We had a great last day in Havana and manged to pack in a lot.
I was not really interested in going to the cigar factory, but, when in Rome.
It was actually really cool. Our guide was a gorgeous, sassy Afro-Cuban woman who danced and flirted her way around the factory.
The fatory has been running since 1746, with 700 workers who roll 20,000 igars each day. (Ha, back to the computer with seletive ´s.)
It takes 9 months learning to become a roller, then eah igar is quality ontrolled in four different ways and if they don´t pass every test they go back to be re-rolled.
They roll seven different brands at this factory, in all shapes and sizes.
For a factory it didn´t look too bad. They hae music all day, are fed (important in Cuba) and each morning someone reads the newspaper to the workers as they roll and each afternoon they read romance noels for 45 minutes. Now both of these ould be seen a torture. (The v´s are seletie too).
They dry the tobao in the fields and then grade it in one department, and roll it in another. It was quite beautiful to watch the rolling.
On our way out we stopped just inside the entrane to work out where we were heading next and there was a man standing with us about to head home after his shift. They are given three igars eah per day to take home and he had his in his hand. I was explaining to Quinn about this when the man smiled and gave me one. I smelled it and showed it to Quinn then went to hand it back and he said keep it, smoke it.
It was a ery touching gesture from someone who earnes as much in a week as I earn in an hour.
No comments:
Post a Comment