CUBA: DAY 1, MIAMI TOUR

CUBA:  DAY 1,  MIAMI TOUR

Egad – our guide, Martin, took us everywhere!  We saw Miami, Miami Beach (which is a separate island), Key Biscayne, Coconut Grove (no, not the old night club but a residential area), and Coral Gables (a poshy planned community completely surrounded by the city of Miami).  Miami is on the mainland but Biscayne Bay has lots of little islands with exclusive, gated communities (translation:  multi-million $$$ homes).  We drove out to Star Island and also looked at Fisher Island from across the water.  Fisher Island is so exclusive you can only get there by boat and they have an exclusive ferry boat for workmen and invitees to get there – the crew apparently grills everyone who tries to board the ferry.  Saw lots of wonderful art deco buildings on Miami Beach.  Even saw a team of guys in a cherry-picker truck slowly going to each palm tree and cutting down the coconuts so they don’t fall on people. 

The Miami city hall is in the building that was once the Pan Am terminal in the 1930’s.  It used to take a week to fly from Miami to Rio because they did sort hops down the coast.  In the entry lobby they have a terrazzo floor with a map of the US, Central and South America, showing all the Pan Am flight routes.  And the terminal and check-in counter is now the city council chambers, but they have kept the Pan Am art work on the walls and ceiling.  Don’t know why, but the ceiling has beautiful paintings of all the zodiac symbols. 

Was wonderfully delighted by the Wynwood outdoor art neighborhood.  This is the area where they have a huge outdoor art exhibit of modern art each year.  I remember reading about this sometime back.  Usually very well-known artists show and sell their work alongside unknowns, and the event attracts some big money.  Now, artists are invited to paint murals (if you can call it that) on the walls of the buildings in the area (mostly warehouses that the artists use as studios).  It is a dizzying display of styles and themes.

Miami is the 2^nd largest financial center in the Americas, after New York.  Doing business in Miami is easier, cheaper, and faster than anywhere in South or Central America.  Businessmen fly to Miami, and their clients or buyers fly from all over the world to meet them here.

A bit of Miami anthropological history:  the earliest people in the area were the Tequesta, most likely the people that greeted the first European explorer.  They all died out and there is very little evidence of their culture.  Currently, the native population is carried by the Seminoles and the Miccosukees.  The Seminoles are a part of the Creek Nation, who came down from the Carolinas.

Walked through the Miami Biltmore Hotel and was told an interesting story about Johnny Weismuller who played Tarzan in the early Tarzan movies.  The first movie was partly filed at the Biltmore Hotel where Johnny, a former Olympic diver, had a job as a pool boy.  He regularly gave diving exhibitions for the guests for fun and tips.  Well, on the first day of filming, the actors and crew were set up and ready to go but the actor who was hired to play Tarzan didn’t show up.  What to do?  So someone pointed to Johnny and said “what about him?”  “But he’s only a pool boy,” was the reply, “and he’s not an actor. He looks good but can he memorize and deliver lines?”  And then they realized that Tarzan had very few lines.  And so began his career.

One more interesting story about Miami.  There is a relatively new building called the New World Center, largely supported by Carnival Cruise Lines (a big surprise to me) and other large donors.  The building contains a music academy that is run in the winters and headed by Michael Tilson Thomas.  They only allow a small number of students (about 80, I think).  Students who are accepted receive three years, fully paid.  Now back to the building – the architect was Frank Gehry.  And how did he get the job?  Well, it turns out that Frank Gehry was Michael Tilson Thomas’s babysitter and they kept a friendship over the years.  You just never know how the people you meet in your life come around to intertwine later.

No alligator sightings today.