Che Guevara

Our last day in Cuba, and it was Che Guevara day, or Ernesto Guevara day as he was known to his mum.

Unfortunately our guide was a little distracted today, and so I really couldn't get a sequential account out of him. It means that my dates and facts are rather rubbery and, as I don't have any internet in Cuba to do a bit of research to unravel it all, I'm happy if you don't quote me on any of this. Maybe our guide's mood was impaired by having been away from his two month old son for a whole week. Maybe his mood was impaired by having to go home to his two month old son. It's not really up to us to guess, but he tried his best to look enthused at taking us through today's sites as quickly as possible.

Basically we headed back from Trinidad in the south east of the country to Havana in the north west, via a town called Santa Clara which was a very significant town in the 1959 revolution, and where Che and his colleagues are now interned.

Che, which is an Argentinian word for 'mate', as in 'how ya goin Che', was born in Argentina, and qualified as a doctor, though he never got to practice much to his father's annoyance. ('When are you going to get a real job Ernesto?') He seems to have met up with Fidel Castro in Mexico as Fidel was forming plans for a guerrilla movement to overthrow the Bautista regime in Cuba.

Somewhere about this time in the chronology, he also fought in Guatemala against the CIA backed government who were displacing peasant farmers in favour of American businesses, probably using the opportunity to hone his guerrilla craft while Fidel planned.

When all was ready, Fidel called Che back to be one of his commanders, and he landed in the south east of the country, gradually recruiting, organising and motivating ordinary Cubans as he continued to move steadily towards the capital with an ever increasing band. When Che and his revolutionaries reached and took the town of Santa Clara only 300km from the capital, Bautista knew that the game was up, and fled the country to Miami where he was denied entry, finally ending up in Uruguay where he was given sanctuary.

Fidel made Che the Minister of Finance, and head of a number of Cuban trade negotiations delegations.

I think that the chronology is that Che next left Cuba to help fight in the guerrilla campaign in the Belgian Congo in Africa. Of all of the various colonial powers, the Belgians were probably the most ruthless and cruel of the lot, so it was probably a good place for him to use his experience training the revolutionaries there.

After about a year he returned to Cuba, then later declared that he wanted to go to Bolivia and assist the people with their struggle 'before he grew old and fat'. Betrayed by local leadership, Che's luck ran out. He was captured and held until the CIA was informed of his capture and decided his fate. A couple of days later, when CIA approval came through, he was executed by the local garrison commander, along with his leadership group, and the bodies hidden.

It wasn't until quite recently that, out of the blue, an ageing Bolivian offered to take authorities to where the bodies has been hidden, and the remains were taken to Santa Clara and placed in the mausoleum that we viewed today.

Che seems to have been a charismatic leader, a hero to the people and a man's man. Going to Bolivia turned him into a cult figure. I would have been a great disappointment to him. My greatest achievement when I went to Bolivia was to buy a mandolin. But I digress.

Our guide was keen to 'hit the road' as he put it, and with the potholes that we subsequently drove through, it was a fairly accurate description. It's quite surreal. In the early 1990's before the collapse of the communist block, the Soviet Union funded a six lane super highway from one end of Cuba to the other. Of course, funds dried up before it was finished, so you have about 350km of six-lane highway that abruptly stops in the middle of nowhere. Given that few people in Cuba can afford cars, we basically had the whole highway to ourselves, weaving all over the place to avoid the potholes.

Arrived back in Havana at the Casa we previously stayed at, just in time for a rather dramatic electrical storm. Enjoyed another wander around the old, historical town, and a final cheap meal on the Obispo.