by Allan Stratton | Mar 30, 2010 | Travels, X-tra Stuff
Hi there,Today begins a couple of posts about santería and the purification ritual I had with a santera in the countryside outside Guardalavaca in north-eastern Cuba. This is a statue to Babablú-Ayé, otherwise known as Santo Lazaro or Saint Lazarus. I took it inside...
by Allan Stratton | Mar 26, 2010 | Travels
My first novel, the Phoenix Lottery, uses lots of other references to Varadero, besides the duPont mansion featured in the last two posts. Above is the lobby of the Melia Varadero. (Go back two posts to see the duPont mansion in the distance with a bunch of beach in...
by Allan Stratton | Mar 23, 2010 | Travels, Writing
As mentioned in my last post, Varadero features heavily in my first novel The Phoenix Lottery — especially the duPont mansion. As an experiment, I’m posting the first chapter here. For photos of the setting you’re reading about, check my last post....
by Allan Stratton | Mar 19, 2010 | Travels
When I first went to Varadero, Cuba, in 1990, I was blown away by its twenty kilometres (1.2 miles) of almost unbroken white coral sand beach. At that time the last hotel, the International, was at about the halfway point. Then one took a moped out a dirt path which...
by Allan Stratton | Mar 16, 2010 | Travels
Once upon a time… I wasn’t so old. The picture above is of me and Daniel twenty years ago, back when we had hair — and glasses were kinda big. It’s taken at dusk in Varadero outside the restaurant of what was a then-3-Star hotel (HAHAHAHAHA)...
