Cubanet – Page 14 – Translating Cuba

Beef, Only for the Privileged / Cubanet, Roberto Jesús Quiñones Haces

La-Ternera-2-Foto — Cuban butcher shop (photo from the internet)

Cubanet.org, Roberto Jesus Quinones Haces, Guantanamo, 12 June 2015 – Among the list of prohibitions imposed on Cubans from 1959 until today is freely fishing, having a boat and wandering around the island or giving our children an education in non-state schools, among others. Until recently it was forbidden to stay in a hotel, sell cars acquired after 1959, sell housing, leave the country without permission from the government, possess foreign currency and buy in stores for tourists and foreign technicians.

Another unusual prohibition that we Cubans have is that the slaughter of large livestock and the consumption of their meat is penalized with harsh jail sentences. For more than 25 years eating a beefsteak has become the dream of the great majority of Cubans. Here, the only ones who can are the leaders, tourists and those with the money to buy it in the currency stores, or those with enough bravery – and also the contacts – to buy it illegally. Not even in the most distinguished restaurant does there appear the longed-for filet. continue reading

A purely Cuban – and revolutionary! – ban

The crime of Theft and Illegal Slaughter of Large Livestock is perhaps unique in the history of international jurisprudence. It had its precedent in the 1962 Law 1018 which last March turned 53 years old and by which cattle owners are obliged to sell their meat exclusively to the state, prohibiting them from consuming it.

In his book, “In Kind Crimes,” Dr. Jose A. Grillo Longoria asserted that before 1959 a great percentage of Cubans could not consume beef and that this law would guarantee that all residents of the country could eat it regularly. For such reason, the distinguished professor of Criminal Law warranted that the state’s efforts to increase the production of milk and beef would be useless if it benignly repressed those who slaughtered those animals irresponsibly or because of a desire for profit.

When he wrote that he knew, because of his age, that in Cuba there had always been milk and meat, even in the worst droughts. From living one could realize that this incomprehensible decision has been the main reason that the Cuban cattle population has decreased continuously from 1962 to today.

Today the number of Cubans, including children, who cannot drink a simple glass of milk as well as those who have not tasted a little piece of beef in years, is much higher. It would prove that the cruel sanctions that he defended have not managed to stop the commission of a crime invented by the bearded ones, the implementation of which has caused thousands of Cubans to rough it in jails, sentenced to thirty and even more than fifty years for having butchered a head of cattle.

The Guantanamo slaughterhouse is militarized

Unable to kill their own cattle, to eat its meat in restaurants, or to acquire it in currency stores due to its high prices, the great majority of Cubans have to go to the black market, supplied by butchers and slaughterhouse workers, in order to be able to eat a steak. In the wholesale network a kilogram costs 10 CUC, more than 50% of the average monthly salary.

According to a source whose identity we withhold since he works in the Guantanamo Slaughterhouse, the manager there is Mr. Gustavo Osorio, a retired colonel of the Armed Services, who believes himself still to be in a military camp based on the methods he uses against his workers.

As members of his team he has named Lioel Cantillo Pelegrin, an ex-police officer who is chief of the slaughter area and Feliberto Espinola, another ex-police officer who occupies the job of Maintenance Chief.

As if that were not enough, Major Liranza, member of the economic police, continually visits the slaughterhouse and together with those mentioned above, carries out suppressive checks of the work stations without these being part of his job. As a result of these actions, worker Manuel Reyes Calderin was surprised last week with 10 pounds of meat in his clothes, which cost him two days locked in a prison cell, the loss of his job and a pending trial.

A steak, which together with some fried plantains and a serving of beans and rice cost some 25 cents before 1959, now joins the long list of scarcities in Cuban homes. Add to that also that risking the great pleasure can involve a solid blow of many years confinement.

And like everything that happens in Cuba, the fault is not with our leaders but with others. In this case it’s the cow’s fault because they do not want to fatten up, increase their offspring or give us milk. Oh, and I forgot it, also the embargo’s fault!

Roberto Jesús Quiñones Haces

Translated by MLK

“The Revolutionary Offensive” Has Returned / Cubanet, Miriam Celaya

Cubanet, Miriam Celaya, Havana, 11 June 2015 – There is no doubt that we are witnessing a new “Revolutionary Offensive*” in Cuba. This time, it is not that cumbersome operation that wiped out the small private property and, in 1968, gave the coup de grace to whatever mom and pop businesses, stands or cafes barely making ends meet at the beginning of the early socialist plateau and destroyed the services that the State was never able to meet. The methodology has changed, we can all agree on this, but the purpose is about the same.

Now, when the government takes a conciliatory stance and desperately seeks the arrival of capital that it has so demonized, it tries to retract to a minimum, but without fuss, the glimpses of private initiative. All this, given the danger posed to the olive green autocracy by the coexistence of relatively autonomous sectors within the island with the avalanche of businessmen and foreign tourists that are expected to flood the country as soon as the restrictions imposed by the embargo and the Helms Burton Act begin to disappear.

However, it cannot be said that, with Raul’s offensive against the small private sector, we are either facing a circumstantial situation or that it is about the regime’s improvisation. In fact, the circumstance was the initiation of the “self-employed” initiative that constituted an escape valve for the government, needing to move the domestic economy, and the creation of new jobs that would lighten the load for the State. continue reading

After all, the General-President always said that with the implementation of self-employment, new ways to reactivate the economy were being “experimented with” for a more prosperous and sustainable socialism. Nevertheless, it is unnecessary to recall that he also made assurances that there would be “no turning back”. What he did not make clear then is that there would be numerous constraints for this sector; so many that they would end up strangling many small entrepreneurs, forcing them to give up.

The crusade began almost on par with the openings, just a couple of years later. Suffice it to review some not-so-random events. In December 2013, dozens of self-employed persons who were engaged in imported apparel surrendered their licenses after liquidating their goods. They were bound by the express official ban against continuing with their business activities. The restrictive measure at that time was justified by a simple appeal: licenses to market imported goods had never been issued, since the self-employed did not pay import taxes and the State has an absolute monopoly on that activity. Those merchants were only allowed to sell handmade clothing manufactured in their capacity as dressmakers, tailors and seamstresses. Ergo, there was no official deceit, but the letter of the law had been misinterpreted or deliberately distorted by the self-employed.

Unofficially, it was an open secret that State stores dealing in hard currencies had had significant declines in sales of clothing, shoes and other items since the beginning of commercial activity of the self-employed because the small business owners’ merchandise offered more variety and was of better quality and price. On the other hand, in the shadow of this new trade, and in the absence of a wholesale market, a whole shenanigans of “mules” had proliferated, bringing goods from different countries of the region and keeping private markets stocked.

In short, individuals in the private trade successfully emulated the State, not only just in sales, but also in rustling, thus creating efficient supply channels that outwitted official controls.

The healthiest logic in that case would have been to set import tariffs and to expand the content of what was included in the sellers’ authorizing licenses. We know that such a concession would go against the restrictive nature of the system itself, though the State has proven, amply and sufficiently, its inability to meet the demands of the population, not to mention the deplorable quality of its offerings. As we say in classical Cuban, “we had to ditch the couch**.” Thus, 2014 began with a considerable decrease in the self-employed sector, although the official press declared otherwise.

In recent days, however, it has finally been officially acknowledged and spoken by the very officials in charge of the case that a high number of self-employed individuals have returned their licenses. The sector has been contracting and this time the decline covers a wider spectrum of occupations.

Everything indicates that the amount of the excessive tax imposed – which has gradually been increased for some occupations — the permanent scourge of an army of corrupt inspectors, the absence of the promised wholesale market, the arbitrariness of the established rules and fines, the “under declarers” and other equally absurd legal restrictions, are taking a toll on these “entrepreneurs” who once believed in the good intentions and the irreversibility of Raul’s reforms.

Interestingly, the segment of those engaged in the rental of rooms and apartments has benefited from a significant tax decrease, though taxes still remain high. It is likely that the faulty hotel infrastructure and the lack of State variants to meet the influx of tourists and other visitors is influencing official tolerance in favor of those who are legally making a living from this activity. Goodwill towards landlords will go on, at least until the State produces an adequate number of units to assimilate the tourist boom that is beginning to surface.

For now, let’s allow the fluctuations in the saga of the self-employed sector to be an example of the ineffectuality of our laws for those who venture to negotiate with old olive-green thugs; but also as an indicator of the high expectations of the Castro regime before the arrival of the cherished foreign investors, which will be – without any doubt — shroud and epitaph of what was once the domestic business sector prototype… dead before being born.

