Last Thursday we were in Coral Gables and decided to stop by the new Loew’s Hotel, which was opening to guests that very day. I love hotels; also, I thought of people attending the grand opening of the Biltmore Hotel in 1926.
The Loew’s opening was much more low-key, though the staff was extremely welcoming. Even though we looked like we had just come in off the street (which we had), the concierge insisted we take the elevator to the ninth floor to see the pool and enjoy the view. Unfortunately, you need a room key to access the area, which we explained to an employee back in the elevator who took us back up and opened the door for us. From one side of the terrace we got an unobstructed view of the Biltmore.
Downstairs, I asked two workmen when the plaza will be finished. The hotel is part of a complex of shops, restaurants, and residences, including, they told us, the house of the only person who refused to sell his property to the developer. They pointed it out to us and we walked back to see it – it sits opposite the hotel entrance – a simple one-story house with an orange tile roof and a mango tree in the front yard. It looked forlorn sitting there dwarfed by the high walls of the new development that keep it in eternal shade. But it provides the development, the clear winner in the deal, with a charming object of curiosity. The valets told us the owner was offered two million dollars and a new house on the corner but he refused to budge. The concierge, who had come outside, said that in his two months at the hotel he had not seen the man once.
Back home, I messaged a friend who lives in the neighborhood. She said that the owner of the house is Cuban, and used as the reasoning for his obstinacy the fact that his family’s land had been taken from them in Cuba and nobody in this country was going to take his land from him. To which my friend, who is half-Cuban, noted, “Dude, Castro didn’t offer your family two million dollars.”
For me, Jojo Morales bears a vague resemblance to Elián González. And it was refreshing to see a story about a little boy who is safely returned to Miami and not controversially taken away from it.
I took Lyft the other day and my driver, Kamal, was from Pakistan. On 595 a car unexpectedly cut in front of us and I called to Kamal to alert him. He had seen the intrusion, in fact maybe even anticipated it, and told me not to worry.
"I drove in Pakistan," he explained calmly. "I'm very used to this kind of thing."
The Mai Kai, Fort Lauderdale's legendary Polynesian restaurant, is still closed for renovations, but they are selling some of their popular cocktails for takeaway. So the other week I ordered a quart of Barrel of Rum and drove up Route 1, crossed the wooden planks of the entrance way, gave a woman my money, and was handed a plastic jug filled with a light brown liquid. The operation seemed like a cross between a drug pickup and - because of the container - buying cider at the farmers' market.
Hania not only listens to the weather forecasts, she believes them, so we prepared for a long weekend of rain and nixed any idea of driving to Miami because we didn't want to get caught in any flash floods.
Then we woke up to two successive mornings of sunshine. Saturday evening we took a stroll around the island, and yesterday afternoon I swam laps in the pool, an activity made possible, admittedly, by overcast skies. (I normally swim in the evening, when the pool's in the shade.) As I did my breast stroke I could hear rumblings of thunder in the distance, so presumably it was raining somewhere. This is the saving grace of being a weather person in South Florida: in some part of the region, you'll always be right. But it doesn't mean we have to listen to them.
We're off for a week: the nation's capital and that state that's supposedly for lovers. Hope it doesn't rain.