Se puede Bailar

Monday morning took us to Regla. To visit the church there where most
people go to learn about the Afro-Cuban culture and especially
Santeria, an animistic religion that is practiced by many Cubans and
to see the famous black Madonna holding the white baby Jesus in the
local church.
Michael and I were also excited about visiting this area for a more
personal reason. When I was researching family trees on Ancestry.com,
I found a few Cuban addresses for Michael's great-grandfather listed
on various boat manifests back in the day of the family's frequent
travels back and forth between Cuba and Florida. One of these was from
1915 and was in a town called Regla. As one might imagine, the street
numbers themselves have changed. There is still a Marti Street (pretty
much the main drag) but the numbers start on the water with Number 100
and the address we had was 10. However, the general consensus between
one of our guides and the curator of the little museum was that #10
would have been right there at the "Mother's Park" where women would
take their babies down by the water. So even if we don't know the
specific house, his family must have lived right in this little area.
Very cool.
The rest of the day was filled with professional meetings with the
Ministry of Health and the Tourism folks, but Monday night we ate at
El Tablado de Pancho and then went to enjoy the show by the world
famous Buena Vista Social Club. The Social Club is an organization
dedicated to the preservation of the music from back around the
1940's. Not only is the music old but the band includes several
performers who were also popular at that time. It was not only
entertaining but also inspiring to see these musical artists in their
70's and even 80's singing and dancing and clearly having a wonderful
still enjoying performing. And the flowing mojitos, cuba libres, and
conga lines didn't hurt either. A good time was had by all.