Translator’s notes:
*”Revolutionary Offensive” is the name Fidel Castro applied to the final government confiscation, in 1968, of all remaining private businesses in Cuba, down to the smallest shoeshine stand.
**This common Cuban expression comes from a joke about a cuckolded husband who comes home and sees his wife snuggling on the sofa with her lover. Enraged, he decides to throw out the sofa.

Translated by Norma Whiting

Cuba: Capitalism has Won the War / Miriam Celaya

Cubanet, Miriam Celaya, Havana, 8 June 2015 — In the beginning, there were the cassettes, first the ones we viewed on ancient Betamax equipment, and a bit later on VHS. In those dark years in the 90’s, the illegal dealers, better known as “messengers” would arrive with their backpacks, pedaling their inseparable bikes, from customer to customer. They charged of 5 or 10 Cuban pesos rent per cassette, depending how many movies were on each tape and the quality of the recording.

Video equipment was not readily available among Cubans, so the happy owner of one of these was not only privileged, but he would become the host of friends and nearby neighbors who eluded the harsh reality of the so-called “Special Period,” taking refuge in some colorful Hollywood product or another, usually recorded by the even more restricted group –favored among the favored- who owned a DIRECTV antenna.

Sharing a show or a movie was also a matter of affinity and solidarity at a time when almost all Cubans suffered the brunt of an economic crisis which, in the same way as the system that generated it, seemed to have no end. So some fellow invitees would agree to rotate the expense for renting the cassettes or contribute some snack to improve the get together, such as tea or coffee or another beverage, duly accompanied by roasted chickpeas. continue reading

The messenger, meanwhile, had to have sufficient intuitiveness and training to sort out certain obstacles. His was an illicit occupation, so the risk of an envious denouncement on the part of a member of the CDR [Committee for the Defense of the Revolution] or police harassment. Law enforcement officials would hunt down the messengers to confiscate the tapes and later resell them on the black market to another messenger or the owner of some video store, which was also illegal. Thus, the circle was complete.

The authorities had arranged a police hunt to end this practice, which favored “the imperialism’s ideological penetration” in the Cuban population, and affected “especially the young.” In workplaces–in particular those involved in social sciences and research–the battle against the subtle enemy propaganda was an essential point in the guidelines of the nuclei of the Cuban Communist Party (PCC) and the administrative and syndicate leadership, though many of the leaders themselves and almost all of the workers were regular users of the “venomous” product.

Thus, while during working hours the system’s bureaucrats railed against “track two,” the official label for the “ideological war” of the US government against Cuba, on the domestic front the consumption of the demonized product was growing exponentially. Without a doubt, the same “black” propaganda that the government whipped up against foreign shows and movies only managed to interest the audience in favor of its consumption. The olive-green battle against Yankee influence was doomed to failure.

The “antenna” and DVD’s, imperialist agents of the “zero years”

With the arrival of the twenty-first century and of new informational and communication technologies, video-cassettes were falling into obsolescence, even on this backward and un-computerized island.

During the last few years of the previous decade, DVD technology made its entrance, supplanting old video equipment and favoring the proliferation of CD’s“burned” in some living room, and distributed the same way by a whole army of messengers. The use of satellite dishes proliferated, and their owners rented out their networks to the homes in their vicinity which were able to pay for the use of those services.

Although limited to the preferences of the owner’s shows, the system expanded rapidly in the capital and main cities with large population concentrations, which made it difficult for the repressive forces to detect and confiscate the equipment.

On the other hand, the more technology moved forward, the more difficult the struggle against it. It was no longer about pursuing messengers fleeing on bikes through the maze of streets, but it was necessary to mobilize specialized resources, personnel and equipment, in addition to police patrols that needed to take part in confiscating equipment and arresting offenders.

Such deployment of repressive forces carrying out their duties on one block allowed for entertainment dealers to dismantle equipment in the surrounding areas, stowing it in secure sites. Soon Cubans learned to identify the minivan with the signage “Radio Cuba” that headed the police delegation, and soon the owners of the antennas also had their own informants at the police station, who, through bribes, would warn them ahead of time about the confiscating operations. At any rate, each piece of seized equipment was like a Greek war victory dance for the authorities, taking into account the cost of the operation and the meagerness of the harvest.

The government would score another embarrassing defeat against resources dictated by popular fancy and the experience of half a century of survival in the midst of ploys and unlawfulness.

The Internet, the devil incarnate

With that stubbornness of the mentally castrated, today’s official lackeys pull out their hair and rend their garments before the evidence of the inevitable: the preference of the overwhelming majority of Cubans for the cultural products of “savage capitalism.”. The illegal vessel that now often lands on a weekly basis in Cuban homes is the so-called “package” which has broken all records set by its predecessors’ audiences.

Today, it is almost impossible not to hear from a neighboring home the sounds of regular foreign TV. The package has invaded national domestic life to such an extent that Cuban TV has become an almost furtive intruder amidst an empire of consumption of smuggled audiovisual materials.

An external hard drive is all it takes to transport terabytes of capitalist entertainment and culture that is broadcast in “socialist” Cuban homes at affordable prices, between 25 and 30 Cuban pesos, to break through the grayness of State TV programming.

However, the appointed censors, with that infinite vanity that makes them believe they are arbiters of what should be the general taste and the managers of what each Cuban on the Island should culturally consume, labels as “banality” peoples’ tastes favoring a soap opera from wherever over Cuban TV’s La Mesa Redonda (The Roundtable) and knowing by heart each new series that airs, every movie that comes out, and what Alexis Valdés newest joke is, in addition to a host of musical talents and of the most diverse foreign shows, including cartoons and a great variety of kids programming that fills in the gaps, the blandness, and the poor quality of Cuban TV programming dedicated to children.

Much to the despair of frustrated cultural bureaucrats, the antenna has now been enriched by the undisputed power of the Internet, that “runaway horse,” shortening the time between what is produced and what is consumed in the cultural field, in addition to allowing coherent news updates outside the government system.

A lost war

In this vein, it is not surprising that the official cymbals and trumpets have summoned their cultural curators and their rusty institutions to fight yet another battle against Yankee penetration, as if this was not already a fait accompli. The cultured officials, like vestal virgins, are outraged with the surrender of the former warrior people to the seductive charms of the consumer society.

With their characteristic lack of creativity, the ever-killjoys have launched their own strategy: “backpack” — a ridiculous parody of the “package” — whose most eloquent proof of modernization is the inclusion, among their offerings, of Cuban TV series that made history with the national audience in the ’80s: ” “En Silencio ha Tenido que Ser” [It’s had to be in Silence], “Julito el Pescador” [Little Julio the Fisherman] or “Algo Más que Soñar” [Something Else to Dream About]. And they still expect to be taken seriously.

The truth is that, as technology makes strides and its messengers refine their strategies of survival to escape official controls and sell their products, repression –just like the system it represents — continues to be tied to the same methods of surveillance and prosecution typical of the Cold War era. They remain anchored to a past that will not return.

By now it is obvious that Cubans like a colorful world that arrives each week in the package more than the promise of eternal poverty that everyday life throws at them. The socialist mirage that mobilized us decades ago has died a natural death: it suffocated, submerged in its own failure. The date that today excites humble Cubans is with capitalism, even if, for the moment, it’s only through their TV screens.

Translated by Norma Whiting

Women Before Their Time / Cubanet, Luis Cino Alvarez

On May 17, on the Sunday television program Passage to the Unknown, the journalist and host Reinaldo Taladrid, and guest psychologist Patricia Ares, addressed the issue of gender training received unconsciously by many girls. Training them, from very early days, to be future frivolous objects of erotic pleasure.

The phenomenon of the eroticism of childhood, although it happens worldwide for various reasons, has reached alarming proportions in Cuba.

For some years, it has become common for many parents to dress their daughters as if they were harlots in miniature. To demonstrate how precocious they are, in whatever party there may be, they are encouraged to wiggle, and to shake their rear ends – which still haven’t developed – more than all the rest. The more lasciviously the better, shaking to the most obscene reggaton. continue reading

Not to mention the expensive photos and videos of girls’ quinceañeras – their fifteenth birthdays – in which they change into several outfits rented for the occasion, little girls portrayed nearly naked, wrapped in towels or the briefest thongs, with eyes rolled back and tongues hanging out, in poses that are more suitable for porn stars than quinceañeras.

Taladrid and Dr. Ares, worried about the way in which many parents are violating the developmental stages of their daughters, commented on the increased “adultization” of childhood and the “infantilization” of adulthood. Both blame the problem of macho sexism that afflicts us on the harmful influences of our capitalist consumer society, globalization, Barbie dolls, reggaeton, indiscriminate cultural consumption, the “weekly packet,” and video-clips of Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Beyonce and Shakira.

