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Santiago
de Cuba is the country’s second more
important city and its most Caribbean. The
Santiagueros call it Chago.
Governor Diego Velazquez founds it in 1512.
Santiago was the first capital of Cuba, and
form its port set sail the ships that, with
Hernan Cortes in command, began the conquest
of Mexico.
Santiago is music and rum. It is the first son
and the first bolero; those musical rhythms
that still make people dance in all the
world’s languages.
Santiago is the carnival (July 25) and the
procession moving through its steep streets,
to the sound of the leather drums and the
cowbell, and a wind instrument called the
Chinese trumpet, which invites those, who
listen to move their whole bodies.
It is Chinese in name only, because its origin
is here, in Santiago and Chago, from its
musical and cheerful Black rumba aficionados.
Santiago is to speak singing. It is Criolla
women, who almost dance as they walk along the
sidewalks to the beat of the hustle and bustle
of the city, which reaches its peak of
activity on Enramadas street and Cespedes
park, next to the Cathedral and the Hotel
Casagranda, and extends toward the Morro
castle at the entrance of the bay.
This area has been designated by UNESCO as a
World Heritage site, due to the beauty of its
architecture, which before our very eyes
presents an impressive amphitheatre of
colonial flavor. The typical Santiago-style
homes are arranged around a patio with arches
in the middle, and sport vibrant and cheerful
colors that give life to the steep, narrow and
stone-stepped streets, framed with the red
tiles of their roofs.
Santiago is the Prague Baconao, with the green
of the mountain ranges within arm’s reach
and the blue of the Caribbean at one’s feet.
It is the Caney, with its exquisite and juicy
tropical fruits, the refreshing oriental Pru,
an indispensable drink to alleviate the heat
of the city.
It is people able to prepare a goat Chilindron
in a few minutes, to invite any recently
arrived guest to have lunch or dinner. The Chilindron
isa traditional broth, made with goat meat and
served with Ayacas (sweet corn meat
tamales wrapped in corn leaves) and Tostones,
green bananas fried in boiling fat.
Santiago is a tres, a small, six-string
guitar specific to Cuba, a guitar and some Maracas
to intone the song of love of the traditional
trova that doesn’t age, and that is renewed
in each dawn of serenades. And Santiago is
also visiting the city’s Cabaret Tropicana.
The poet Manuel Navarro:
This is Santiago de Cuba, where nothing should
surprise you. The city alive at any hour of
the day and night, where there is no winter
and the summers are hot, like the warmth of
its people; where each inhabitant knows how to
uncork the bottle of happiness to toast
friendship, that constant embrace of this
hospitable city of Cuba. |
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