"What I like about you... Is you" said the deep, solemn voice of a good looking highly-educated mulatto to a modest, thirtyish señorita, as they waited to be served lunch in a paladar, a new style of a little self-run home-cooking restaurants which are spreading throughout Havana.
I heard the phrase with Pablo Cabado one very hot mid-day, as we rested on a photographing walk, lunching in the "Hurón Azul", a paladar in the Central Havana.
The "Hurón Azul" (Blue Ferret) is painted blue all over. A turquoise/Caribbean sea blue softened by some worn white vaporous clouds formed in relief by the saltpetre in the damp patches. We are received by the man of the house in the role of head-waiter. He wears a green fluo guayabera summer shirt perfectly matching the turquoise. A welcoming present.
Though we are the only guests (not a soul in the street, and if someone else arrived it would be absolutely clear who arrived first), the man insists on adding my name to a list of reservations. To avoid ambiguity or spoiling the atmosphere, I take charge and solemnly say: "López".
I never bothered to find out what magic realism was. But it must have been that. When everyone involved in a situation is aware of participating in an absurd act but is too respectful to let on, to not make it evident. Like a game for grownups.
I also ask myself why they called it The Blue Ferret. Isn't the ferret a kind of weasel inhabiting the prairies of Canada or the Russian steppe? Being a block from the jetty, on an island, wouldn't it be more logical to have called it The Blue Sardine or The Blue Shark?
Inside everything is small. A little living room done up like a lounge with fifties-style armchairs in a green imitation leather, a worn table with a small stuffed gator, a magazine rack with old magazines, a photo of El Che sipping mate, family photographs, a Celia Cruz LP cover, the Havana Club rum poster and little glass shelves with empty beer cans from different countries, some rare and distant, place like decorative collectors items.
When our turn arrives (when the first table is free), the man leads us into the eating areas, which are divided off by a little curtain. Then you have a clear idea of what the spaces were before: the children's room, the master bedroom, the family bathroom converted into a public one...
You enter a bit awkwardly, with the sense of invading the most private areas of someone else's home. Three or four little tables placed unusually close together. I am tempted to reflect one the idea of privacy in Cuba, but perhaps I'd better have a beer instead. No point in talking for the sake of talking...
The air conditioning can't cope, and alternates silences imposed by the thermostat with startups which sound like a jet taking off. After a long while the food arrives: fried plantains, manioc, rice with beans, and a grilled salmon done to perfection.
There is no doubt about the place's magic. The elements lend strength and beauty to one another: the opening phrase, the outmoded tenderness of the Cuban couple (by now they're having their dessert and holding hands); the serious, professional way this family are learning their new job as restaurateurs; the fresh, benevolent, almost adolescent smile of Camilo Cienfuegos keeping us company and watching over us from his portrait in oils.
The señora changes the music and brings another beer. "Mami, don't look me in the eye -the singer says- Your look kills me, thrills me, drives me crazy… Oh what consternation…! If your look could kill I would be in heaven".
My Pampas heart records but cannot understand how anyone can have so much passion.
Local color and feel. The stereotype of the stereotype as a way of getting to the very essence of the problem. That's a road I like to follow. Like a midfield player who comes up from the South to the Caribbean with the dream of reaching the goal area swapping passes and exchanging short balls with Diego and "El Pibe" Valderrama.
With the juego bonito and joy of Brazil.
I feel embarrassed again. Fearing how such phrases may sound, so full of adjectives, so baroque, so overcharged.
What will happen when they contrast with the photographs?
Never mind. Upwards and onwards with the ideals of the Saint and the Warrior...!
If we must dance, let's dance. Or, if not, we can talk of the invisible desires, latent, powerful, hidden behind an incomplete collection of rare beer cans.
Marcos López