The journalist and psychologist also may have spoken not only of sexy clothes – practically those of harlots – the suggestive dances in the parties at home and also at school celebrations, almost always encouraged by the teachers themselves; but also how many mothers and fathers encourage their daughters and sons to ask family and friends living abroad for gifts of every kind, and money, a lot of money, when they come to visit Cuba.

What matters less to these parents is the development of values in their children. Spirituality, values, not behaving so as to be able to buy things in the hard currency stores. Who doesn’t regret it when they see their offspring turned into female and male prostitutes.

There are too many Cuban parents, who in the midst of the national disaster, are turning their girls and boys into adults before their time. What is even more serious, are those who turn into the worst class of adults: materialists, hedonists, self-serving,cynical, amoral. They shall inherit our kingdom of lies and wreckage. Amen.

#TodosMarchamos, We All March, or Fear of Freedom / Cubanet, Antonio Rodiles

Cubanet, Antonio Rodiles, Havana, 3 June 2015 – Right from the year 1959, Fidel Castro made it very clear that public spaces were only for “Revolutionaries.” To achieve this objective he converted every public act in a harangue to intimidate the citizenry. Very quickly Cubans saw that the saber-rattling was converted into actions and mobs that could demolish them and their loved ones. Terror was implanted, the “Revolution” imposed.

Fifty-six years later, totalitarianism seeks to maintain its power with the tool it knows best, violence. Reactivating the panic genes that put you in a straightjacket is the regime’s priority.

Can Cuba change if we continue to sustain the memory of fear? Can Cuba change if we accept the terms of some decrepit old men and their followers?

It is not about a dilemma between a supposedly peaceful change and a violent one, as some want to show. Cuba will change if we feel the determination to make it so, if we push a genuine desire to end the nonsense and the stupidity. continue reading

For eight Sundays, the regime has brutally repressed a group of opponents who, together with the Ladies in White, demand the release of the political prisoners. Two points are intolerable for the dictatorship: that we demand the inmates be released, and that we exercise our right to demonstrate publicly and peacefully.

However, what has been unexpected is the ability to resist that we have demonstrated in the face of the abuses and the impunity of the repressive forces. Nearly a hundred activists, we continue to attend despite the violence they impose on us. It is hard, but our rights are worth it. We don’t know how many more Sundays of abuse and outrages await us, but we are confident that we will win freedom.

Last week we asked some friends to support us, because we need help to sustain this demand in the face of the silence of the international community. Quickly they promoted the Twitter hashtag #Todoas Marchamos (We All March). A “twittazo” – Twitter protest – against repression was organized, in support of the Sunday marches. And the result could not be better. Thousands of Tweets flooded the Internet. Seeing them was a balm after so much abuse.

Next Sunday we will be back on the street along with the Ladies in White, those humble women, laden with virtues and defects, but who have persevered like few others, and to whom we will be grateful for the Cuba of the future.

Hopefully many will join. Off the Island, let all those Cubans who yearn for a change send their Tweets, or gather in public spaces to show that Cuba is hurting. Within Cuba, let the rest of the opposition understand that the street is a space belonging to everyone, and that the blows hurt, but more painful for us is the indifference.

If #TodosMarchamas – If we all march – on Sunday, the fear and the disctatorship are finished. Let’s do it.

What Is the General Plotting? / Cubanet, Rafael Alcides

Cubanet, Rafael Alcides, Havana, 26 May 2015 – From a distance I saw them arguing. They were father and son—they could not be heard, but their animated gesticulations spoke volumes. The son, already in his 60s; the father, a captain in the Sierra, who escaped from the Party a while back, is a person I’ve always gotten along with, although we are not intimate friends. Finishing the discussion, the son was telling him, as I approached, “I will not forgive you for that.” And the captain, catching up with me, replied, “Because you’re blind.”

Unexpectedly, he asked me if I believed in the sincerity with which Obama and those people from the European Union (EU) were accepting the “skeleton deal” that Raúl had sprung on them, “unless Raúl is also partaking of those magic powders of Belarmino’s,” he remarked sadly.

As he was also on his way to the farmers market, hopeful of finding a little bunch of lettuce, at least, or a carrot, and because my columns tend to focus on the national situation not from my own viewpoint but rather from what people are saying on the street, I listened to him intently. Given his age, his “Belarmino” quip might be considered a flight of senility, but in the captain’s account, it was quite realistic.

When Belarmino would arrive at a dance, some girl would soon disappear in the darkness for a while, and so would Belarmino. continue reading

A thirty-something jabao [light-skinned mixed-race man] with a gold tooth, and sporting a linen guayabera even when going down to the river to bathe, Belarmino was the proprietor of the town funeral home. The term “funeral home” here is generous, because in that little shack, nobody ever lay in state. People would come and buy the coffin—built by Belarmino himself—to take away by horse or wagon.

In the town where Belarmino was previously established, and from where he had to flee under protection from the rural police, he “damaged” fourteen teenage girls, and took to his bed everyone and their mothers for he had some magic powders that made him irresistible. In the brief time in which he resided in the captain’s town, he had no chance to use them because very soon the girls were being hidden by their parents or sent to relatives up in the hills; and a lovestricken quinceañera [a girl celebrating her 15^th birthday], resisting being sent away, hanged herself. Belarmino became invisible. He was never heard from again.

Perhaps, the captain did not deny, there are in politics powders that have equal powers of seduction to those used by that Belarmino of his childhood. Why did the captain say this? He began to list the reasons:

Upon nationalization [taking possession of foreign-owned properties, businesses and industries in the Revolution’s early years], Fidel and Raúl left the Americans living in Cuba—and the priests, and most Spanish merchants, as well—without even the laces to tie their shoes. They took down God from His altar, implanted a political system that is the negation of everything that had been known in these parts, agitated the political henhouse of the region (because this America of today is not the same as in the 1950s), and now—as if none of this had taken place—suddenly, almost 60 years on, the United States gives in, the EU gives in, the Pope smiles, and Raúl continues to make demands. Besides removing Cuba from the list of state sponsors of terrorism, and reestablishing diplomatic relations, the USA now has to return the naval base in Guantánamo and lift the embargo—and maybe even indemnify it. Could this be understood?

As psychiatrists do, I responded with another question. “Where are you going with this?” And he, in psychiatric fashion, asked me if I believed in the power of Belarmino’s magic powders. He was laughing at me. In any case, for him, the situation was very clear: Whereas the super-powerful United States could impose on Cuba the “skeleton deal”—as in his straightforward way of speaking privately Raúl Roa characterized this relationship—Cuba couldn’t do the same with the US, nor with the EU. And so given that Raúl doesn’t possess anything similar to Belarmino’s magic powder, nobody here should lose hope yet. Nobody, affirmed the captain resolutely. Another thing: Hadn’t Fidel kept until the right time the secret that the Revolution was Communist?

At the farmers market there was nothing green to be found—except for some mangoes going for five pesos per pound, which were already under the effect of some evil liquid that in two hours makes them look ripe on the outside, but on the inside they are acidic and greenish, and ready for pitching into the trash 48 hours later, covered by then with a white mold resembling a sinister cobweb. The captain mourned them, recalling the mangoes of his childhood, when the best of them—the fragrant mango bizcochuelo—cost two cents, and others—including the Toledo mango—could be purchased by the bag, filled to the top, for a nickel. But he did not ask for my view on his theory regarding the Raúl-Obama-EU-Pope Francis issue. Having undergone his catharsis, what could my opinion matter to him?

Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison

About the Author

Rafael Alcides: A short biography is here.

Mariel, the Past and Present of an Exodus / Cubanet, Camilo Ernesto Olivera

Fishing school, El Mosquito camp in 1980, seen from the point of view of the River Homonimo (photo by the author)

“They left through here and will never return,” recited a sign on the wall of the power plant. Nevertheless, those who “left” became the support of those who stayed. Today many share the Miami exile with those who said goodbye to them by throwing eggs or rocks

Cubanet.org, Camilo Ernesto Olivera Peidro, Havana, 28 May 2015 – In the town of Boca del Mariel there is a small beach preferred by the locals. Next to it are the facilities of the former bulk sugar terminal. A little further beyond operates the Maximo Gomez power plant.

One Sunday in mid-April 1980 the beach-goers saw four boats flying the flag of the United States enter. They observed how they were directed toward the area of the neighboring pier. At that time the presence of armed Cuban officials became apparent. Later it was learned that there, in a sugar storage warehouse, was the temporary headquarters of the captaincy.

