In what could be interpreted as neocolonial indifference and/or mindless “exotic” chic, the heir to a wine, banking and international food distribution fortune and his fashionista partner chose to get married por todo lo alto in Havana this past weekend. This involved a slew of foreign guests, who stayed at the deluxe Gran Hotel Manzana Kempinski. They included members of the Spanish nobility along with assorted other “beautiful people” of the jet set.
For the preboda (pre-wedding), guests were picked up at the hotel by vintage convertibles of different colors and taken to the famous Cabaret Tropicana, apparently hired for the occasion, for a big party including a show by the flashy Tropicana dancers. The groom-to-be, of course, wore a guayabera. No doubt a great time was had by all.
The wedding took place at the Cathedral of Havana, with formal dress for men and the bride in a designer gown by Lorenzo Caprile, a top name in Spain. This was followed by a dinner with fancy catering and another big party, with handmade Cuban cigars distributed to guests. As one report put it, this was a wedding in which no ha faltado nada. Needless to say, the whole affair must have cost a mighty pretty penny, and you all know into whose coffers the money went. This kind of thing is the stuff of wet dreams for the military oligarchy which controls Cuba.
This has happened before, as reported here, but Cuba is in considerably worse shape now than before the pandemic, with abysmal living conditions for ordinary people along with ramped-up oppression by a totalitarian dictatorship which fears a popular uprising–especially after the nationwide 11J protests. Younger Cubans see no future on the island and are desperate to leave it, which has resulted in a massive ongoing exodus. Havana, along with the rest of the country, is literally falling apart, despite the Potemkin village pockets designed for tourists.
So, what were rich privileged Spaniards, who could have held this wedding anywhere, thinking? Or were they? As the novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, the rich are different from you and me, which includes living in an alternate reality. Plus, these are Spanish rich people, and we’re talking about the former jewel in Spain’s crown (ruined though it is), which Spain never got over losing and still regards with an indecent, not to say perverse, longing.
Really, these people need to be put through serious sensitivity training, because apparently no tienen ni puta idea. Unless, of course, they do know what they’re doing but don’t care, as if Cuba were still there for the benefit of Spain.
This sort of wedding was once common in Havana among Cuba’s upper class. That ended long ago, but it’s still welcome and encouraged if it brings in hard foreign currency. It makes no difference how privileged, classist and exclusive the thing is, even if the guest list includes the likes of the marqueses de Griñón and the marqueses de Cubas (which it did). The economics could hardly be clearer, at least to people who care to see it. But, there are people who choose to “overlook” that or willfully ignore it. Ka-ching!
Obviously, “doing Cuba” remains fashionably cool—this upscale Spanish crowd wouldn’t be caught dead doing anything that wasn’t. I wouldn’t be especially surprised if they all voted socialist, and you’d better believe none of them votes for the “ultra-right wing” VOX party in Spain, certainly not openly.
It may be of some relevance that one of the groom’s business concerns has an office in Havana. He also happens to be of apparently gallego stock, like a certain dead Cuban dictator.
I suppose we must allow for the fact that, apart from exceptional cases, non-Cubans are never going to feel our pain, even if there are significant historical ties like those between Cuba and Spain. But, indifference is one thing and being actively part of the problem is another. I stopped expecting non-Cubans to care and help Cuba long ago, but I cannot and will not accept any sort of complicity with or enabling of Castro, Inc.
The Spaniards in question here apparently went “Oh, let’s do a big, expensive wedding in Cuba” as if it were the same as “Oh, let’s go to Paris for the weekend.” It is NOT the same. The implications are vastly different. How difficult is that to figure out? What part of materially assisting evil do they not understand?
What gets me the most is how blatant the regime is in its hypocrisy. If the so-called revolution was according to the officialdom fought because folks like these aristocrats lived so well while the masses lived so wretchedly, then why allow such a wedding to take place in Cuba now that the contrast between the haves and have-nots is so much more obvious? This is a rhetorical question of course, because we know the answer. The regime only cares about money, and it is so used to enablers in the MSM backing them that it doesn’t care how bad the optics are and the optics are really bad.
The regime is also totally shameless. It’s always been a fraud, but it’s “fooled” plenty of people, especially foreigners. By now, with Cuba becoming unsustainably dysfunctional, it cannot afford to worry about optics when it comes to money, which it MUST get to finance the repressive apparatus that keeps it in power and its extensive international PR/influence network.
The optics are also bad for the Spanish “beautiful people,” but they’re mainly concerned about how they look to each other, and they couldn’t care less how they look to “those people.” Cuba to them is like a movie set or a video background. Their lives are not about reality but about image.
Yes, the contrasts cannot be more obvious. So many lessons to be learned. The most obvious for me is that Fidel was always a monarch. The absolute ruler of the kingdom of Cuba. All Cubans are allowed to live to serve the king. The only change now is that the current king is not popular with the majority of his people.
Spanish nobility admire Cuba’s kings. They are like the kings of old. The only thing unique about these modern day Cuban kings is that they are godless and insane. Installed to power and maintained in power not by the will of God but by the use of violence, murder, torture, lies and thief. All tools of Lucifer.