La Bodeguita

We were standing in Empedrado Street in Havana. Through an open door we could see some free seats at the bar. The bar was originally called Casa Martínez, but since it was the bar in the middle of the street quarter, it came to be called Bodeguita del Medio by the locals.

We ordered mojitos. While I was sitting there just watching the people slowly moving out on the street and enjoying the buzzing atmosphere in the bar, I spotted a framed napkin above the bar. It looked like someone had spilled a lot of red wine on it despite the text being “My mojito in La Bodeguita, My daiquiri in El Floridita”. It was signed Ernest Hemingway. Perhaps it was right here on this chair that Hemingway sat and wrote about the old fisherman Santiago, the young boy, and the great sea.

In the story everyone in the village had lost faith that the old fisherman could catch fish anymore, everyone except the young boy. Many had also lost faith in Hemingway at this time. It had been more than ten years since For Whom the Bell Tolls, and although he had written a novel a few years ago, it seemed as if his glory days were over.

However, it turned out that there was more ink left in the old author after all. Rumours that his writing days were over were put to shame by The Old Man and the Sea. Hemingway actually received the Nobel Prize in Literature for this book in 1954.

The Old Man and the Sea was supposed to be the first in a series of books by Hemingway about the sea but became the author’s last novel.

While I sat there stamping the mint leaves in my glass with the straw and philosophising about Hemingway and his mojitos, I became aware of a couple of loud Americans who felt there was too little rum in the mojito they had been served. The bartender looked a bit insulted at them, and then at the drinks on the bar. Without saying a word, he grabbed a rum bottle in each hand and poured into the drinks until the rum ran all over the bar counter. The Americans were completely taken aback, grabbed their drinks and disappeared looking ashamed. I smiled about the incident with the inexperienced tourists. Suddenly I became aware that the bartender was now staring at me. He resolutely grabbed the straw from my drink, threw it over his shoulder while shouting ¡la bebida era perfecta cuando la obtuviste!

Despite three weeks in Havana, I was also a tourist. And the bartender was absolutely right; my mojito was perfect when I got it. Every time actually.