In the days following, the presence of boats and yachts from the north increased. The people from the town of La Boca as well as Mariel were taken militarily by army troops and police personnel. continue reading

Fifteen years earlier the Cuban government had equipped the port of Mariel, located 20 miles to the west of Havana, as an embarkation point for a migratory bridge leading through Boca de Camarioca in Matanzas. Between April and October of 1980, 125,000 Cubans left for Florida, in what came to be known in the United States as the Mariel Boat Lift.

The way of the cross of the Marielitos

The Cuban government announced that all who wanted to do so could leave. But, as a condition, they had to apply for permanent dismissal from their places of work or education. With this safe-conduct pass, many who had taken refuge in the Peruvian embassy went out. They were victims of fascist acts of repudiation in favor of the regime.

Many Cubans carried out diverse actions in order to visit relatives who were waiting for them in that port. Men, women and children arrived there with visible signs of the humiliation suffered at their places of origin.

But something as bad or worse awaited them at the last stop.

At the corner of the Wakamba pizzeria, the mobs armed with sticks and iron bars lurked, cheered on by local government officials. Those who arrived were hunted down and beaten with a vengeance. Then the police “intervened.”

Little beach near the mouth of the port, town of Boca del Mariel (photo by the author)

Those attacked were taken to the Border Guard Unit known as El Mosquito, located at the mouth of the river of the same name four kilometers from Mariel. They were confined there for days or weeks. The conditions in the barracks were inhumane. They mixed the families with criminals or prisoners taken from penitentiaries, sent to this checkpoint to then be deported. The place was guarded by armed military personnel and trained dogs.

On the trip back, the buses took a route to Mariel crossing the bridge. At the end of this, the authorities posted children brought from the schools of Baracoa and Henequen. The teachers passed out eggs and rocks for the students to throw at those in the vehicles.

Currently, on this site, where so many Cubans suffered, is a school that teaches fishing.

The threshold of freedom

The pier of the Camaronera Flota (today the Astilleros Astimar Company) was the last step in the way of the cross. Those who were leaving were concentrated there on two boats next to the pier, at that time, empty and half finished. They waited to be called from a list. Then on boarding they passed through another control.

As a condition of being able to take their relatives, those who came with the boats had to permit themselves to let their decks be stuffed with other people of various kinds. There were those who chose refuge for their families in the cabins.

When the boats pulled away from the coast, the last image, from afar, was of the columns of smoke coming from the chimneys of the Mariel power plant.

Entry point of the former Mosquito Camp, currently a fishing school (photo by the author)

On a stretch of the perimeter wall of that plant, there was for many years a sign that said: “Through here they left and they will never return.”

The sign disappeared during the nineties. That was when the crisis increased. Those who “left” turned into the support for those who stayed.

Today those who left in 1980 share exile in Miami with many who said goodbye with eggs or rocks and later fled in the raft stampede of 1994.

The dictatorship that made them abandon the country still governs with an iron fist poorly disguised with a fine silk glove.

Pizzaria Wakamba in Mariel where the trip ended on Route 218 from Miramar (photo by the author)

Warehouse where the registry of the Port Captaincy was located during the Mariel exodus (photo by the author)

Muro-de-la-refineria-Maximo-Gomezen-este-tramo-existio-este-cartel-Por-aqui-salieron-y-jamas-volveran-Foto-Camilo-Ernesto-Olivera-722x505 — Section of the Maximo Gomez refinery wall where the sign existed (photo by the author)

About the author

Camilo Ernesto Olivera Peidro – City of Havana (September 14, 1970) – Screenwriter and Researcher – He has participated in theorist events in almost all the rock festivals that have taken place in Cuba from 2001 to the present – Workshop for screenwriting, production and staging of musical events (UNEAC, CARICATO) 2004 Graduate of television script and drama course (ICRT Teletransmisora training department) 2006 collaborator on Cuban non-official publications concerning the rock genre like “El Punto G,” “Insanedrac,” “Ilusion.” Since December 2007, he has been part of the Cuban Rock Agency where he works as a cultural promoter and member of the editorial board of the magazine “Rock del Patio” (in process). His texts are published in “La Corchea” (ICM), websites AHS, maximrock.com, cubametal.com, esquife.cu, Cubaencuentro, Voces, Cubanet and Diario de Cuba.

Translator: MLK

Laritza Diversent, the Cuban Lawyer who met with Obama / Cubanet, Manuel Guerra Perez

Laritza Diversent independent lawyer (Internet photo)

Cubanet, Manual Guerra Perez, Havana, 30 April 2015 — Laritza Diversent is a lawyer and director of the Cubalx Center of Legal Information, an independent office that has offered free legal advice since 2010. She graduated from the University of Havana in Law (2008), she is married and has a 16-year-old son.

What exactly is Cubalex and for what purpose did this project come about?

Cubalex is an office that specializes in human rights issues, focusing on national law and the conventions of international laws, which Cuba supposedly relies on. We try to document violations of Human Rights, but our core business is to provide free legal advice to citizens.

The legal advice is for citizens who are ignorant of the law with regards to disparate issues, topics as diverse as housing, criminal, immigration procedures, in short, the varied issues we face daily. Always in legal terms.

Do you collaborate with lawyers from the collective law firms to represent your clients? Who makes up Cubalex?

Our organization is composed of several lawyers, human rights activists, a medical assistant, paralegal and secretary, here in Havana. We also have offices in Camagüey, Granma and Las Tunas. We received requests from the Isle of Youth and to the East, from Baracoa for example. continue reading

We do not work with lawyers from the collective law firms, although we do work with other independent lawyers. They don’t allow us to represent our clients in court proceedings, so we have no link with lawyers from collective law firms.

Should Cuba modify the current judicial system?

The Cuban judicial system needs many reforms. Many articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are not addressed in national legislation. There are no laws to exercise the right to complain, protest, freedom of speech, nor for the protection of women, or people with disabilities.

Cuba has signed many international treaties that have no direct application within the system. The National Assembly (Parliament) has had no interest in legislating on human rights issues. This is a very difficult issue for the government. To date it has not evidenced any intention to provide protection or guarantees for citizens’ rights.

Recently you lost a lot of information from computers in this center

There was a robbery in our office where they stole all the computers, all the mass storage media with all the information of years of work.

It was an intentional theft, with a specific order to take only what contained information. My husband and I were abroad and my son had gone to school.

At that time part of the team was undertaking a training abroad. Inside the house there was valuable equipment that wasn’t stolen. This incident resulted in our being unable to serve the public for a month.

Why are people flocking to Cubalex and not the collective law firms?

I think in collective law firms they don’t give the required attention to their clients. They do not provide the free legal advice they offer and we do.

The lawyers of the collective law firms have a conflict of interest because they act on behalf of an individual and the state at the same time.

The Ministry of Justice has established fees for legal service contract but the lawyers of the collective firms charge extra to try to complement the service they offer. The people who usually come to us are poor and are unable to pay those extra fees a lawyer asks. If a customer does not pay those fees, there is a complete lack of interest and motivation that results in little or no results.

In many cases, lawyers for law firms act more like judges and prosecutors than like defense lawyers. They are also ignorant with regard to Human Rights, which is where we specialize. ”

Cubalex office in Havana (photo by the author)

Cubalex collaborates with international organizations

We collaborate on Human Rights, information and complaints to agencies of the United Nation. With the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights or the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, through the provision of injunctions, presenting petitions, hearings. We also have contacts with other international organizations specializing in human rights and other related organizations.

We had to go to these institutions because we are not educated on Human Rights. Although we studied law we were not given adequate training on the subject and so we had to go to these organizations to give us tutorials, information to present strategic litigation at the international level on this issue, as we do the State. If this does not resolve it, then we present them to international organizations. This is the kind of relationship that we have these bodies.

Do you feel satisfied with the work done Cubalex?

We have grown from the legal, personal and cognitive point of view. We have been able to learn more about the concerns of the population, to know what are the main violations toward society. In 2013 we went to the United Nations and participated in report to the Cuban State on the convention on discrimination against women. We have presented reports on people with disabilities, the situation of human rights defenders such as the Ladies in White and independent journalists at hearings of the Inter-American Commission. We want to give a minimum of information to the majority who do not know that Human Rights are violated in Cuba. We live in a society almost closed in terms of information, with limited access to the Internet.

Have Cubalex members been assaulted or harassed by the authorities?

Assaulted, not directly, but they have been visited by the Department of State Security (DSE) members working here. Our lawyers in Eastern Cuba have received a lot of pressure because the authorities say they will not allow a site like we have here. Authorities also increased the smear campaigns in digital media.

We have requested an injunction from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that was given to us to protect our work team. The State must follow the recommendations of the Commission although we know that they do not do so but have responsibilities toward the commission. Therefore we ask for our lives and our personal integrity. Everyone knows that the Law 88 remains in force, it has not been commuted, or suspended, so we fear that they could take any legal action against us.

