A Spanisch Frauen few momemts later on an elder black woman wearing a red scarf more than light tresses came up regarding second-flooring window. She featured baffled then again acknowledged Willy. “ Hola. Hola. ” She acceptance us upstairs.
Her label is Gladis Castaneda, and you may she was actually an expert classical pianist from inside the Havana during the the brand new 1950s. She are a small lady in her eighties otherwise 1990s. She nodded when he said Los angeles Reina. Yes, she told you, he would lived in this community, best nearby. Here, on the tissue, is actually an individual who realized this new legendary Superman-evidence, actually, the guy in fact stayed.
Superman, Castaneda said, try significant, strong, respected. “Men and women understood him once the King,” she said. “He had been gay, but you failed to mess with him.” She expected us to sit. “He had been the height. However, good. Muscle.” He had body such as for instance hers: dark, not most. “He had been good guy. No-one got an issue with him.” I inquired in the event the everybody in the community knew what the guy performed to possess a living. “Son, it actually was years ago. The guy remaining many years ago.”
Willy questioned when the she knew what became away from your, and she said she thinks the guy died when you look at the Miami. Her time try waning, and you may Willy nodded in my opinion to indicate it was time i wade.
Upon the road, we found a vintage guy leaning contrary to the wall structure. His title try Elado. He transmitted a cane and you will wore a loose environmentally friendly jacket that have a good Masonic icon dangling regarding a sequence up to his shoulder. Willy advised your we were wanting information on the person they called La Reina.
“ Si, si, ” the old guy said. “La Reina-folks realized him. Mulatto. Regarding the top,” the guy nodded in my own direction. “Folks acknowledged him. The guy existed right here getting twenty years. Of course, people realized what he performed to own a full time income.” The guy told you Superman leftover into U.S. into the 1959. “No body know their identity. Every person only titled him La Reina.”
I entered their spacious apartment, and you can Willy explained everything we was in fact starting
Across the street by the chapel, roosters crowed. An excellent girl using Rollerblades spoke to the a wages phone. A vintage guy during the a leather golf cover used a great cigar with the a backless wooden couch.
His tresses is actually white and wild
I stepped as a consequence of Los Sitios to your Barrio Chino until we arrived at the 507 Marquis Highway. We endured in the street taking a look at the entry so you’re able to an excellent martial-arts school: Escuela Cubana de Wushu. They got a yellow and you can yellow act with a silver foo canine and a purple iron door.
The door are open. In front gate is actually a courtyard having a little restaurant and several fixed exercise equipment. The newest theater immediately following stood where in fact the school’s outdoor courtyard has started to become. We tried to thought in which the stage might have been. The latest putting on a costume room in which Superman available to the fresh let you know. The fresh balcony where drunken travelers spotted brand new performance.
A short time later we returned to Barrio de los Sitios so you can material for others just who possess identified Superman. About apartment building next to Gladis Castaneda’s, we came across Superman’s actual neighbors: a former pizza pie cook entitled Roberto Cabarero, 82 yrs old, having a greatly tarnished and you may lengthened muscles shirt, sagging brownish shorts on fly spacious, and black socks having holes in the leg. His epidermis sagged such as for example a sea turtle’s.
Cabarero’s flat, in which the guy resided together with his wife, is actually tiny and you will ramshackle, littered with nonsense. His spouse sat in the exact middle of the little home, rocking forward and backward from inside the a solid wood sofa, talking loudly on no body particularly. A wireless blared tinny dated Spanish sounds, and your dog came in and outside of the space to help you eat crumbs from the floors. An alarm time clock sounded through the duration of all of our appointment. Not one person bothered to make it off.
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