yearbook 2004/05 - The European Film College

FROM THE TEACHERS
Visiting the Film School in Cuba
By Susanne Katz
In October 2003 it was finally our turn to have
a real vacation. Not a trip including a meeting
here and a seminar there and then being off a
few more days, but really - a holiday!!
And a long held wish of ours has certainly been
to visit Cuba. So now time was up!
Apart from a wonderful holiday with many fantastic
and overwhelming experiences and sights,
two events absolutely made the deepest impression:
Visiting Don Robaina – the fantastic legendary
Cigar-maker, and visiting two former
students from the year 2002/2003 in the Cuban
Film School in San Antonio.
In Cuba you see no signs in the streets or on the
roads to show you the way. The roads are in a
very bad shape and you have to drive very slowly
and very carefully not to puncture all four tyres
at the same time! The maps of the country do
not give you very good information either, so
you are sort of lost if you do not pick up the
hitch-hikers that are on every corner trying to
catch your attention and get a lift due to the lack
of their public transportation! So of course you
do that, even though communication is rather
difficult with most of the population, as they
do not speak any other language than Spanish.
The teachers’ wing
A good Spanish/Danish dictionary helped us
along most of the time, and Jens’ efforts in Italian
were successful every now and then.
Having left Havana heading south we picked
up the first hitchhiker. We asked him: “Havana
Film School” – no reaction – but San Antonia
de los Baños was the signal that would put us
through the next two hours. People in and out
of the car several times, driving with us for a
shorter or a longer distance, and finally having
entered the small village some rather old-looking
and damaged wooden signs along the road
would show us the direction – but not all the
way! Being alone in the car it was up to us to
decide weather to go left or right arriving at a
junction. Of course we picked the wrong direction
– but what a blessing in disguise! As far as
your eye can see there were beautiful orchards
with grapefruit trees. We stopped the car and
began picking and eating grapefruits.
The car was turned the other way around and
we stopped a man to ask him the way – only
to find out, that we had already passed the sign
“Escuela Internacional de Cine y Televisión”.
Here we were warmly welcomed by the English-
Photo: Jens Rykær