What are your thoughts on the resumption of relations between the governments of the United States and Cuba?

On a personal level I am in favor of this reset because I think it’s the first step to end the conflict. This is a conflict between governments and those who principally suffer are the Cuban people.

On the other hand, the new policy published by the White House on the issue of the private sector, human rights, support for civil society and communications, we still have reservations about, in the sense that there is a legal system of citizen control that prevents this development. Because I believe it is a necessary step does not mean I agree with everything or believe that it will be effective.

It is the responsibility of civil society to find information on these legal restrictions that exist and prevent the politics of goodwill of the United States toward the private sector (which I still insist this sector does not exist in Cuba), Human Rights and civil society, to warn about the dangers could represent, because here there is a blockade of the government against its citizens.

The contact between the two governments has awakened civil society, which sees that change in Cuba is not dependent on any foreign government but on Cubans themselves. We are preparing ourselves, therefore to seek ways to put pressure on the government, if they do not want to talk to us we have to out pressure on them to do so.

Barack Obama meet in Panama (Internet photo)

How would you describe VII Summit of the Americas in Panama, where you participated?

In general terms the summit was a positive balance for independent Cuban civil society, and I had the opportunity to participate on an equal footing with others in Latin America. This was very helpful to make it known that there are people in Cuba who think differently than the government, who want democracy and respect for human rights.

Moreover, the Cuban State showed its own nature, violent and intolerant.

Describe your meeting with US President Barack Obama, in the forum of civil society in Panama

“Firstly I should clarify that I didn’t participate in the forum of civil society, as I was not accepted by the Panama NGO that selected the participants.

I was in a private meeting by invitation, where the dissident Manuel Cuesta Morua and 13 other leaders of Latin American civil society were also present. There President Barack Obama expressed his support to foster the development of civil society in the region, and invited those present to say in which way they (also there were the the presidents of Uruguay and Costa Rica) could support us and encourage the Latin American civil society. Venezuela and Cuba were the ones who began to offer recommendations because both countries have the most repressive contexts in the entire region. Most agree that civil society must have sources of funding to develop and to carry out their projects.

In my particular case I called attention to the dangers that surround the Cuban legal system with regard to the policy that the US government intends to develop with Cuba on the issue of the private sector, communications and everything else. It is impossible to obtain any financial or material resources through donations or any other kind of help that can be given by current banking regulations within Cuba.

State Inefficiency, Convenient Business / Cubanet, Ernesto Perez Chang

Selling yields no benefits (photo by the author)

Cubanet.org, Ernesto Perez Chang, Havana, 22 May 2015 — Attestations about poor or non-existent attention in Cuban state businesses are so abundant that few pay attention to them. In order to offer a response to the indignant, the island’s official press searches for causes of such abuse not in the inefficiency of the state enterprise but in other absurd factors like poor education or lack of professionalism, which do not reveal the corrupt essence of a system that, in spite of the proof of its uselessness, will be kept in place by government will, as is expressed in the Guidelines of the Sixth Congress of the Communist Party.

Why do we receive better treatment in a private restaurant or cafeteria? Why do customer demands bother the clerk and managers of a state eatery and why do they not improve the quality of their offerings? Why do they hide behind any justification in order to remain closed or to reduce their public service hours to the minimum?

According to Vladimir Rodriguez, owner of a busy little restaurant in downtown Vedado, the problem is in the objectives of each:

“As the owner of my business I seek to attract more customers, to offer more variety. I listen to the opinions of the people, the suggestions, I serve them like they were kings because it winds up as earnings. In a state restaurant the earnings do not come from the clients’ consumption and satisfaction but in that quite miserable thing that happens in the warehouse, in the sale to the black market of everything that arrives to be produced and sold to the customers, who turn into a nuisance. What little gets to the table is only to justify the work in case an inspector comes, but the clerks as well as the manager live on the black market. continue reading

“That is something everyone knows. (…) I worked for years in restaurants in Havana, even in luxury hotels in Varadero, and what I saw in the kitchens is nasty. (…) Rice that customers leave on their plates went back in the casseroles, a bit of meat, salads, the olives, everything that people leave on the plates is served again. That is way of dealing with leftovers. That’s why I left and opened my own business. I would not be caught dead in a State restaurant; God only knows what they are serving you.”

For Iraida, a clerk in a private cafeteria in Arroyo Naranjo, the matter is more complicated: “It is a secret to no one that in the stores as well as in all the state enterprises the people do not work, they are going, as they say, to struggle, that is to say, to steal. And the worst is that the government knows it and “plays the silly goat” [pretends not to know]. (…) Why? Because it is convenient for them. If they attack the black market the people will rebel because everyone lives off that, even them. There, yes, the revolution is over. They promised to create a wholesale market for the self-employed and even now we continue in the same way, buying on the black market because there is nothing in the stores or if there is, it is hidden in the warehouses, so that you have to buy from a warehouseman, who has a fix with the manager, and so forth and so on. There you realize that the government is involved in that mess (…) if it does not benefit with money, at least it does by leaving it to the people ‘to struggle’ so that they see the ‘blessings of socialism.’ In troubled waters, fishermen gain.”

Marta Li, owner of a café in Vedado, illustrates for us with her own examples what she considers the superiority of private enterprise. “In a State café no one worries about serving the customer well because it does not end up as earnings. They sell or not, the salary is the same for the manager as well as for the sales clerk. They care about what is left from a liter of oil and the chicken, to resell the cheese and the spaghetti; they are not sold because no one would buy them. I, on the other hand, have to constantly create sales strategies; my objective is that nothing is left, not in the pots or in the freezers, to sell everything because what I have paid is quite a lot. (…) Since I am close to the university, I make offers to the students who present their student ID, I discount the price. Sometimes for someone who buys more than one pizza or for a repeat customer I give them a free drink. People come because they know that they will receive good attention. It is not about lowering prices but giving good service.”

Customers do not matter; what’s good is what happens in the warehouse (photo by the author)

A former civil servant of a business enterprise in Havana, who wishes to remain anonymous because she is currently the owner of a restaurant, tells us of her experiences in a state business:

“Satisfying the customer is the last of the priorities [of a state enterprise]. Whatever it may be. They all work in order to steal everything that can be stolen and in the least time possible. One enters with good intentions and ends up coming to terms with the corruption because there is no other path. (…) The socialist economy has neither feet nor head. When I studied [economics] at the university the professors themselves said that there is no way to explain the Cuban economy. And when you try to apply any model you realize that they all fail. (…) It is not that you propose to steal, it’s that you have to do it because everyone is out for himself. It didn’t matter to me or to any of the workers in all the stores where I worked, which were more than twenty; it didn’t matter if the wages were low or not, not even the bonus, the salary was a formality, the true earnings are not even on the counter as many think. Where the money comes from (…) is not the counter. And be careful with making yourself the conscious one [honest] because you wind up blaming yourself for everything.”

Will they be able someday to prove the efficiency of the socialist state enterprise, as Cuban leaders claim, based on a couple of suspicious exceptions? According to the recent statements by Miguel Diaz-Canel, this “demonstrative work” is one of the main undertakings of “the country’s leadership with the Cuban people.” As if half a century of failures that we Cubans currently suffer did not matter, the government pushes to prolong an economic experiment behind which is hidden a vast fabric of corruption.

Against that piece of nonsense, for years it has been very common to hear on the street a phrase that sums up the inefficiency of state enterprises: “The government pretends to pay us, and we pretend to work.”

Outside the businesses, in the doorways, people resell products on the black market, in view of everyone (photo by the author).

Iniciativas-a-favor-del-cliente.-Una-paladar-privada-en-el-Vedado.-Foto-P.-Chang-722x505 — Initiatives in support of the customer. A private restaurant in El Vedado (photo by author)

This snack bar gives students 5% off (photo by author)

Satisfying the customer is the objective of private business. There are more menu items than in State companies. This snack bar gives students 5% off (photo by author)

Guarapera-estatal-cerrada-en-horario-laboral.-Foto-P.-Chang-722x505 — A State business closed during working hours (Photo by author)

About the Author
Ernest Perez Chang (El Cerro, Havana, 15 June 1971). Writer, graduate in philology from the University of Havana. He studied Galician Language and Culture in the University of Santiago de Compostela. He has published the novels: Your Eyes Are in front of Nothing (2006) and Alicia under Her Own Shadow (2012). At the end of 2014, the publisher Silueta, in Miami, will publish his most recent novel: Food. He is also the author of books of stories: Last Photos of Mama Nude (2000); Sade’s Ghosts (2002); Stories of Silk (2003); Variations for the Preliterate (2007), The Art of Dying Alone (2011) and One Hundred Deadly Stories (2014). His narrative work has been recognized with prizes: David de Cuento of the Cuban Gazette twice, 1998 and 2008; Julio Cortazar Latin American Story prize on its first call in 2002; National Critics Prize in 2007; Alejo Carpentier Story Prize in 2011, among others. He has worked as editor for numerous Cuban cultural institutions like the House of the Americas (1997-2008), Art and Literature Publisher, the Center for Research and Development of Cuban Music. He was Chief Editor for the magazine Union (2008-11).

