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José Martí...
...looking on.Writing this one up slightly out of order, as there´s still plenty more to come from Cuba, just so I can put up some fidel pics!!
Well, first things first, the beard survives!!! I arrived in the Plaza at around 8.30am. The man himself was already in full swing, ranting against Georgey W, and praising his new bestest friends Hugo and Eva. The huge crowd, of mainly young people dressed in red T-shirts carrying various slogans, were loving it, and waving their little paper flags vigorously at appropriate moments.
Somehow I managed to squeeze myself into an excellent position directly infront of old Fidel, literally standing on the covered cables leading to/from his mic. Except at the particular point where I was, they weren´t actually covered. I resisted the temptation to cut the cables, shout out pro-democracy/capitalism comments, get beaten half to death by an angry mob and arrested, thereby causing an international diplomatic incident and writing my name in history. Just.
It´s amazing how energetic the old fella is, waving his arms around and talking constantly for well over 3 hours. He lost his place a few time, and occasionally appeared to get confused by the (endless)
statistics he was wading through, checking their accuracy with those sat around him (this year we have provided for the people 2 million 3 hundred and 76 thousand 4 hundred and 7 spoons. And seven... is that right?!...).
All the same, pretty impressive. He finished with his traditional "Patria o Muerte" to loud applause, flag waving, and chants of "Fi-del! Fi-del! Fi-del!". Then the national anthem broke out from the speakers, after which the square quickly emptied in a semi-march semi-salsa fest kinda thing. Surely there won´t be many more opportunities to experience something like that?! It all felt very historic and surreal.
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