How different from earlier visits. The U.S. flag flies over - well, in - Cuba.
Once anti-American sentiments were easy to spot …
… as when I took the above film photo in Havana. For those who don’t remember or know, U.S. Senator Jesse Helms (an unrepentant North Carolina segregationist) backed a law that tightened embargoes against Cuba.
But, twenty years later, I am back as President Obama’s visit later this month is announced. Admittedly I know before most Cubans, but foreigners, unlike Cubans, can watch the BBC.
And, only a few hours later, Cubans know, too, as coverage of a top official’s announcement is carried on Cuban TV. I take this shot in my hotel room.
’President Obama will be welcomed by the Cuban government and people with the hospitality that characterizes us’, says the Cuban Foreign Ministry’s Josefina Vidal.
Mind you, I suspect many young Cubans are far more eager to cheer the Rolling Stones, whose free concert is announced while I’m here.
Coincidentally, the same day as Mr. Obama’s trip is international news, I spot a rusting - but still thoroughly ominous - Soviet ballistic missile (the large red-tipped weapon) of the type that precipitated the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.
A CIA photo shows similar Soviet missiles in western Cuba.
The 20th Century missiles (the one above is surface-to-air) corrode ‘mid tropical foliage near an 18th Century Spanish fortress in Havana. The CIA knows that the nuclear missile has been deactivated. Well, presumably it does. Presumably it is.
And how could anyone - when nuclear apocalypse loomed - have imagined that a pope and Russian Orthodox patriarch would - with the help of a Castro meet (for the first time in a thousand years) at Havana airport. But they did, two days before I arrive at the same airfield.
Certainly Pope Francis (the poster, which I find in old Havana, was for his visit last year) would have been on familiar ground. Indeed, Cuba is no longer officially an atheist country and Francis was key in brokering improved US-Cuban relations.
Raúl Castro was quoted - gasp! - as saying, 'I read all the speeches of the pope, his commentaries, and if the pope continues this way, I will go back to praying and go back to the church. I’m not joking'.
Other than the American flag, if I had to chose a single photo to sum up changes since I was last here, it would be the one above. Five young Habaneros, in a scene not out of place elsewhere, are absorbed in their mobile phones.
At an historical site, students use mobiles to photograph a friend.
Yes, by Cuban standards, they’re privileged and the country’s phone system - in the provinces - still creaky, but mobiles and limited access to the internet mean near revolutionary - double gasp! - change.
When I last came, any Western advertising dated from before 1959 and took on something - for visitors, at least - of a nostalgic glow. And older Cubans may also have been nostalgic as the store above certainly didn't sell Philips or Hotpoint products.
Now, Cubans with money sip drinks, shaded by Lucky Strike (in a country known for the world’s finest tobacco).
On my early visits, foreigners in Havana, if not unusual, were certainly far fewer.
These days, huge cruise ships disgorge tourists by the thousands.
They crowd into the ubiquitous 1950s cars …
… and eat excellent meals at private restaurants. I have this ‘lamb in red wine’ at Nao, a delightful spot near Havana’s port.
Meals were once always eaten in government-run restaurants and something of an ordeal, although visitors ate far better than Cubans. That’s still mostly the case.
Sweet dreams, my little piggy friends, but you’ll soon be pulled pork on a tourist’s plate.
Taking pity on pigs, in Trinidad I have a superb vegetable curry in what was once a home. Patrons eat ‘mid the furniture. Supposedly cutting edge Toronto restaurant designers, take note.
So, foreigners swarm into Havana and now regularly into the provinces while bemused locals look on.
Even in the provinces, marketing in the world language and tripadvisor make their appearance.
American flags, once unthinkable, are seen …
… and, yes, I know Cuba remains a dictatorship and there are some political prisoners, but can you imagine a North Korean wearing a U.S. flag?
True, you do spot odd, even unsettling, sights, such as this visitor (Cuba says 147,000 arrived from the U.S. last year) proclaiming her allegiance.
This photo joins my ‘summing up changes’ category.
On an early morning stroll, I notice a dozy individual running up the Stars & Stripes. I hope dear American friends will forgive me, but I see the shot’s potential. The man’s act isn’t intentionally disrespectful and, on wandering by a few hours later, the flag is the right way up.
An upside down flag - normally a signal of distress - becomes a useful analogy for American-Cuban relations. Plenty of differences, misunderstandings and mistakes are ahead. One might presume that, with President Obama’s visit, continued rapprochement is inevitable. But, as we’ve seen with this year’s American election, nothing is certain, not least dialogue between Washington and Havana.
