He talked very fast but Ledesma was the most relaxed driver I had ever seen In Montreal where I live everyone is always in a rush Our drivers will go through red lights if they think they can get away with it and they cut off other cars for sport Not Ledesma He sang along with the radio one hand on the steering wheel the other hanging out the window tapping the side of the door to the beat It looked like Cuba was frozen in the past The other cars on the road were pretty much like Ledesma’s rusty Russian Ladas or old-time models like the ones you see in black-and-white movies You know with big grills in front like shark’s teeth and pointy fins in the back They were painted bright colors pink and turquoise and lime green The city of Havana was like an old-car museum There was another thing missing I didn’t see any billboards with ads for clothes or the latest album by some rock star And no fast-food restaurants the way there are back home But I did see an enormous poster on the side of a building with the picture of a man looking very heroic He had long hair a beard and a beret not the way a soldier or a president would usually be dressed He was speaking to a giant crowd of people who were all cheering Who’s that guy on the poster I asked my father Che Guevara Sí sí Ledesmas said very enthusiastically from the front El Che Un grande Hero of the Revolution Viva la Revolución Who’s Che Guevara I asked He helped with the Cuban revolution that threw out a dictator named Batista my father said Everyone loves Che Guevara here even if he wasn’t Cuban He came from Argentina Get used to seeing him He’s everywhere
Ledesma turned up the radio La Bamba poured out of the speaker and he sang along with it Para bailar la bamba se necesita una poca de gracia It must have been his favorite song Even with the music and the bouncing backseat my eyes were closing Che Guevara would have to wait
TWO The Hairless Purple Dog I opened my eyes and saw two wrecks A wrecked building and a wrecked car Ledesma’s Lada might have been a little rusty and the seats saggy but it had delivered us to where we would be staying Unfortunately for us Your friend Señora Gloria lives here I asked my mother An old car with no tires or windshield sat in front of a building that must have been ten stories tall Our Lada looked like a Rolls Royce next to the wrecked auto A man was sitting on an upside down garbage can in front of the hood eating Three very dirty mangy-looking cats followed his spoon from his plate of rice and beans to his mouth and back again like they were watching a tennis game
He had spread out his dinner on a newspaper draped over the hood At least the car was still good for something Hola Ledesma called to the man Buen provecho The man raised his spoon as Ledesma got out of the car and walked around a big pile of stones and rocks to the front of the building Then he put his hands around his mouth and shouted into the air Gloria Mi corazón Mi vida My heart My life Was he going to have a heart attack or was he reciting a poem The next minute from a balcony five floors up a woman’s head appeared Even from the ground I could see she was wearing a big smile Ledesma amor she called Then they had some more shouted conversation separated by five stories I did not catch any of it But they must have decided something because Ledesma walked back to the car grabbed the heavy suitcase from the trunk and motioned us to follow I never saw a man that old move so fast We picked up our backpacks and ran after him into the lobby of the building You know that expression when something has seen better days This building had seen better days but I couldn’t tell exactly when those days were The mailboxes were all broken there was a pile of old papers in one corner and some sand in the other Ledesma pointed to a metal grill in the wall It looked like the door to a jail cell Were we going to spend our vacation in prison El elevador he said
