Gypsykayak_at_aol.com wrote: > And I was raised in Venezuela (I still have family there) where President > Chavez is in bed with Fidel Castro. It is very scary. > > Now..to keep this on topic so Jackie won't have a fit....when I was there a > couple of years ago I looked for kayaking outfitters and couldn't find any. > Since then, I've heard that somebody was able to have some boats shipped out > there. > > Thanks for reminding me...I have to make a trip to Ven. within the next month > or so, maybe I'll see where those boats are kept. Since this discussion started on paddling in Cuba, I would like to return to that. My father was born in Cuba but I never visited the country until 1976-1977 when I worked for an international publishing and consulting company. I went in about a half dozen times with some stays of a few weeks when I organized a meeting for some 80 multinational companies. I did meet Castro several times leading up to that meeting and during it. I don't want to get into the politics but I would like to talk of the paddling possiblities that I can recall now that I look back at it. Plus tell a few Castro stories (if Jackie doesn't mind...paddle talk is slow right now for the most part anyway). First the paddling. There are all sorts of possibilities starting with good ole urban paddling right in Habana. The city faces the sea with a long stretch of sea wall and also has a harbor. I still have a foto up in my home taken from the hotel showing sets of waves coming in and hitting the seawall. Elsewhere, in any direction, along the coast the waters look interesting with coves, beaches, etc. and plenty of towns and villages. That is the north shore. On the south shore you have some great marshes albeit populated by aligators especially the area facing the Bay of Pigs. The attack by the exiles were planned for that area precisely because the marshes and narrow corridors down to the peninsula where they came ashore would slow down the Castro military defensive forces and give the exiles time to declare a free state. It didn't happen that way. On the one narrow road down to where the exiles were defeated is a museum with a knocked out Sherman tank or two and other captured stuff. Across the road is a humble Arc of Triumph with the statement running across it "Here Imperialism Was Stopped." Now the Castro stories. My first interview with him was with my company's boss, Orville Freeman, who had been Governor of Minnesota and Secretary of Agriculture under Kennedy and Johnson (and one of the names in play for the VP spot under Kennedy). Orville and I had been having a big lunch with plenty of daiquiris and mojitos when suddenly Castro aides rushed in, said we could meet Castro right then and commandeered some cabs to get us to the executive offices. I was in agony because the meeting took some 3 plus hours and I had to pee badly. But the conversations were fascinating between these two old political pros. They compared grass roots political movements in Minnesota under the farmers movement and Castro's own attempt to run for office when Bautista staged his coup d'etat. Castro went on for hours. I felt my job was to watch that the translators were being accurate. I listened carefully to both the Spanish and English to make certain my boss was understood and that he was hearing exactly what Castro was saying. At one point, the tired translator made a slight mistake in translating what Castro had just said. I started to butt in but before I could get beyond a raised hand and a word out of my mouth, Castro corrected the translator! He too was listening to every word! During the chit chat before we got down to the heavier talk, I asked Castro about his playing baseball. He replied he no longer did preferring to bowl! I replied that he had made a liar out of me with my then 10 year old son to whom I had said that the leader of Cuba regularly played ball. He took quiet note of that. When I left the country after that visit, one of his aides came rushing up to me with a baseball glove to give to Jason. It was an awful glove of a leather that could never take a good pocket but it was certainly a unique souvenir. Later I returned to Cuba for the big week long meeting for our clients. My wife had worked on the captions a book on the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown published by McGraw-Hill. Jason, like most American kids, was so deep into all of it that he lent quite a hand to Donna in her work. Just before going to Cuba, we got an advance copy of the book for Jason to give to Castro. The Cubans knew of all this through bugging us and what we had told them. When Castro came to the real big meeting of all the executives, I greeted him at the steps of the hotel. He asked "donde 'ta el hijo?" Where's your son? He was out to lunch with the wives of the executives. I had hoped that Jason would be back before the session but on the chance that he might not, I left the book up in our room with a note to write something in it for presenting the book to Castro. Jason got back, rushed up to the room, wrote something and speeded back to the meeting room. Castro was in his full glory giving a three hour answer to someone's question. He himself called a coffee break in the middle of it the session. At that point, Jason came running up, darting in between Castro's bodyguards and aides (Jason is a well trained artful dodger from living in Manhattan and weaving through crowds.) He handed the book to Castro. Castro opens it up and looks at the dedication Jason had written" "To my buddy, Fidel" Jason Castro turned around to us and asked "Que quiere decir Buuudddy?" I and several others replied "gran amigo, amistad, etc." He then proceeded to give Jason a tap on the head and swallow my son in the biggest bear-hug abrazo I have ever seen. A postscript. A few months later Barbara Walters had her famous interview with him in Cuba. At one point, her overvoice refers to a book about the Baseball Hall of Fame "obviously placed there for our benefit." No, Barbara, he really liked it!!! I wonder what she would have thought if she had seen a 10-year old American boy's scribbled words. Probably about the same reaction that a contingent of Houston Astro players visiting Cuba at the time felt when they got out of the team bus for a ball tossaround with the Cuban National team. There at the bus doorstep was this 10-year old American kid with a NY Yankee hat, Met's jacket and an autograph book! Apologies for the length and digression in all this. saludos, ralph -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Ralph Diaz . . . Folding Kayaker newsletter PO Box 0754, New York, NY 10024 Tel: 212-724-5069; E-mail: rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com "Where's your sea kayak?"----"It's in the bag." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Thu Jan 11 2001 - 11:38:17 PST
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.4.0 : Thu Aug 21 2025 - 16:30:36 PDT