SHINING THROUGH DIRT

This is the view from my new room.

I spend the morning lying on my bed with thoughts churning around in my head. My room feels like a hospital ward, with harsh light and beds covered in white sheets. Everything is white in this room, except the red fabric flowers on the mantle.

Now that the police are monitoring me, I'm not exactly sure what to do next. Also, judging by my foetal position, I think I might be a bit traumatised.

I don't dare to go interviewing people now, and I have no idea how I'm going to leave with my material. I have to make backup copies, but how?

The internet rooms in hotels are monitored and cost up to $15 an hour. I have about nine hours of material. Also, I have to download an editing program and hook up my mini-disc recorder in order to transfer everything in real time, before exporting MP3s to memory stick. And I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure this whole process might not go unnoticed.

I go and email, and wander the streets for a while in search of food. Cuba regularly fumigates all its buildings, it's choking. I'm starting to develop a conspiracy theory about what's in the billowing smoke, but really, conspiracy theories are so 1980s.



When I get home, J has rung. So I call her back and explain the situation with I a slight wobble in my voice when I get to the bit about "..and I'm not really coping".

"Use my laptop," she says. Oh my God, I'd forgotten she has one here.. this is great news. I go over and we sit talking about where to put the memory stick. I suggest my tampon idea, but she points out that I won't get through the metal detector. Thank Christ I ran it by her, that could have been really embarrassing.

The conditioner bottle seems the best idea, because everything is X-rayed on mass in the cargo luggage, so it's less likely to be detected.

I spend six hours transferring material, J goes to a BBQ. At 11pm, I call it a night and pack my things. I don't have the patience to try to flag a taxi tonight, but I have to walk some dark streets to get home, so I put the memory stick in my bra and set off.

I am walking down the median strip where the street lights are the strongest, when
I remember something Michel said, "Blah blah blah.. and you've got a good walk". Since when was your walk another factor in the equation as to whether you're sexy?


More to the point, I'm less likely to get mugged if I look like a Cuban, and you can always pick a tourist because they walk without the grace of locals. We walk as if it's a means to an end, they walk as if it's the end in itself.

So in the choking night air, I work on my walk. I notice that my head is down and I'm striding quickly so I slow my feet and sway my hips. Ironically, a more sexy walk should help abate the relentless whistles and hisses of appreciation that seem to be part of parcel of being a gringa. Then I see the street sweeper.

Last week I interviewed a street cleaner, and when he mentioned his job I assumed he went around with a broom made out of sticks like the street sweepers in Mexico. But this is a big, industrial truck with spinning bristles and water. And I need to get the sound for my story on the street sweeper.

An internal battle ensues.
"I have to get this sound."
"But I'd have to hook up my mini-disc and record in public. Not tonight, I'll do it some other time"
"But this is your only chance."
"No it's not, I'll go in the morning and find one."
" Find one? How? You know you're not going in search of a street sweeper in the morning. Besides, it's just THERE."
"But I'm soooooo tired. I actually just can't be bothered. I'll get the sound in Mexico."
"No. You won't."

Fuck it.

Despite myself, I find my hands hooking up the mic and holding it out of the bag. By now the street sweeper is far behind me, all that time I was having an internal chat, it was driving in the opposite direction.

So, I run. My legs don't want to move and my thongs flap about. I can feel the sweat on my face, mixing with the grime of a day in this pollution. My mascara has ventured from my eyelashes to the skin under my eyes. I am wearing the green dress that someone mistook for a uniform last week, when they asked me a question in the internet room.

I'm following the truck with my mic when it stops. Shit, he's seen me. I keep walking and he gets out and removes a plank of wood from the path of the truck. This gives me enough time to get ahead and record the sound perfectly.

I retrace my steps, back along the median strip.

I hear a hiss. Ignore. Hiss. Ignore. Hisssssss. I look sideways with fury, and see a young man walking across the road, carrying a notebook and pen. Great, just what I need.

Then I notice he's in civilian clothing, with one of those bags you buy in Guatemala or Ecuador. He gets to the median strip and says something, "What?"

"I need to show you what I'm writing," he says.

Oh no, maybe he's an informant. Hence, the secrecy. Am I getting paranoid.

In short, yes.

I watch as he writes, his pen moving unhurriedly across the paper. Finally he rips it off, and hands it to me. It's a poem.

Due to extenuating circumstances:

a) it's dark
b) his handwriting is illegible
c) the words are unfamiliar

I can't read it, but I suspect going through it word by word may shatter the moment. So, I assume it's a nice poem, and act accordingly. "Oh, thankyou," I say, shakily. He explains that he has had to follow me back and forth with all my changes in direction, but he seems to be coming my way so as he walks me home I get him to tell me about his life.

He's a Jewish computer programmer who's qualified in sports science but there's no work in that so he works at the Jewish centre. He's one of the few Cubans who can leave, because there's some setup with Israel that all the Jews can go back. He has a high-pitched nervous laugh that doesn't match his beautiful face, and he seems very shy.

We reach my place and I brace myself for the usual, "When will I see you again, what's your phone number, I invite you for a softdrink", but it doesn't come. He kisses my cheek and I worry that he can smell the day of trauma in the sweat and grime on me. I wonder if seeing me up close has shattered whatever the hell inspired his poetry.

My house mother translates the poem into Spanish I can understand:

You pass,
You walk the world
leaving a sensation of sweetness

Without memory
And leave in your wake
Rays of the dawn

What, I wonder, about me running down the street could inspire this? In sweat and grime, fatigue and fear. Matted hair (no water this morning) and smudged mascara.

Maybe because at the moment, when you're in flight running towards your goal with gritted teeth against all your urges to stop... maybe that's when you shine.

But who knows, maybe he writes that poem five times a day.