Raisa Gorbachev a Hit on Tour of Old Havana

Raisa Gorbachev strolled through the heart of Old Havana on Tuesday, captivating a sparse but enthusiastic crowd with personal greetings from her husband, Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

She stepped from her limousine into the Plaza de la Cathedral and told the crowd, “I would like to shake hands with all of you.”

Pausing briefly to allow her words to be translated into Spanish, she added, “I wish to send you a message from my husband wishing you all the best.”

In response, onlookers clutched at her hands. A few called out in heavily accented Russian.

As she approached a waiting honor guard decked out in red and yellow uniforms of colonial Spain, the Soviet first lady paused to admire a flowering shrub in the plaza’s central garden.

She plucked several flowers and held them tightly throughout much of her tour.

“This is the oldest part of the city, no?” Mrs. Gorbachev asked her guide, city historian Eusebio Leal.

The tour began at El Templete, a Roman-style building marking the site in 1519 of the first Roman Catholic Mass celebrated in Havana.

With the former home of the bishop of Havana to her left, Mrs. Gorbachev crossed the plaza to the governor’s residence, built by the Spaniards in 1776. It also once housed the U.S. governors from 1899-1902 when Cuba was a U.S. protectorate, at the end of the Spanish-American War.