Jeremy Clarkson's Motorworld | Cuba S02E02

[Music] [Music] yeah [Music] [Music] [Music] to be perfectly honest there are very few motoring stories in Kerala however this is no ordinary Caribbean island this is Cuba home to some of the best motoring stories in the world and it must be said stop the worst hold on a minute something is not right here what I mean a lot isn't right here but specifically something it's very definitely wrong this may look like an old mga but beneath the bonnet beats the heart a very different animal [Music] no dear oh dear that is a Lada engine it's funny isn't it cars can survive the Arizona desert they can survive an Arctic winter that give them the slightest whiff of communism and ago altarpieces communism came to Cuba in the 1950s when Havana was where high-rolling American mobsters lined the pockets of a president called Batista Peace Prize winner it was not their policy la vita Batista's police managed to assassinate no less than 20,000 young people during the period that is tyranny the repression every hour every day every instant that was lived in Havana the whole country was really ferocious invested by their immense their fellows with yet this made the people led by Fidel Castro rise up in rebellion to fight Nikita in a clandestine struggle they fought equally in the mountains as in the city it was a period when the Cuban family lived in great sadness in great agony but with a great spirit of rebellion a spirit of rebellion which enabled the success of the revolution on the 1st of January 1959 not community or marketing in our idea our political philosophy is representative democracy and social justice in a well planned economy so well planned that this is what Havana looks like today Russian missiles may not have made it here but that architect did there's now a strange Silvia style concrete or ground to the peeling colonial backdrop of yesteryear [Music] we men Russian cars made it here to Moscow bitches and ladders were given to government officials and important workers but everyone else had to make do with what they have before the Revolution do they own Alfa Romeo common care a yellow day regalo el agua con a la Vida hoy un artista north-american lalito say trajo a key un carro con Carlos area Farina yes Aomori lock emprego le me tiene una finca in can piranha privy end oh yeah Kade a vanilla intervention de todo Yahoo Takei donde yo let me intervene Aaron la finca con el carro bolo no Lavina unis Paulo suiza creo que le Spanos and opera in espanha suiza jo te le pas no sleep tambien Miren Miren todo esto es apareció en sake avi Amira automóviles mil Altima be less también el gobierno de poele party goes poor vestro Fabolous expla Cali automóviles buenisimo americano Americanos que les Courtin on consulate a poor Lomita bachata of course a great many survived but think about this when the Americans close the door on Cuba and ban trade there were no more spare parts for all the cars and 33 years on there still are there are no quick fix in Havana so how come they're all still going [Music] I'd like you to meet Hector Cuba's answer to Keith Floyd the silver tooth galloping gourmet of Havana now he's going to explain how you make brake fluid this is the real stuff trouble is in Cuba it is very hard to come by and furiously expensive there is no alternative though what you need is brown sugar what it will do if you have a ladder but for those old Chevy's Brown is best you also need them this is a curious one some shampoo and slinging alcohol goes all girl take it away Gus so what you do then is you making sure a no flies have crept into your bottle and the alcohol there it depends how many cars you're looking to serve obviously about how much you need but that should be enough for I should be enough for a Cadillac Coupe DeVille right you two spoonfuls of the brown sugar and it goes cleanliness not an important issue then on this sort of cooking obviously and then you simply stir it up like that really yeah it's going to be delicious isn't it now look you do this for about three minutes okay but to save time and in the best traditions of cookery programmes here is one we did earlier no sticky back plastic this time though a mate so there you go now that is enough to feed well at least one Chevrolet and now we're going to need some shampoo in there are we so it consistently is with any good source consistency does matter and brake fluid is no exception Hector is actually a chef on a Cuban merchant ship so he knows what he's doing here this is going to give it that all-important brake fluid texture mmm and then we just mix it up a bit more and that's about it I think look at that look at that ladies and gentlemen brake fluid for less than a dollar thanks Hector mrs. hexa meanwhile was to be found in the sitting room making a hood for their Cadillac and you'll find the same sort of thing going on all over the island sit back now and watch these guys make a new rear wing for a car that mainland would throw away all they're going to use is some brown paper a pair of scissors a comma and the loop from a method Cadillac [Music] [Music] it may say Yamaha on the steering wheel but this 1955 Thunderbird has a larger engine most cars have a rush meant in these days but not this one for 20 years it's been in a shed untouched and unloved until we roll into town the whole thing was seized it had no brakes no hoses no battery and starter motor then exhaust it was a shell but we desperately to to get it going again [Music] it would take nine people nineteen den colossal disappointment followed disappointment [Music] and then just 24 hours before we would you to go home it cost into life it was quite a moment [Music] the reason why I've been so keen to get this car going and actually take drive is that it once belonged to someone pretty special in Cuba's history Che Guevara whoa zoom out and so there you have it the first person for 20 years to drive the Chevy let's say use 20 was president of the National Bank I feel no sense of elation though because I discovered this morning but che is in fact a nickname and his native Argentina it means power mate this