The orchestra is called The Camerata Romeu, formed in 1993 and conducted by Zenaida Romeu. They are quite famous, having toured internationally including in California. Their CDs are available on Amazon. I won't try for superlatives here; just listen.
We visited a tribe in rural Senegal where we visited a local school. The children welcomed us with a song.
A woman in a village near Inle Lake, Burma, shows how she strips silk from the stalks of lotus flowers, which another woman then uses a mechanical loom to make it into silk fabric.
We enjoyed lunch in Bagan, Burma, and we're entertained by the locals. I loved the little kid.
We ventured by boat deep into the jungle in Brunei to visit the indigenous Iban people. They performed a song and dance for us. I'm sorry the young dancers are so backlit. The boy and girl are truly gorgeous.
Elders from the Huli Wigmen clan performed a ceremonial dance for us, the sort that they would do before going into battle with a neighboring clan.
This first one is in Tahiti. At our last dinner there a troupe of Tahitians did a traditional cultural dance for us. Note first how BIG these people are (even the women). This is especially interesting because Polynesians are descended from Melanesians, a branch of which populated New Guinea, and when you see the Huli Wigmen they are quite short and small. I know who'd be favored in any sporting event.
Just arrived home safe and sound, midnight Saturday. Amazing trip, but it's always good to be back in your own bed!
Despite my bitching so far, we have had a nice time in Havana. The theme of this US State Department-sanctioned "People to People" visit (i.e. cultural exchange) is "the arts," and we enjoyed listening to a wonderful all-women orchestra play beautiful classical music (and got their CD too).
We visited the National Art Museum and were led on a tour by their director, and it was really fantastic (both the museum and the director). Unfortunately one is not allowed to take photos inside, but there were wonderful examples of 18th century colonial paintings, portraits, modern and post-modern art plus some fascinating pop-art on La Revolucion.
From there we visited the home-and-studio of Jose Fuster, considered the Picasso of Cuba. His home looks like Disneyland! Every square inch of the place is covered in ceramic tile painted by Fuster, and he has in fact tiled fences and homes of others in his neighborhood. Truly surreal.
That said, Fuster (above) is a fascinating person and his canvas paintings are fantastic. Debb bought one to bring back for our house.
We're staying two nights at a hotel right on their Central Park. It has 3 elevators but only one works. It has Internet but it doesn't work. At times the power in the rooms shuts off, but then comes back on a minute later (thank goodness). Our first night here our group went to dinner at a restaurant and were enjoying cocktails on the rooftop when the power went out. And stayed out. We ate dinner inside by candlelight plus a huge floodlamp being powered by a generator. Like I said, the infrastructure seems to never have been maintained.
Just a note to say that I'm not sure if we'll have Internet access in Cuba. We'll leave there Saturday morning and should be back home that night. So you may not see the final posts until then. Stay tuned!
We had a lovely evening sailing on the Cartegena Bay on a pirate ship accompanied by a fabulous band! The weather was warm, there was a lovely breeze, and the music was fabulous. A nice ending to a really good day.
First time for us in South America, so obviously we can't generalize from one day in Cartagena. But Debb said she'd like to come back. To a former narco country ... Go figure.
Anyway, here's the by now-obligatory view from the hotel ... the very nice Hotel Santa Clara in Old Town. New hotel built inside the shell of an old monastery. A little odd, but they pull it off. If we weren't kept so busy I'd like to just lounge by the pool -- it's quite hot & humid here.
Old Town has narrow streets with quite beautiful apartments painted in bright pastels with balconies overflowing with bougainvillea. Quite lovely.
It is also infested with locals selling hats, t-shirts, silver (?) jewelry, etc. but not nearly as persistent (and annoying) as those in Bagan, Burma.
We left the hotel by horse-drawn carriage for a quick tour of Old Town, and then visited several museums and historical places.
The central square, with a statue of Simon Bolivar ...
... and thousands of pigeons! Again, very reminiscent of San Juan!
A museum dedicated to the Spanish Inquisition, with several items of torture on display. Ouch!!
A curious iguana crawled out to meet our group. He wasn't shy.
We left Old Town and hiked up into historic Fort San Felipe, from which locals defended Cartegena from Pirates in the 17th and 18th centuries. The fort is full of claustrophobia-inducing tunnels!
Back resting at the hotel this afternoon before an evening boat ride and dinner. Then off tomorrow to Cuba!
Yesterday we flew from Dakar, Senegal to Cartegena, Colombia. I think the actual travel time was about ten hours, but we went through five time zones so it made for a long day. The good news is we're back in the Western Hemisphere and are in the Eastern Time Zone! The pic above isn't much, but it illustrates that this city is on the Caribbean Sea and reminds me a bit of San Juan: high rises along the water but also an Old Town (the city dates to 1530) in which our hotel is located and which we will tour today. Debb is *still* suffering from her head cold but is determined to see South America.
So nice to see the Atlantic Ocean finally! We arrived last night and checked in to our Radisson hotel on the ocean. Breaks our string of consecutive nights in a Four Seasons at five <sigh>, but ah well.....
We spend the day at a rural village well outside Dakar, about which more in a moment, but first we enjoy (!) a two-hour ride through the streets of Dakar. Crazy stuff, man. We're a caravan of 23 Toyota Land Rovers driving 70mph on neighborhood streets and boulevards led by a police escort with sirens going and everything. The locals must be wondering who we are. And yet without the escort we would never have made it to the village. I'm surprised we didn't kill any pedestrians or rear-end the Land Rover in front of us. That said, the driver was very competent and friendly. He only spoke French, and neither of my two fellow passengers did, so I got to practice my French for several hours today, which I enjoyed immensely. (Debb is sick with a bad cold so she stayed behind at the hotel today, attended to by our travel physician.)
At the village we are greeted by ladies in very colorful garb singing and shaking bowls off of which hang little bells.
We meet Molly, who founded an NGO called Tostan which over 38 years has grown to work in 8 African countries on literacy, human rights, health and sanitation, and importantly, eradicating the practice of female genital cutting. The imam seated to her right above was instrumental in beginning these programs many years ago and has personally visited 347 other tribes in Senegal to educate their people about the dangers and immorality of FGC, as they call it.
Even though this is a Muslim community, it is night-and-day different from Saudi Arabia. Compare the ladies' garb with the black abayas we saw in Arabia.
And the children are adorable, as they are everywhere around the world.
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