Translated by MLK

“If I had someone to sponsor* me…” / Cubanet, Rafael Alcides

Cubanet, Rafael Alcides, Havana, 19 May 2015 – This morning I woke up pessimistic. There was no milk in the house, and the kind they sell at the “shopping” [hard-currency* store] is priced out of reach for anyone who is not an executive at a firm or who does not have relatives out there who love him very much and are well-off.** But at the bakery where I purchase the bread allotted to me via the libreta [ration book], I ran into somebody who today was more pessimistic than I am. He is a retired teacher and, without taking into account his age, one of those characters who pride themselves on being well informed told him that the ration book is about to be discontinued, that in fact it would be eliminated before August.

The teacher understands that this book weighs heavily in the pocket of the government, but he also thinks that instead of taking it away, the government should make it selective. Neither the powerful musician, nor the executive, nor he who receives remittances from abroad, nor any other characters of the New Bourgeoisie, need the ration book. The teacher, however, retired on a pension of nine dollars per month (that is, less than 30 cents a day), and with no one abroad—what would he do without this small assistance? There are just four little items that the ration book now subsidizes, but these four little items keep him from begging in the streets. The teacher spoke to me very badly of the Revolution, to which he had dedicated his life. continue reading

To console him, and because I don’t believe that, for now, the government intends to abolish the ration book—a costly burden, yes, but an even greater psychological benefit—I advised him to relax. “Don’t believe in rumors,” I told him.

“This was the only life I had,” he replied.

I let him vent.

Have you considered leaving the country?” I asked him.

He sighed heavily.

“If I had someone to sponsor me*…”

I purchased my three little rolls of 20-something grams each, and perhaps because an evil shared among many is easier to bear, I returned home feeling better. On the way back I compared the disenchantment of this teacher—a fragile but dynamic man who used to dress in his militia uniform festooned with all his decorations—with the latest hobby of a certain neighbor. This is a widowed doctor who grew old dreaming of leaving the country, and who, now that he could do so without major paperwork and without losing the house he inherited from his elders, refuses to go. Neither his children nor his nieces and nephews (all of whom are abroad) are able to persuade him otherwise. Of these, one who was visiting in January, told me, grinning, “Imagine, with the remittances we send him, he’s living like a king, with a maid, lots of Viagra, and three, 20-something doctor-girlfriends to keep him busy.”

They seemed to be saying—that disenchanted teacher who wouldn’t know how to live without the ration book, and that doctor who has discovered that, with money, even being widowed and very elderly one can be happy—that the Cuban exodus would not have been so massive had the socialist government been able to provide a privation-free life for the citizen. However, the end of Pinochet, even though he left Chile off the charts in terms of a First-World standard of living, or of Franco, despite the vertiginous development achieved by Spain during the Generalísimo‘s last two decades, demonstrate that the issue is not just an economic one. As I read somewhere once, without freedom there is no lasting splendor. Nor is there ground that can withstand the cathedral placed upon it.

It has always been thus. Rome, once the ruler of the world, that mighty Rome of patricians and slaves where, moreover, the Christian was persecuted, eventually disappeared. A comparable lack of freedom ended Spanish colonial domination of lands in Our America, as well as the English, Portuguese and French. Vanished from that former America were Juan Manuel de Rosas, and Gaspar Rodríguez Francia, and Rufino Barrios and Porfirio Díaz and Gerardo Machado. In the America of my time, that America from when I was young, we saw the last of Trujillo with his braided uniform, and Somoza, and Stroessner, and Pérez Jiménez, and the Brazilian Joao Goulart, and Cuba’s Batista…

In recent times, following the fall of the Berlin Wall, the world has continued lightening up. No longer are there even Hussein, Milosevic, Gaddafi, nor now, finally, that odious fellow in Yemen. With efficiency, in each of these cases, the lack of liberty—that secret gift of the oppressed—has done its fatal deed.

I do not surrender, and therefore do not give up the dream that today or tomorrow—that is, sooner or later (and these things almost always happen when one least expects them)—I and others like me, who number 11 million, including the glum teacher from this morning, will see solutions to our problems putting food on the table—as well as the slum housing, our city falling apart, and everything else that we know too well.

Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison

Translator’s Notes:
* To obtain a visa to immigrate to the U.S., a Cuban national must have a sponsor. This page from the U.S. Interests Section in Havana explains.
** Cuba has two currencies: Cuban pesos, also called moneda nacional (national money), abbreviated CUP; and Cuban convertible pesos, abbreviated CUC. In theory CUCs are a hard currency, but in fact, it is illegal to take them out of Cuba and they are not exchangeable in other countries. Cubans receive their wages and pensions primarily in CUPs, with wages roughly the equivalent of about $20 US per month, and pensions considerably less. The CUC is pegged 1-to-1 to the American dollar, but exchange fees make it more expensive. The CUP trades to the CUC at about 24-to-1. See here a concise description of Cuba’s dual-currency system and an announced plan to unify it.
*** The average Cuban citizen relies on “remittances”—material help—from relatives abroad. A Cuban blogger explains it here.

About the Author

Rafael Alcides was born in Barrancas, municipal district of Bayamo (Cuba) in 1933. A poet and storyteller, he was a master baker in his teen years. He has worked as a farmhand, cane cutter, logger, wrecking crew cook, and manager of a sundries store in a cane-cutters’ outpost. In Havana in the 1950s he worked variously as a mason, broad-brush painter, exterminator, insurance agent, and door-to-door salesman. In 1959 he was the chief information officer for the Department of Latin American Affairs in the Ministry of Foreign Relations, and spokesman of this agency in a daily television program in which he hosted and interviewed foreign political personalities. He was chief press officer and director of Cultural Affairs in the Revolutionary Delegation of the National Capitol.

Among his most recently-published titles are the poetry collections, GMT(2009), For an Easter Bush (2011), Travel Log (2011), Anthologies, in Collaboration with Jaime Londoño (2013), Conversations with God(2014), the journalistic Memories of the Future (2011), the multi-part novel, Ciro’s Ring (2011), and the story collection, A Fairy Tale That Ends Badly (2014).

As of 1993, he had been employed by the Cuban Institute of Radio & Television for more than 30 years as a scriptwriter, announcer, director and literary commentator when, at that time, he ceased all publishing and literary work in collaboration with the regime in Cuba. As a participant in numerous international literary events, Rafael Alcides has given conferences and lectures in countries in Central and South America, Europe, and the Middle East. His texts have been translated into many languages. He was honored with two Premios de la Crítica, and a third for a novel co-written with another author. In 2011 he received the Café Bretón & Bodegas Olarra de Prosa Española prize.

What the Wind Left Behind* / Cubanet, Rafael Alcides

Cubanet, Rafael Alcides, Havana, 10 April 2015 – Havana sixty years ago was a pretty city—clean, young and with no thieves of any consequence in the neighborhood. Around 9:00 at night the garbage truck would make its rounds. It was a regular truck, not one of those modern-day versions that look like interplanetary spaceships. It carried four workmen—two standing and holding on to the rear of the truck, flanking it—the other two at the top. Upon hearing the bell signaling the truck’s approach, the neighbors would hastily place the garbage can at the door, the two men from the rear would toss it with great flair to the ones at the top of the truck, those men would fling it back with equal style, and the can would be placed once again by the door. It was painful to watch them do this work that would cause the street to be enveloped in the stench of rotten melons. However, these men, with the elegance and precision with which they went about their task, made it seem like they were playing an individual basketball game. How many of these vehicles the city possessed, I don’t know, but your neighborhood truck would show up every night, through rain, a cold snap, or the coming of a hurricane.

This was not all.