man whose face stared down at me from a poster on my study wall at school who symbolized all that was good about rebellion in the 50s and 60s with his long hair and his smoking habits his real name was earnest and he drove the slowest Chevrolet in the West and sometimes it was even slower than that [Music] well I don't have such we played these Cuban mechanics but they don't deserve every penny [Music] really awfully hot in here and I don't think it's entirely down to the fact there's no air-conditioning [Music] - damn loud in here [Music] I suspect they've made the fuel pump out of an old garden sprinkler but it didn't seem to matter we have set fire to a Cuban icon understandably we never even asked if we could have a go in some of the other vehicles from the revolution Castro's Land Rover the bulldozer they turned into attack and the bread van that a bunch of students have used to storm Batista's palace another bunch of students had even bigger ideas ideas that would rock the world of motor racing they called themselves commandos and on the eve of the Cuban Grand Prix they kidnapped one Manuel Fangio from this hotel lobby now this man went on in life to be Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs but at the time he was one of the kidnappers anything they said with the operation carried out in this Lobby was what we called Operation Fangio that is to say kidnapping to detain him with us in such a way as to prevent him competing in the Grand Prix the next day he was surrounded by many friends his minder some mechanics many people but in spite of this two of our colleagues from the commando force entered the hotel and with the threat of a pistol captured Fangio they neutralized the guards and took him to the waiting car building in law gravel principality I think he understood the principle points of our history and the way of life at that moment in Cuba the proof of this is that we developed a friendship that continued until the last days has really brought Fangio to this very house and told him that once the Revolution had succeeded he would be our guest of honor this is spooky I'm in the house where they held Fangio more than that I'm in the same room yes this was the room where Fangio was kept the house was occupied by a family a widowed lady with her two daughters all three were militant participants of the revolution they were Fangio's hostesses so to speak during the time that he was held here even though fan gear was otherwise engaged the race went ahead a mistake because some say revolutionaries had sprayed oil on the track one car plowed into the crowd and that was the end of motor racing in Cuba everyone follow up on this boat is all deal Fangio sympathized with his abductors telling the world's media afterwards that he supported their cause and that he never once feared for his life no matter he wrote to them right up to his death in 1995 but never again would Havana streets echo to the sound of finely tuned racing cars in 1994 some estimates said 2,000 people a day were trying to make the 90 mile sea voyage to Key West they were using inner tubes oil drums egg boxes anything so long as they could get to freedom freedom from communism and it's buses they cram 300 people under these things ABS as many as you get on a 747 even a real cop would complain which is why some people choose to use them without getting on board [Music] the trouble with being pulled along by a bus is that it keeps stopping all the time this is the answer part bicycle part Yuma Gatien pond it's the rally Wayfarer Zed Zed r11 [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] how we're looking like a three garages [Music] things were going well till the fumigation punks sparkplug since two thousand volts to my leg machine class is easier for our chainsaw Nikola boy Oh that is I have a three trucker decisive same tour motor family for fumigation Club [Music] I was being scratched until I fix my spark plug [Applause] but then it all went horribly wrong again when I got to a 1 in 68 radians [Music] no in Cuba all the animals are equal but at it all well put it some of them are more equal than others there are rich people here you know and they need something which befits their status [Music] let's now go here do we not got a right to know ladies and gentlemen you have now seen it all this is a stretched lager you know something interesting it costs exactly the same to elongated larger as it does a Cadillac in fact you'd have to say this one probably cost even more because it's got three doors on either side and that's an expensive cut and shut job it seems peculiar therefore that they haven't fitted any of the usual accoutrements found in a limousine there's no video player there's no treats cabinet there's no the walnut fittings not really any fittings at all actually [Music] [Applause] this will never make the grade as a cherished classic and nor I suspect will this the cars here for the most part are worthless racks everyone knows it too which is why everyone here tries to argue that their car was once owned by someone famous this Aston Martin apparently was once the property of Ernest Hemingway this jag was Frank Sinatra's and this Cadillac is one of 36 in Havana alone that belongs to mrs. Batista [Music] [Applause] [Music] if you want to come on holiday to this superheated American Car Museum where laboratory paper is considered a luxury good and where all the air-conditioning units are Russian and therefore sound like Fox back Jets that's fine but don't whatever you do feel tempted to buy one of the exhibits because according to the teachings of Karl Marx the customer is always wrong the owner of this Maserati wants $50,000 for dream on baby dream [Music] and there's more from Jeremy Clarkson's motor world next here on Dave as JC meets America's rudest car dealer what a lovely bloke very rude run lovely you

Channel: Jeremy Clarkson's Motorworld Channel

Views: 130,480

Rating: 4.832952 out of 5

Keywords: cars, Jeremy Clarkson Motorworld, Cuba, Jeremy Clarkson, Motorworld

Id: npOGVgx-Rtk

Length: 23min 1sec (1381 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 30 2017