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Charge and refutation: Che Guevara enjoyed big feasts and luxury.
Charge and refutation: Che Guevara enjoyed big feasts and luxury.
Anyone can clearly see that after the victory of the Cuban Revolution, the fairly slim Che Guevara became a much stronger-built man and he obviously put on some weight.
Some photos:
Some people accuse him of living a luxurious life with huge, rich meals and luxury objects like his famous Rolex watch or his home in the popular and rich neighbourhood, Tarará.
Che was really given expensive presents by foreign ambassadors every time he met representatives of foreign countries in Havana or abroad, and he gave these presents to other people, schools or other insitiutes - with the exception of the watches that were important for a guerrilla fighter.
In his home there was no abundance - he wanted his family to live on the same living standard like other Cubans did. (According to a source, when Aleida asked him to give him the car to take her ill child to the hospital, Che refused this request saying the car was for the work and not for the family.) When he got to know that his family was given two ration books (the system of distribution of foodstuffs and industrial products to the population), he told his wife to return one of the ration books immediately.
There are no reliable sources about the furniture Guevara-home (though we must be sure that it contained a huge collection of books, thanks to the passionate reader Che) but anyone can see that Che didn't spend much money on clothes (most of the time he wore only his olive green fatigues and boots, and only one occasion - on a baseball match - he was wearing a T-shirt and jeans). Aleida and the children wore simple but lovely dresses - no precious necklaces or diamond rings.
In March 1959 Che's whole body suffered a serious collapse and the doctors ordered him to have a big break. He was given a luxurious seaside house in the exclusive neighbourhood of Tarará, large enough to give accomodation for Che, Aleida and his bodyguards. The magazine Caretas published an article about it, saying that Che was abusing his privileges. Che got angry and replied in an open letter. He said he became ill because of overwork and the government loaned him a house - he chose the least luxurious one - because his salary as an officer of the Rebel Army was not enough to pay for it. He promised to leave the house as soon as he recovered - he did so.
By the end of May Che was in great form again, so he and Aleida moved to a rented house in Santiago de Las Vegas, a suburb of Havana.
Other, less prejudiced sources claim that he put on weight because finally he could eat properly, after more than two years of fighting in the mountains of Sierra Maestra and Escambray where sometimes there was nothing to eat at all.
Besides the availability of proper food, there were other reasons as well.
He had jobs to do: he was the commander at La Cabaña, then the President of the National Bank of Cuba and the Minister of Industries, besides other important administrative tasks that he had to do while sitting at a writing desk (and not by climbing a mountain or leading a column through the forests). He had much less time for going on trips or doing physical trainings like before.
Finally, he started to take a new kind of medicament for his asthma: cortisone, that had a side-effect: gaining weight easily and having a chubby face.
Sources:
~ Lucia Alvarez De Toledo: The Story Of Che Guevara
~ Jorge G. Castañeda: Compañero: The Life and Death of Che Guevara
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