In the afternoons, a crop duster would fly overhead, fumigating against flies and mosquitoes, and at dawn, Havana smelled clean. Overnight, its streets had been washed down and whisked with the metal brush that was applied between the road and the sidewalk by a powerful machine. The sewer manholes had their covers, the sanitation system was inspected every week, power outages were unknown, and Havana gave the impression of a city inhabited by people who had never done harm to anyone and therefore could live without fear, despite this being a time when the din of sudden gunfire was commonly heard along with the eruption of firecrackers. In the residential neighborhoods open planting beds were common, and in the traditional El Vedado neighborhood, the little foot-and-a-half high wall was established by municipal ordinance. continue reading

Not even the multimillionaire Sarrá** was allowed to hide his mansion behind the sinister metal sheeting so reminiscent of the Nazi crematoria, so in-vogue today among the nascent New Man of the Havana bourgeoisie, with the addition of a pair of large dogs prowling the yard, fierce as lions—whose daily upkeep costs as much as a doctor’s retirement—plus the requisite car alarm. Even regular Joe Schmoes who once had to sell their toilets just to survive have assumed a “bunker mentality,” securing their doors and windows with iron grilles.

It is true that in that Havana prior to the advent of The New Man, the car would slumber near the front door and awaken with its four tires, battery, radio and windshields intact. The petty thief of those days didn’t venture beyond the occasional shirt or boxer shorts fished through a window with a wire coat hanger hooked to the end of a broomstick. You would open the door upon awakening in the morning, and there would be the milk bottle and bread sack that had been left on your stoop. It is also true that, day or night, a generally friendly foot cop (the mean ones were in the squad cars) would guard the block with monastic devotion, he would stop to chat with the neighbors and, where least expected, there he would be, with his whistle and club. The night patrols of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDRs) have not been able to take their place.

Back then Havana had a slum neighborhood called, “Las Yaguas.” Today it has dozens. The lack of employment had stimulated the presence of door-to-door salesmen and street vendors, persons generally lacking much education. This army’s ranks have increased a hundredfold, and now includes the university professional who in his free time will come to sell you ham, powdered milk, and olive oil. Even the vendor of bleach and brooms, which he lugs on his shoulders, is a high school graduate or mid-grade technician. Amongst female and male prostitutes, a doctoral degree is not uncommon.

It is appalling to see so much bad taste on display in today’s Havana; to see the ruins that make some of its central areas reminiscent of the London depicted in the RKO Pathé newsreels at end of the Second World War; to feel the funereal shudder of buildings that haven’t been painted in years; to contemplate the orthopedics present in a storefront converted into jerry-built housing by a bricklayer without resources; to walk through the streets at dark with the fear of being flattened by a falling balcony. Yes, we have things now that we didn’t have before. The infant mortality rate has been reduced to insignificance, and the embargo continues. But, Ladies and Gentlemen, 56 years have passed, not two or three. Fifty-six: the age of the Republic that is gone with the wind.

About the Author

As of 1993, he had been employed by the Cuban Institute of Radio & Television for more than 30 years as a scriptwriter, announcer, director and literary commentator when, at that time, he ceased all publishing and literary work in collaboration with regime in Cuba. As a participant in numerous international literary events, Rafael Alcides has given conferences and lectures in countries in Central and South America, Europe, and the Middle East. His texts have been translated into many languages. He was honored with two Premios de la Crítica, and a third for a novel co-written with another author. In 2011 he received theCafé Bretón & Bodegas Olarra de Prosa Española prize.

Translator’s Notes:
*The author is likely making a play on the title of the novel, Gone With the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell, which is translated into Spanish as, “Lo Que el Viento Se Llevó” – literally, “What the Wind Swept Away.”
**The Sarrá family was prominent in the pharmaceutical industry in pre-1959 Havana.

Translated by: Alicia Barraqué Ellison

Deportees in Their Own Country / Cubanet, Reinaldo Cosano

In Cuba, if you do not have permission to reside in Havana, they deport you to your province of origin (internet photo)

Cuban Apartheid, suffered by families who abandoned their homes and went to Havana in search of a new life

Cubanet.org, Reinaldo Emilio Cosano Alen, Havana, 15 May 2015 – Rodolfo Castro, from Santiago de Cuba, met with three other young men detained at the Guanabo police station east of Havana. Driven to the Central Train Terminal in a patrol car – so that they could not escape – they were put on the train and deported to their provinces, following imposition of a fine of a thousand Cuban pesos – some 50 dollars – each. So says Osmany Matos, of Guanabo, arrested for a traffic offense who witnessed the incident.

The “Palestinians” (as they ironically call those who come from the eastern provinces) Yordanis Reina, Maikel Cabellero and Edilberto Ledesma, from the rural area El Parnaso; and Amaury Sera, from the Manati township, all in the Las Tunas province, explained to Graciela Orues Mena, independent trade unionist: continue reading

We went to work at Guira de Melena in Mayabeque province, because here either we don’t work or they pay a pittance, always hired by a farmer. One afternoon we were walking through the city with work clothes covered in red dirt, when two police officers asked us for identification. We were arrested and deported for the crime of ‘being illegal.’ They put us on the train with the warning that if we came back we would wind up in the courts. They didn’t let us collect our pay for the time we worked or change clothes or get our belongings. We spent so many hours hungry on the train, without money. An abuse.”

The Crime? Not having a registered address in Havana.

Independent lawyer Rene Lopez Benitez, resident of Arroyo Arenas in Havana, explains: “The Law Decree 217 of April 22, 1997, Internal Migratory Regulations for the City of Havana and its Contraventions, better known as the Internal Immigration Law, tries to control immigration to Havana (also to the capitals of the western provinces). They justify its application because of the dire housing situation, difficulty getting work, public transportation crisis, the supply of water, drainage, electricity, domestic fuel, sanitation, the low level of quality in the provision of other services, which put great pressure on the capital’s infrastructure. The Decree arranges for the eradication of illegal persons and settlements in Havana and the other provincial capitals with work of the Interior Ministry and the National Housing Institute. They have carried out thousands of deportations, forced evictions. Appeals to the Government and the Communist Party for legal protection are a waste of time. The evictions seriously undermine the integrity of entire families, including children and elderly people, who had achieved labor, social and personal stability.”

Slums surround the country’s western cities. There are onslaughts of demolitions “in the name of urban order and discipline in the charge of the Institute of Physical Planning, whose director is the Division General Samuel Rodiles, which intends to eradicate the slum areas that have emerged in the face of the government’s construction paralysis. Now – with the failure of the state initiative – they are trying to increase housing construction through their own efforts and a policy of bank credits and subsidies,” adds Lopez.

Graciela-Orúes — Graciela Orúes (photo by author)

Acts of rebellion across the island against the evictions have managed to paralyze some removals and building collapses.

Resolution 267 of Internal Immigration is at odds with recent laws related to self-employment and Housing. Says Lopez:

“On October 7 of 2010 the Minister of Employment and Social Security issued Resolution 32-2010 arranging for the Regulation of the Practice of Self-Employment by which the restrictions of Law Decree 217 – among other reasons because of lack of work – do not have justification. Many go to the capital to work for themselves in the most varied trades to provide services in construction, plumbing, house cleaning, child care, health care, agriculture, trade, agricultural supplies, farming. Also the essential requirement of proving legality in housing in order to get a license to work is facilitated through Law Decree 288 from the October 28, 2011, Modifications to Law 65, General Law of Housing, in reference to the conveyance of property by buying and selling, inheritance and gift; and it supports the leasing of dwellings, rooms and spaces. All of which, in fact, would annul the restrictions of migration to the capital and decrease the record ‘floating population’ of almost half a million, according to the Housing and Population Census of September 2012.”

The most important thing would be to eliminate, above all, the inhumane deportation. People and even whole families abandoned their homes in order to work, study and try to move forward, but then they were deported like pariahs.

The Internal Immigration Law denies Article 13, Paragraph 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948): “All people have the right to freely move and to choose their place of residence within the borders of a nation.”

The construction industry, prosperous until 1958, was in rapid decline thereafter. Internal deportation for political reasons was used by the colonial Spanish government in the 19^th century. Carlos Manuel de Cespedes (1819-1874), Founding Father, was banished to Contramaestre, near Bayamo, his hometown.

About the Author

Reinaldo Emilio Cosano, Havana, May 1943, graduate in Philology from the University of Havana. He worked as a teacher the last 20 years of his career. He was removed teaching for lack of “political suitability,” as recorded in the minutes of his final dismissal. He was a member of the Cuban Committee for Human Rights and participated in the Cuban Democratic Coalition. He has written for more than ten years for CubaNet, through the Sindical Press agency, with email address of cosanoalen@yahoo.com

Translated by MLK

Fidel Castro’s “Hardships” in Prison / Cubanet, Roberto Jesus Quinones

Fidel Castro’s mug shot (photo from the internet)

“We sleep with the lights off, we have no roll calls or formations all day, we get up whenever (…) Plenty of water, electric lights, food, clean clothes and all for free”

Cubanet.org, Roberto Jesus Quinones Haces, Guantanamo, 15 May 2015 – This May 15 marks the 60^th anniversary of the release of the Moncadistas. The attack on the Moncada barracks is characterized by many as a terrorist act. Beyond the adjectives, always debatable, those who have been charged with praising the rebellious generation and denigrating the army officers of the time say nothing about the soldiers killed that Carnival dawn. Nineteen officers fell, but their names do not count for the official historians.

