Simon Chase, a British sage of the cigar world, stood in an elegant hotel salon in Havana on Wednesday before a select group of aficionados, scrutinizing a box of 1970s cigars for evidence of their proclaimed vintage.
One clue, he said, was the style and quality of the seal on the box. Another was the cigar?s old-fashioned, slightly domed end, or ?cabeza tumbada.? The group muttered with interest and lit up, using cedar strips, or spills, to avoid contaminating their cigars with lighter fumes. Gray wisps curled into the air, and a brief hush fell as they solemnly considered the $90 smokes.
The private tasting by some of Cuban tobacco?s most devoted connoisseurs took place on the fringe of Havana?s Cigar Festival, an annual, five-day whirl of grand receptions, talks and plantation visits organised by Habanos, a joint venture between the Cuban government and Britain?s Imperial Tobacco.
The event, much of which is staged at a gloomy 1970s convention center, is a somewhat surreal eruption of luxury in a landscape that, after five decades of Communist rule, is an odd m?lange of tropical exuberance and stern socialism.
Cubans are inveterate smokers, and men and women alike suck on huge ?tabacos? that cost about four cents. But with salaries of around $20 per month, very few islanders could afford even the least expensive offerings from Habanos, whose retail prices on the international market can go as high as about $80 apiece.
The sale of cigars to wealthy foreigners helps bring in hard currency, which the government needs to finance programmes like health.