Charles Dickens and Cuban cigars

I had learnt from previous experience that it was better to pay for one dedicated 'helper', than to have to continually fend off all the others when in a strange town of a poor country, and when Manuel introduced himself to us on the street and suggested a personal tour of his home town, we immediately accepted his offer.

I think it would be extremely difficult to find someone who is hostile to strangers - or just simply out for every penny they can get - in Havana, and Manuel was just as keen to learn as much about the outside world from us as he was to earn a few dollars to spend on his extremely young and beautiful fiance.

Sitting in a little run-down cafe, he would translate the list of how many other countries we had visited into Spanish for her, and they both stared at us in wonder. It is also extremely difficult to dispel any image of yourself as a wealthy, international jet-setter in Havana too.

I think things may have become a little more relaxed these days, but when we were in Cuba, the locals were not supposed to have any contact with foreigners at all. This meant that, as we walked about the humid city streets, Manuel would have to stay about 20 paces ahead of us, and if he was - as he was on a couple of occasions - stopped by the police on suspicion of illegal guiding, we would walk past as if we had never seen him before, then wait around the corner for his interrogation to be over.

"Let's get this straight", I said to Manuel at our first outing, "I don't want to buy any cigars. OK?"

"Sure. No problem."

Of course, within a couple of hours, I was wondering why he was ushering me into an incredibly dark and smoky bar, leaving H.I. on the outside and introducing me to a couple of his older friends in the gloom. There was no way that he could not buckle to peer pressure and have at least one half-hearted attempt to get a few dollars for his mates in the neighborhood, and pretty soon I was being shown box upon box of famous-name cigars, varying from panetella-size to the sort of monsters seen hanging from the mouths of maniacal Voodoo priestesses.

You are warned not to buy inferior, fake branded cigars from street vendors in Havana, but in truth, there is - apart from the price - no difference between the ones they sell and the ones sold in the government controlled factory outlets. They are all made by the same people using the same tobacco, and the real, insignificant difference is that the finished article is only teamed up with a label once it has - like the labels - been smuggled out of the factory. Also, if you have ever wanted to believe the myth that the larger of the cigars are rolled up and down the thighs of perspiring young women in airless factories, don't. The reality is about as far from the truth as you can get.

Many state cigar factories employed a person who would sit at a high chair, reading Charles Dickens novels (translated into Spanish) to the workers below, as they carried out the highly skilled and dextrous work of rolling the damp leaves in leather and wood. Even at work, they were being entertained and educated about the dangers of poverty due to the excesses of capitalism - albeit in Victorian England, 150 years too late.

After the fifth box was tried out on me, I politely said, "Listen, I don't smoke cigars. Why would I want to buy any?"

They immediately became genuinely apologetic to a man (and there were about 6 of them), explaining that it was their duty to at least try to earn a few dollars for their families, and I bought them all a drink.

Back out in the sunshine, Manuel took us to the 'Capitol' building, then left having arranged to take us to a nightclub that evening. Under the dome of this church-like structure (copied from a similar one in Washington DC), a 'real diamond' marks the 'very centre' of the island of Cuba - I doubted the authenticity of both claims. More interesting to me were the bullet-holes that riddled the marble staircase that lead to rooms containing glass cabinets which - in turn - contained various, slightly pathetic mementoes of the struggle for Cuba Libre.

One particular exhibit was peculiarly pathetic - a plastic knife, fork and spoon set belonging to one of the famous fighters of the revolution, which now had pride of place in the main cabinet of the main room. Like I say, there is something very child-like about Cubans, nomatter what their rank in an equal society.

Later, in the Museum of the Revolution, H.I. and I had the extremely odd experience of standing right next to the stretcher upon which Che Guevara breathed his last, and was paraded in front of the world press on by the Bolivian Army, in order to prove that he had - indeed -been killed. We actually recognised it from the photos, and could have - if we had wished to - reached out to touch the dark stains in the canvas from his bullet-riddled legs.

The club which Manuel took us that evening was an overtly Gay one, and since homosexuality was an imprisonable offence in Cuba, I wondered how they managed to keep going under the noses of the olive-clad police force. Our waiter for the night was an extremely camp, white man of about 35 years of age. When he had gone away, leaving drinks on our table, Manuel whispered to me, "He is gay!"

"I know", I whispered back.