the Christmas angel would dance, with his hands high in the air and his long, imaginary hair flowing in the breeze.

“Yes, well,” says Edgar brusquely, “Anyone for rum punch?”

It is at this point that Junior lets out a hair-raising scream, drops to the floor and skitters backwards into a corner like a crab. Terrified, he scrunches into a ball and points at the ceiling. “The Pillow Lady’s in the chandelier!” he screams. Emily runs to comfort him. “Pillow Lady! Pillow Lady!”

“He’s still going on about the Pillow Lady?” Althea demands, her right eyebrow arching off her forehead. “I understood those Toronto head doctors had put an end to that.” Her gaze swoops to the unfortunate Kitty who collapses sobbing at Edgar’s feet. Edgar, in turn, implores Henry with the helpless look of a man who knows he ought to be doing something, but can’t figure out exactly what.

No such indecision affects Sara Pérez, the head maid. She knows she must visit the high priest, the babalawo, immediately. There is witchcraft afoot.

CUBA: THE DUPONT MANSION

When I first went to Varadero, Cuba, in 1990, I was blown away by its twenty kilometres (1.2 miles) of almost unbroken white coral sand beach. At that time the last hotel, the International, was at about the halfway point. Then one took a moped out a dirt path which ended up at a golf course which is part of the old duPont estate. After that, the mansion and more sand. Now hotels extend the full length of the peninsula. However, unlike most major beach destinations, with the exception of the small downtown, only one row of hotels line the ocean. It's the busiest of Cuba's resort towns, but extremely quiet by most standards.

Dupont arrived in 1930 and built his million-and-a-half dollar estate in the middle of the Great Depression. Its elaborately carved railings and supports are all mahogany, and it includes a pipe organ and one of the first private working elevators. He also bought up lots of beach to keep his privacy. This is the view from his balcony looking over his golf course. When he was here, the resort in the distance didn't exist. (There was also a private airport runway.)



Dupont introduced potable water to the area -- unlike some other Caribbean destinations, its tap water is safe to drink. And he provided schools for the area's children. When the local church was destroyed, he rebuilt it:



He was an acquisitive/philanthropist of the old school. When he left at the revolution he asked the authorities not to destroy it: "Let history know I was here." The beaches are now all public and the mansion is a restaurant, although many of the rooms are exactly as he left them. Here's the dining room with organ:



Oh, and here's his bedroom. Actually, his wife's. He slept just off it as he drank a lot and snored:



A lot of my first (adult) novel, The Phoenix Lottery, is set in this mansion. Next post, will be the chapter that introduces Vardero and then some posts on my experiences with santería.

Till then,

Allan

CUBA: ONCE UPON A TIME...

Once upon a time... I wasn't so old. The picture above is of me and Daniel twenty years ago, back when we had hair -- and glasses were kinda big. It's taken at dusk in Varadero outside the restaurant of what was a then-3-Star hotel (HAHAHAHAHA) the Kawama. Before the revolution it was a casino. It's just down the beach from Al Capone's old pad, on a strip where Cary Grant, half of Hollywood, and REAL gangsters -- like The Godfather gangsters -- used to jog, gamble and barbecue. Anyway, the Kawama has subsequently been renovated. (Collapsed in a hurricane and was rebuilt.) I believe it's now a 4 Star. (HAHAHAHAHA)



This (above) was our room on the beach. It was actually a shed at the side of a large house divided into rooms. The wood supports were crawling with termites which you could see if you looked behind where the concrete had broken away. Which might explain why it and the other buildings like it collapsed. Hurricanes aside.

Anyway, Daniel and I are off on Friday for three weeks in Vietnam and Cambodia, so I'm trying to do a series of prescheduled posts... because I don't think I'll have much time for the Internet while sailing on Halong Bay or crawling over the vines and banyan trees at the jungle temples of Angor Wat. To keep this blog alive while I'm gone, I thought I might do a series of posts about Cuba. I've been there over forty times. It's inspired large parts of my first novel (The Phoenix Lottery -- now out of print but which you can buy from me). It's also where I go to unwind and snorkel. And where I had my santerìan purification ritual -- Spanish voodoo, very common in Florida -- which fairie_writer at Livejournal asked me to talk about.

Cuba has changed SO much over the years. Things are far from perfect, but the vitriol you hear on FOX "News" is mainly recycled stuff from the Cold War days. What hasn't changed is the warmth and generosity of the people.

Also, the beauty of its waters.



I'll be talking about the changes, and also including chunks from Phoenix Lottery in sections where the book touches on my real-life experience or describes things I've seen. I'm picturing a kind of writer's-eye view where the real and the imagined come together. Not sure if it'll work, but we'll see.

Oh, here, by the way, is one of the old American cars that were still running in 1990. (I saw them as late as 2000, now hardly ever.) Still, imagine cars lasting fifty years today!



And here is a view of the beach -- and of the duPont mansion, now the Las Americas Restaurante -- where we'll pick up next post.




Cheers,

Allan