For some people who has recently visited Cuba, Havana is the loveliest city in
the world. The capital’s ability to seduce all never fails to astonish every
one, thus they feel it only right to
reflect on its charms.
A defining feature of
Havana’s appeal has been its singular mix of ethnicities, beliefs, traditions,
smells and contrasting colors since November 16, 1519, when - after having had
three different locations - the Villa de San Cristóbal de La Habana was
officially established, at the site where the Plaza de Armas, El Templete and
its revered ceiba tree, are found today.
However, Havana is
currently more popular than ever as confirmed by the third edition of the Seven
Wonder Cities of the World competition, organized by the New7Wonders Foundation
based in Switzerland, in 2014. Havana placed among the top wonder cities of the
world, alongside Beirut (Lebanon), Doha (Qatar), Durban (South Africa), Kuala
Lumpur (Malaysia), La Paz (Bolivia) and Vigan (The Philippines).
It is worth
highlighting that the competition featured 1,200 cities from 220 countries,
while Havana also featured among the 25 most photographed places in the world.
According to the President of New7Wonders, Bernard Weber, the title of Wonder
City of the World will be awarded to the Cuban capital on June 7, as a symbol
of the global diversity of urban society and because everything – tangible or
intangible – included within the 726.75 square kilometer area is Cuba.
THE KEY TO A NEW WORLD
Although there are many
stories about how the city got its name, the most widely accepted is that
relating to the Taíno chief Habaguanex. Boasting an advantageously positioned
port and enviable geographic location, Havana became the most prized of Spain’s
colonies throughout the Americas during the colonial period, and subsequently
became known as the “Key to the New World and Rampart of the West Indies.”
Officially declared a
city on December 20, 1592, by King Philip II of Spain, and following the
relocation of the Spanish government headquarters to the area in 1593, from
Santiago de Cuba, Havana became the island’s capital. The city currently covers
0.7% of the country’s surface area and has, among its extraordinary relics,
over 30 National Monuments.
With its unique natural
environment, Havana will forever be remembered as the “city of architecture,
poetry, rebellions; the conspiring city, of great heroics, and of course, of
culture.”
Diría Xonia Beltrán,
director of Tourism for the popular city destination of Havana, noted that
efforts are underway to further develop varied events and protect cultural,
patrimonial and educational treasures; with work focused on cultural and
scientific activities, which include the majority of the island’s
professionals.
But despite the fact
that one fifth of the island’s total population and 30% of its professionals
live in Havana, and although the city generates over half of the country’s
tourism revenue and Gross Domestic Product, the capital lacks mobility.
A HISTORIC CITY
What is more, as the
city celebrates its 490th anniversary, Havana “is rundown in many places, in
ruins in others, often the victim of neglect, negligent tendencies and lack of
appreciation for the symbolic value of a city that was able to announce a new
order which it has maintained for over half a century with the noble character
of our own people.” Unlike many places throughout the Americas, Havana has
successfully preserved its colonial architectural heritage.
The world famous Old
Havana, which includes the city’s historic center and network of forts declared
World Heritage sites by UNESCO in 1982, is interwoven among former palaces,
mansions, small and large squares, cobblestone streets, churches, saints and
lofty balconies filled with a mixture of people, voices, and flavors. Cuba’s
oldest square, Plaza de Las Armas; that known as Plaza Vieja; Plaza San
Francisco de Asís and Plaza de la Catedral, which were built at the end of the
16th century, have all become important icons of the area.
In addition to the San
Carlos de la Cabaña Fort, which protected Spanish forces after the British navy
captured Havana in 1762, and which still symbolically guards the bay, the city
is home to castles built to ward off corsairs and pirates, while it also boasts
some of the oldest forts in the Americas including the Real Fuerza (1577), San
Salvador de La Punta (1600) and Tres Reyes Magos del Morro (1630).
One hundred and forty
structures dating from the 16th-17th centuries still stand in the historic
center, almost all military or religious buildings; as well as some 200 from
the 18th century, the majority civil infrastructure spaces; and over 450 from
the 19th century, during which urbanization greatly expanded. The city
continued to develop rapidly expanding beyond the perimeters of the defensive
wall constructed to protect it. Almost 100 years later, around 1863, that wall
began to be demolished.
BEYOND THE WALLS
Havana began to grow
rapidly during the first half of the 20th century. The city expanded from east
to west in a rapid process of addition rather than substitution, over less than
six decades. With the triumph of the Revolution the idea was now to focus on
investing in the rest of the country in order to reduce the historic disparity
between the capital and the rest of the island
Pre-1990s migration
figures show that Havana had a sustainable migration rate. However, with the on
set of the Special Period, this trend shot up and the city become an even more
diverse place.
This is the same city
that is home to the stunning Playas del Este beaches; whose Parque
Metropolitano represents the enormous green lung of the capital; which today
still features the first promenade built in the city; as well as Paula street,
along which a young Martí would stroll, and the University of Havana stairway,
where the most radical and authentic revolutionary ideals were formulated;
which among Daiquirís and other alcoholic beverages guards the memory of visits
by Ernest Hemingway to the El Floridita bar and restaurant, and Creole cuisine
and wall scribblings at the La Bodeguita del Medio.
Havana also boasts the
majestic Colon Cemetery and exquisite Hotel Nacional, which has seen important
figures from the arts, culture and politics, parade along its hallways; ancestral
Asian culture brought over by the Chinese from 1847; the grand neo-classical
buildings which surround the Capitolio, the memorial at the Plaza de la
Revolución, or the talented artists who have performed on stages such as that
of the Alicia Alonso Grand Theater of Havana, the National Fine Arts Museum and
Paseo del Prado.
To the west of the city
the streets begin to widen leading to the busy neighborhood of Vedado, then
onto the dazzling Tropicana Cabaret and 5th Avenue, whose elegance has seen it
become a diplomatic and business center, until the Havana Convention Center,
which hosts a wide variety of events.
It was to this Havana
that the rebel soldiers entered in 1959, and where almost half of all visitors
to the island come every year. Havana is quite simply the sui géneris mother of
the social, cultural, economic and political evolution of a country committed
to its people’s wellbeing.
Protected to the north
by a eight kilometer-long sea wall (the
Malecón), the warm and welcoming city, the inspiration for many poems and
songs, greets visitors with the open arms of its Christ, and watched over by
the La Giraldilla weathervane. Havana is the traditional melting pot, as
described by Fernando Ortiz; a city which belongs to its residents and to all
Cubans.
CUBAMIGOS PRIVATE VACATION RENTALS
http://cubamigos.webcindario.com
cubamigos@yahoo.es
GUIDE IN HAVANA( WALKING TOURS IN OLD HAVANA):
Humberto Linares
email: humbercuba@yahoo.es