What would happen today if a group of Cubans, tired of political discrimination and abuses, were to attack a military unit? Would they receive sanctions as benign as those applied to the Moncadistas? Would they be allowed to meet in jail and be separated from the regular prisoners? Would they be granted amnesty? continue reading

The “cruel” prison of the Moncadistas

In the articles that the figureheads of Castro Communism have written about the event, it is emphasized how “cruel” the prison was for the Moncadistas during the year and nine months that they were held. It is embarrassing to read that in comparison with what many opponents of the regime later had to — and still — suffer.

In the book “The Fertile Prison,” published in 1980, historian Mario Mencia says that Melba Hernandez and Haydee Santamaria were sentenced to seven months for their participation in that event, a surprising sentence compared to the sentences currently meted out to the brave women who dare to raise their voices against the regime. Suffice it to say that recently Sonia Garro spent more than a year in jail awaiting trial.

Arriving at the women’s jail at Guanajay, Melba and Haydee were not only allowed to make phone calls to inform their families, but they were fixed up with accommodations consisting of a bedroom, kitchen, bathroom and dining room; they were permitted to receive all kinds of books, visits by family and friends, and they were always separated from the ordinary prisoners. I must add that before 1959 only three women were sentenced for political reasons, all during the Batista dictatorship, an insignificant number if we compare it to what happened after 1959.

The 27 Moncadistas were sent to the Model Prison on the Island of Pines and separated from the common prisoners, something that Castro-communism has never done with political prisoners. Mr. Mencia says that jail was a hell because it had 460 cells for 930 prisoners and only three showers and two toilets per 25 men. I would like, if he is still alive, for Mr. Mencia to see the 2C outpost of the Guantanamo prison where I was a prisoner between 1999 and 2003, a place built for 90 men and that at that time came to house up to three hundred, many of them sleeping on the floor with only two holes for defecating and two showers. Or he should see the sealed cells where political prisoners are kept. Would Mr. Mencia write about that?

The Moncadistas – according to Mencia – were allowed to have an electric stove, a library with more than 600 books, to read even after the 10 pm roll call, to play ping pong and volleyball and to form an ideological academy in which they debated all kinds of subjects without intervention by the prison authorities. Fidel Castro had at his disposal a Silvestone brand radio. Sixty years later, no Cuban political prisoner enjoys such benefits.

On page 76 of the book there appears a letter by Fidel dated April 4, 1954, where he wrote: “I am going to dinner: spaghetti with squid, Italian chocolates for dessert, fresh brewed coffee and then an H. Upman 4 [cigar]. Don’t you envy me? They take care of me, they take care of me a little among everyone… They take no notice, I am always fighting so that they do not send anything. When I take the sun in the morning in shorts and feel the sea air, it seems that I am on a beach, then a little restaurant here. They are going to make me believe that I am on vacation. What would Karl Marx say about such revolutionaries?”

The permissiveness of the authorities so encouraged the prisoners that their families bought them a refrigerator.

In another letter from August 1954, page 149, the despot in the making wrote: “Cleaning is for the prison staff, we sleep with the lights off, we do not have roll call or formations all day, we get up whenever; I did not ask for these improvements, of course. Abundant water, electric lights, food, clean clothes, and it’s all free.”

The Supposed Isolation

The supposed isolation of the Moncadistas is another falsehood because the book records that on July 8, 1954, Bohemia published an interview with Fidel Castro with the title “The Political Prisoners on the Isle of Pines.”

The prisoners’ mothers formed the group “Cuban Mothers,” which would become the Committee of Pro-Amnesty Relatives of Political Prisoners. They were never beaten for fighting for their relatives’ freedom, much less arrested or slandered as the most worthy Ladies in White are today by the government.

On March 25 of 1955 Bohemia magazine published a document by the Moncadistas addressed to the Cuban people, and on several occasions they were visited by high officials of the regime. Castro-Communism has never permitted that liberty to its opponents.

The lessons of a political mistake

The mistake by the politicians of that era was to believe that if they granted amnesty to the Moncadistas, they would renounce the violent vocation that the letters written by Fidel Castro from his comfortable prison clearly announced.

The dictatorship disguised as Revolution, which that young man of supposed ideals imposed on us, is now 56 years old. He and his brother learned the lesson very well. Hopefully some day the Cuban people will learn that the best leader of a country is respect for institutions and, consequently, will create the needed mechanisms so that we never again suffer another dictatorship.

About the Author

Roberto Jesus Quinones Haces was born in the city of Cienfuegos September 20, 1957. He is a law graduate. In 1999 he was unjustly and illegally sentenced to eight years incarceration and since then has been prohibited from practicing as a lawyer. He has published poetry collections “The Flight of the Deer” (1995, Editorial Oriente), “Written from Jail” (2001, Ediciones Vitral), “The Folds of Dawn,” (2008, Editorial Oriente), and “The Water of Life” (2008, Editorial El Mar y La Montana). He received the Vitral Grand Prize in Poetry in 2001 with his book “Written from Jail” as well as Mention and Special Recognition from the Nosside International Juried Competition in Poetry in 2006 and 2008, respectively. His poems appear in the 1994 UNEAC Anthology, in the 2006 Nosside Competition Anthology and in the selection of ten-line stanzas “This Jail of Pure Air” published by Waldo Gonzalez in 2009.

Translated by MLK

Mass in Cuba for Oswaldo Payá and Harold Cepero / Cubanet, Ignacio Gonzalez and Osmel Almaguer

Cubanet, Ignacio Gonzalez and Osmel Almaguer, Havana, 13 May 2015 – A Mass for the deceased Oswaldo Payá Sardiñas, opposition leader, and Harold Cepero, activist, was held this afternoon at the Church of Los Pasionistas in Havana, with Rosa María Payá in attendance. Rosa María, daughter of the Cuban human rights activist and recipient of the European Union’s Andrei Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, arrived from the Miami Airport to Cuba on the morning of May 11, to reunite with her family and friends and to honor the memory of her father.

The Mass was attended by activists of the Estado de Sats project, Antonio Rodiles and Ailer González, and by Manuel Cuesta Morua, leader of Progressive Arc, among others.

“I come to my country because it is my right” — Rosa Maria Paya / Cubanet, Ignacio Gonzalez and Osmel Almaguer

Screen shot from a video of Rosa speaking in Havana after visiting her father's grave at the cemetery — Screen shot from a video of Rosa speaking in Havana after visiting her father’s grave at the cemetery

Cubanet, Ignacio González and Osmel Almaguer, Havana, 11 May 2015 — Rosa María Payá, daughter of the late fighter for human rights in Cuba, Oswaldo Paya, arrived in Havana on Monday morning, from the Miami airport, in order to reunite with family and friends and to honor the memory of the father.

The daughter of the important fighter, who traveled to her homeland in the company of other activists, commented on the military presence in the “José Martí” National Airport, which is, according to his fellow passengers, an anomaly.

She also said she does not know the length of her stay and must take care of some legal paperwork before her return.

“I come to my country because that is my right as it is the right of all Cubans, whether or not it is recognized in the law. I think we have a unique opportunity as Cubans to work for our welfare, taking the risks to work to win our rights,” she said. continue reading

Rosa Maria kindly agreed to answer some questions for this team of reporters, and thanked those who support her cause, and the importance of the legacy of her father:

“My greatest thanks to the people who have accompanied me on my return to my country, to the people who have electronically sent flowers to honor the memory of my father. We have many friends and Cubans who want to honor the memory of Oswaldo Paya, and emphasize that his legacy is still relevant.”

Oswaldo Paya was one of the founders of the Christian Liberation Movement, created in 1988 with the aim of fighting for the human and civil rights of Cubans. He is known worldwide for his intention to run for deputy to the National Assembly of People’s Power, and in 1997 achieved hundreds of signatures supporting his candidacy.

He also co-founded the Varela Project in 1998, which pursued collecting over 10,000 signatures to present to the government asking for for changes in legislation through a national referendum. For this work, he received the prestigious Andrei Sakharov Prize for Human Rights from the European Parliament in 2002.

His death took place in dubious circumstances and there is currently an ongoing investigation, pushed by Rosa Maria, to confirm suspicions about the possible involvement of State Security in his death.

The video accompanying this article is in Spanish:

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