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Romany
people in Havana
BY RAFAEL LAM—Special
for Granma International—
ROMANY gypsies disembarked in Cuba, Brazil and Latin
America, doubtless alongside the first Spanish and
Portuguese colonizers in the conquistadores’
caravels, according to Brazilian Professor Atico
Vilas-Boas. Cuban life is also permeated by that
legendary culture.
With
their dark skin and strange customs, they always
aroused curiosity. They are also called tsiganes,
yeniches, zingaros, and they have been
the victims of misunderstandings, prejudice and
persecution; however they have kept up a resistance
and tenacity in terms of preserving their character
and exotic authenticity.
People associate them with nomadism, caravans,
horses, tents, caves, caverns or huts. Carts,
covered traps or wagons. Neighborhoods, streets or
rural areas.
Their trades include wickerwork, bullfighting, tin
working, gold leaf jewelry and fortune telling. And
music with groups of guitars, vocal expressions of
their sorrows and an arrogance that left them
marginalized transformed into a lament that is a
work of art via a prodigious and millenary
Andalusian tradition, one of the most beautiful on
earth, according to Spanish author Félix Grande.
It
is a fact that many of these Cuban and Latin
American popular musical traditions, was born in
that arrabalero (poor areas of the city)
world, humble and despised by the aristocracy. Let’s
remember the tango, samba, meringue, mariachis,
calypso, bomba, porro, joropo,
son, bolero, rumba, guaracha, conga and
others.
The
origin of the Gypsies was a mystery during
centuries, specialists today have no doubts that
they originated in India, around the year 1,000,
proved through anthropological, medical,
ethnological and linguistic studies.
Gypsies seem to have arrived in Cuba over five
centuries ago. Art specialist Antonio Alejo Alejo
tells me that it used to be very common to see
Indians working in the area of the Havana port.
The
largest wave of Gypsies arrived in Cuba in 1936,
fleeing Franco and the Civil War. And later the
terrifying Nazi concentration camps. Author Renée
Méndez Capote dedicates some pages to the Gypsies in
her book Una cubanita que nació con el siglo
(A Little Cuban Who Was Born with the Century). And
in an issue of the magazine Carteles from
1940, we can read an interview, where we find out
that the Gypsies sought refuge in the arrabalera
area of the port in the Lawton hills.
Many
utilized the island as a bridge to reach a third
country, although some stayed in Cuba and began to
integrate since the island has always been very
welcoming. In a last November issue of Juventud
Rebelde, there was an article on how many
descendants of those families, arrived in the
1920’s, still survive. Here, they found—according to
them—the only country where they could live in
peace.
They
left their customs, attires
and words. They
imposed attractions to the circuses, fairs,
fiestas and carnivals. In the current musical jargon
of dancing music or salsa, or in the
filineros of the
1940’s, we find words such as: jama (food),
curda (drunkard), puro (father) and
en el dulce brazo gitano (in
the sweet Gypsy arm).
The
culture of today’s youth is permeated with Gypsy
customs: bracelet, anklets, large rings, necklaces,
scarves tied around the waist, headscarves and
colorful clothing.
Where is the Gypsy truth? / Since I remember, / I go
around the world with my tent, / I seek love and
affection.
(Rasim and Sedjic)
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