If Zeus, the father of all gods and goddesses, would suddenly crave for a good Habano, he couldn’t help but going down to Cuba and look for Cueto. Only this experienced cigar hand-roller could offer him a stogie worth his statute, like a 20.4-meter-long cigar that holds the Guinness World Record as the longest Habano on the face of the earth. The history of this amazing cigar started the day Jose Castelar Cairo –nicknamed Cueto by his friends- had the idea of doing something to lure far more customers to the La Triada store, in La Cabana compound, home to a former Spanish fortress that overlooks the Havana Bay.

Perhaps I’m dead wrong and its origins go a longer way back, maybe when that well-known cigar hand-roller was in his teens and was cutting his teeth at La Corona cigar factory, blending leaves and layers with his own hands to roll a Habano. Today, his calloused hands can roll any band in the market.

That’s why one day it occurred to him that a 6-meter-long cigar in his hands would be nothing to write home about. And that was just the beginning of his astounding deeds. On April 18, 2001, three days later, the Cuban hand-roller got his big break into the Guinness Book of World Records with an 11.04-meter-long monster. But, watch out! Cueto’s hands were just revving up and his jackknife was moving restlessly. He went himself one better two years later, on May 23, 2003, and broke his own world record with a 14.86-meter-long stogie.

It’s fairly enough to say that other competitors, eager to vie against the Cuban, have popped up elsewhere under the sun. Dominican Mauricio Pena, who’s been living in Puerto Rico for thirty years, amassed nine kilos worth of tobacco leaves from Puerto Rico and Pennsylvania to make an 18.6-meterlong cigar in four days. However, Cueto wasn’t ready to let anybody snatch his title and on February 24 of that same year, in barely three days during the 7th Habano Festival, he came up with a whopping 20.4-meter-long Habano.

The curious thing about these monster cigars is that they can be smoked like an ordinary stogie. As a matter of fact, if the 14-meter-long cigar were chopped off, it’ll churn out 800 topnotch, regular-size Habanos because tobacco leaves for Mr. Cueto’s first two record-breaking cigars hailed from Vegas Robainas, home to the world’s finest plantations. For the new record holder, Mr. Cueto’s leaves were donated by Partagas, a well-known, world-class brand.

And if seeing is believing is what really counts in your case, stay cool. Swing by La Triada and you’ll find there the three amazing cigars preserved at 17 degrees Celsius and a 60 percent relative humidity. As many as a hundred tourists visit this place every day and they just can’t believe their eyes! But, don’t take too long to drop by. Perhaps you might find Zeus there bargaining with Mr. Cueto for a puff at one of his huge cigars.