January 04, 2006
La Ventanita
I still walk up to them with a certain reverence. La Ventanita. The name alone alone conjers up something almost ethereal for me. La Ventanita. That little place, el timbiriche, with that distinct aroma of cafe cubano brewing. With that unique sound of frothing for un cortadito. That place you used to go to with your dad or your abuelo. And you'd walk up to the window and they'd order their cafecitos and you'd just stand there staring at the contents of La Ventanita.
Chiclets. Violet Candy. Doublemints. Los caramelitos de miel. The honey candies with the bees on the wrapper. Las postalitas. Baseball cards and those other ones you'd buy and have to fill the album. Where you would always need that one postalita for that one page and you'd have to get packs and packs and packs to complete the album.
All of those little kid treasures, of course, right next to los tabacos. Cuban cigars of every make and model. Boxes and bundles. Lanceros. Robustos. Gordos. Flakos. The ones that even as a kid you knew were crappy cigars. Flor de la Montaņa. La Esperanza del Rio. Reina de la Hoja.
Candy and cigars. Right there in front of you at little kid eye level. Of course, candies and cigars side by side inside a glass case was something completely normal for you. It's only later on that you realized just what an inherently Cuban thing that is.
En La Ventanita.
And, if you were a smart kid, a precocious one, you'd always try to listen in on the conversations from los viejos. Chistes, baseball and politics. Siempre y sin falta. At La Ventanita you'd always hear the latest news from Cuba and in our standard animated fashion.
All of the worlds problems were always discussed at that little place, that little window in that restaurant or cafeteria or timbiriche with the Formica counter and the candies and cigars encased in glass below.
Well, we now have our very own Ventanita here in the blogosphere. There may not be Chiclets or Padrons for sale, and the aroma of cafe cubano will be difficult to come by, but the debate and the commentary will always be there.
At La Ventanita del Wall Street Cafe transplanted from La Habana to cyberlandia via New England, USA.
Posted by Val Prieto at January 4, 2006 07:22 AM
Comments
Bienvenida a la Blogoesfera, Chica!
I'll have a cortadito, one pastelito de guayaba and three packs of Zorro cards.
JulioZ
Posted by: Julio C. Zangroniz at January 4, 2006 08:09 AM
Not sure where to post this, but I gotta vent.
First castro, then Venezuela and Cuba. Then Cuba, Venezuela, and China. Now Cuba, China, Venezuela, and Bolivia.
Boy that blimp and flying antennae, now that'll show em! I wonder when we'll really scare'em by using the famed "Oh yeah?" or maybe Condi and the President will offer up the triple dog dare. This is nothing short of ridiculous. Our foreign policy regarding Latin America is non-existent and will sneak up and bite us. Don't expect our castro problem to ever go away at this rate. It actually seems to be getting worse. I can hear them in Cuba now, we must be right as others are following our model. C'mon administration act now or it'll turn into another Iraq.
Posted by: pototo at January 4, 2006 08:40 AM
Bienvenida La Ventanita, I look forward to daily visits to your wonderful blog. Be prepared for lots of traffic, and watch out for trolls.
Posted by: ziva at January 4, 2006 11:25 AM
Thanks Ziva and Julio. And pardon my ignorance of some terms, but what the heck are trolls?
Posted by: La Ventanita at January 4, 2006 02:08 PM
La Ventanita - From Samizdata
Troll verb. To troll for hits is to post a provocative article purely in order to generate an angry response (usually followed by sending a mass e-mail shot to the target audience) and commensurate increase in hit rate.
2. noun. A person who trolls.
Posted by: ziva at January 4, 2006 03:22 PM
And I had just taken the comments moderation thing down.....I guess I will put it back up.
Posted by: La Ventanita at January 4, 2006 03:47 PM