'Appreciation is a wonderful thing: it makes what is excellent in others belong to us as well.'*

El cuarto de Tula has long been a favourite with Eliades Ochoa’s group Cuarteto Patria. This extended descarga (Cuban jam style) features the great soneros Ibrahim Ferrer and Manuel ‘Puntillita’ Licea joining Eliades in improvising lyrics laced with sexual innuendo in the Santiago tradition.

The extraordinary solo on the laoud (a small, twelve string instrument similar to a lute) is by Barbarito Torres, the finest player in Havana. The timbales are played by the 13 year old phenomenon, Julienne Oviedo Sánchez, already a veteran of some of Cuba’s most celebrated modern big bands.**

Watching them (well, not exactly them, as this was… over a decade later and some of them had already passed away) live twice (‘passed away live twice’, great writing, Bruna, great writing) is high on my (still very modest) list of been-there-done-that things. Neither time was in Wales, I dragged my sister along to the Rio de Janeiro concert of their farewell tour a few years ago. She thought it was too expensive at first, but she must have changed her mind by the time the last song was played. Way before that. It was actually she who encouraged me to get in the queue to have my newly bought CD and Buena Vista Social Club passport (yes, lol - a cute little booklet with photographs and stories***) autographed while she waited, patiently. That was nice of her. And unexpected. But that wasn’t in Wales, yeah, I remember.

yes, you've seen this dress - y ffrog - before

(you, who asked whether I was wearing things from Wales-2016)

In Wales I tried to explain the lyrics of another of their songs to a friend (the one above just happens to be the one playing when inspiration finally, not coincidentally, struck me again), using my insufficient knowledge of Spanish and my poor improvisational translation skills as it played, just at the right volume (other friends and I had to ask a waiter if they could turn down the music at Cardiff’s Jamie’s Italian - overrated, Jamie’s - so we wouldn’t need to shout at one another across the little table), in the restaurant where we were having dinner, or was it very late lunch? It was good, anyway, ‘good’ being an unfair understatement. I had a burrito, which came with a little salad and fries - no, not fries, onion rings; or both? Both, I think. Enough food for one person (I offered my friend most of the fries, though), I’d say, not too little (so you’re still hungry after paying the bill) and not too much (so you feel guilty about the waste), very reasonably priced, I thought, and, best of all, tasty. Truly tasty. What’s so special about that, eating good food when eating out? Well, Wales had let me down quite badly food-wise quite a few times before, and that one was a vegan place. Don’t go throwing stones at me (I had an egg, an egg thrown at me, I mean, but that was in Dublin, so another story, which doesn’t even fit the purpose of this blog), I’m a vegetarian (OK, I eat eggs and - get them thrown at me and - I drink milk and I consume dairy), have been one for twelve years now. I trust meat-free (and egg-free and dairy-free and etc.) restaurants, sort of (there’s one where I live which I got tired of for the menu has been the same ever since I moved here four years ago, and it isn’t particularly varied or specially appealing; there's another which has the same style, Asian style, and similar quality food - why do most vegetarian food places around here have to be Asian style?... -, and may even belong to the same family - well, at least they are Asian, which justifies their offering Asian style vegetarian food). Voltaire, however, that delightful little eating house with a cosy atmosphere, tasteful music which would surprisingly cater for most (saying ‘all’ would be unrealistic, tempted as I feel to do so) tastes (was that more bad writing, ‘tasteful’ and ‘tastes’?), friendly staff (they didn’t even give me the stink eye for stupidly taking my first ever - again, I do feel bad, but my fake leather ones wouldn’t last… I’ve got to go for a cruelty-free alternative next time, I know - leather bag to a vegan place, twice - yes, that was stupid; I did try and hide it, so it may have gone unnoticed?...) - what was I saying? Yes! Voltaire, the vegan restaurant in Bangor, made quite an impression on me. On us, in fact, and Ioan, my friend, isn’t even vegetarian. He said he wouldn’t have been able to tell it wasn’t meat he was eating had he not known that was a vegan eating place (and we both agreed the ice cream on the brownie - was it a brownie? Or a lava cake? It was decadent, that’s what matters - tasted just like ‘regular’ - delicious regular - ice cream). Not sure vegans would take this as a compliment (people do tend to become rather extreme in their views, which is, in my view, partly understandable and partly lamentable), but the meaning is quite clear - their food, Voltaire’s food (BTW, we found out, at the restaurant, Voltaire, the philosopher, was a vegan himself - which now sounds obvious, since the place is named after him, yeah, but we didn’t know and would never have imagined), is high-quality food, proper food, not simply some chef’s or cook’s half-hearted approach to animal-free cuisine.

So, if you, like me, happen to be in the city (a university city, with a lovely pier with a lovely view - weather permitting, that is -, which sadly closes a little too early), perhaps on your way to Beaumaris castle or Conwy castle or Caernarfon castle (I also meant to go to Harlech, never found the time, and my friend, Ioan, said it was too out of the way, which didn’t seem the case to me, me and my Brazilian sense of distance, but then I did find out distances in Wales can be harder to cover than they seem to be at first glance), do stop in at its vegan restaurant. Do remember your fivers won’t be useful there, mind you, as it’d be incoherent for a vegan establishment to take money made with animal fat. And leave that leather bag, jacket, wallet, pair of boots at the hotel, spare yourself the embarrassment.

Nice façade, isn't it?

(picture - y llun - not mine, Google Images's)

*by (Google tells me) Voltaire, yes (not very original, quoting Voltaire here, I know)
**from the (European version - bought it in Dublin; Dublin, again - of the?) Buena Vista Social Club CD booklet

**which apparently gives me access to an exclusive website I've just found out (got to find the little thing now!)