The Malecón on a saturday is just like a festival, but without the stands, outrageous prices and the high-tech stages. Just a whole lot of people, drinking, making out, singing, playing guitar.
Statistical estimates are: about 25-35% are kissing pre-coitally, 60% chugging rum in raw quantities, and the rest are playing guitar or some drums. The better ones of these spontaneous or pre-existing groups can draw as large a crowd as one can reach without amplification.
Don´t forget the lyrics!
Category: Reggaeton from Cuba.
Artist: Chiki, the street rapper:
"No soy famoso, pero la gente me conoce
y no solo es p`arriba que me goce"
(I´m not famous, but the people know me, and it´s not only the upper parts that they enjoy)
Street style reggaeton is basically a two-line joke told in a rythmic and somewhat lyrical way. A central theme is getting away from Cuba.
"El Chikiii...
ya no vive aqui...
se colchó con una yuuumaaa
y se fue pa fueraaaa..."
(Chiki doesn´t live here anymore. He had sex with a foreign girl, and left.)
Applause, laughter, cheering, dancing.
The statistical estimate up there isn´t wholly scientific. There are also large quantities of people sitting around, chatting, smoking or shouting (Apparently, any discussion in Cuba ends in a shouting duel).
Finding a place to sit and jot down some notes is not at all easy, as the Malecón is really as stuffed as Roskilde on Metallica night. (Varying densities included)
You can walk for about half an hour through the crowd without finding a spot that´s large enough to avoid cuddling your neighbors.
There´s another difference to the common european festival: The age groups represented on the Malecón are far broader: Whole families, middle-aged people, whole droves of 12-year olds, herded by the auntie in charge, the obvious adolescents, fishermen around 85, bearded european tourists, and thankfully just a very small quantity of the usual "jinetera and big fat ugly white guy" combination.
It´s strange that nobody there has the idea to go out and buy beers for everybody (charging of course). One could probably make a fortune there with a mobile bar. Either the fines are pretty hefty, or nobody has the capital to start such a small business. The only things sold to the partying Malecón crowd are sweets and flowers for the wooed.
Unfortunately, this wonderful transcultural expedition had a quite brusque end, and a bad one, too. Neilé twisted her ankle while walking over a sidewalk. So, she´s in the hospital, and me with a connection less. (Wanted to film her practicing. Won´t work that well with a plaster foot, I fear.)
As if I hadn´t bombarded you with enough text already, here´s some more:
The colour scheme of Cubas license plates.
Yellow is for "particular" , "privately owned",
Blue is for any state-owned company
Brown is for a state-run institution
Red: the tourist plates from the local humongously expensive rental service
Black: the foreign diplomats
And finally, the highest class:
White. Someone from the extended family, or good friends, of the commandantes.
Concidentially, Neilé hurt her ankle just behind a white plate saying "HGB026".
Get it? HGB. Hagenberg. Like I said, coincidence.
thaelmann out.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment