![[The drink is a "Cuba Libre"] By Lia Villares](http://translatingcuba.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/lia420704_513520248684295_208725806_n.jpg)
[The drink is a "Cuba Libre"] By Lia Villares
Cuba Libre. Make It Real. / For Another Cuba, Lia Villares
Category Archives: Translator: Unstated
“Catch and Release”: El Sexto (Danilo Maldonado) Arrested on Saturday, Released on Sunday, His Work Confiscated / Lia Villares, Danilo Maldonado
Saturday [18 May 2013]
El Sexto is raided at his home this afternoon at 1:15 pm, according to Alexandra his wife and owner of the apartment, who learned of it through an email from her dad who lives downstairs and saw men and women in uniform and in plainclothes, accompanied by 2 neighbors from the CDR [Committee for the Defense of the Revolution], and a major from MININT [Ministry of the Interior], in all about 5 people, they showed him a search warrent and confiscated his laptop, spray paints and all the works they found and took him away in a patrol car. As of now with destination unknown.
Translator’s note: This post and the following ones (now with earlier time stamps) together form a report on El Sexto’s (“the Sixth” — Danilo Maldonado) arrest, the search of his home and the confiscation of his belongings.
18 May 2013
My Confiscated Works and the Scene of the Crime (Part 1) / El Sexto – Danilo Maldonado
El Sexto – Danilo Maldonado
– 8 mini cards in the name of Danilo Maldonado – 1 Canon camera – 1 Thinkpad laptop – 15 virgin discs – 76 yellow cards with the writing “I determine” 4 signed by El Sexto – 4 recorded discs – 2 recorded discs with photos and video. [Identifies Danilo as "unemployed"]
37 spray paints, multiple colors and brands – 4 templates to paint – A dossier of the Salbutomal (asthma medicine) project – 1 book of curriculum vitae – 3 DVDs – 3 canvases (of paintings)
1 Samsung cellphone – 14 cards with paintings and sketches – 15 canvases with paintings, 2 Voices Magazines, 4 photos with counterrevolutionary elements
[same as above]
20 May 2013
Cubans One and All: Today is May 20, Independence Day / Ignacio Estrada
Tomas Estrada Palma
With my little note I just want to remember those who wrote history bequeathing the Cuban nation a date that today unites Cubans inside and outside the island.
Independence Day is one of the many festivals they have tried to rip from the memory of our nation. Like they have also ripped from one of our capital’s main arteries the name of the person who was the first president of that fledgling republic, leaving only his shoes and an empty pedestal never occupied by any Cuban.
Palma’s empty pedestal, only his shoes remain. Photo: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo
Don Tomas Estrada Palma is a man worth remembering like those who drew their machetes for a May 20 that was entered into history as a day of glory. I know this date has been erased by those who have tried to show a history not told by our ancestors. The nascent Republic of 1902 is still worthy of being celebrated and is one of the indelible marks of our identity.
Blessed be they day of May 20, the birth date of our Republic of Cuba, island nation that jealously guards the key to the Gulf.
Today we have a Republic, today we have a Nation, today we have independence but our nation weeps to see the Cuban family disintegrate and see it abandoned to the whims of a few in olive-green who have been able to put themselves above all the interests of a group, that only cares for the throne and the perpetuation of its name.
20 May 2013
Three Memories of Angel Santiesteban / Miguel Iturria Savon
Angel Santiesteban
On September 2, 2011 I published the “SOS for Angel Santiesteban” in Cubanet, when despite his having been awarded multiple prizes by the regime itself, the Cuban government’s own political police were harassing the writer. In late 2012 Angel was sentenced to five years imprisonment after a show trial in which his ex-wife was used as a spearhead against him. I will not refer to details of the case because they are still circulating in various writings and in Santiesteban’s blog, but I will offer my personal impressions of this word artist.
Before personally coming to know the author of “Dreams of a Summer Day,” “The Children Nobody Wanted,” “Blessed are Those Who Mourn,” and “South: Latitude 13,” I read his books and listened to several anecdotes that reflected his temperament and satirizes the political situation in Cuba. It’s hard to forget some of the characters of his stories about prison and Cuba’s intervention in the wars of Africa. Perhaps the masterful design of these alienated beings who gallop through the pages of his works are the real cause of humiliating trial that attempted to annul his rebellion and the voice of this audacious man without masks.
As my son was Angel Santiesteban’s lawyer, I had the privilege of welcoming him to my home in Havana and chatting with him over a glass of water — Angel does not drink rum or coffee. We talked about literature and his family experience. Only once, when asked by one of his characters, did he reveal the traumatic imprint of his brief stay in prison before the age of 20, after being arrested on the northern coast while saying goodbye to a relative who tried to leave the island on a raft.
I met Santiesteban several times at the house of the blogger Yoani Sánchez and at cultural gatherings organized at the residence of the physicist Antonio Rodiles, leader of the Estado de Sats program. I remember that Angel barely took part in those debates and almost always sat at the end of the hall, far from poses and prominence poses but friendly with anyone who approached him. In the end he left in his car with 4 or 5 people whom he drove to, or closer to, their homes.
The last time we met was in front of the police station at Infanta and Manglar, next to the “Fame and Applause” building, where fifty opponents demanded the release of Antonio Rodiles, arrested after the funeral of Oswaldo Paya Sardinas, who died in suspicious accident. We chatted there while Wilfredo Vallin and Reinaldo Escobar tried to negotiate with the Head of the Station, also surrounded by a gang of criminals who awaited orders from State Security officials to kick and drag opponents.
The judicial farce against Ángel Santiesteban reminds me of the famous narrator Reinaldo Arenas and the poets Heberto Padilla — imprisoned in 1971 — and Raul Rivero, sentenced in 2003, victims of a dictatorship that punishes free expression and promotes quietism and the complicit silence of the intellectuals.
19 May 2013
Dualities / Fernando Damaso
Photo Peter Deel
In the Republican Cuba each province had a governor and each municipality a mayor, who governed, in the case of the province with a Council of municipal mayors, and in the municipalities with a city council with councilors. The municipality was the local society organized politically to an extent determined by the necessary relations of vicinity, on a basis of financial capacity to meet the expenses of the government. It had autonomy, with powers to meet the peculiar collective needs of local society. The province was composed of the municipalities within its territory. So it was established in the Constitution of 1940.
From the year 1959, instead of perfecting what already existed, these structures were modified and, in the case of the municipality, which is what interests me, the mayor was replaced by a triumvirate of three commissioners, something also provided in the aforementioned Constitution, but with the number of commissioners in correspondence with the number of inhabitants in each municipality, rather than a fixed number for all.
As the experiment failed, due to the multiplicity of leaders, it was changed to just one, though with limited executive and financial power, and with the measures to be applied having to be approved or ordered by the central government.
In practice, the old town hall of municipal government became a mere administration. Then they experimented with the same dismal results, with the so-called JUCEI (Coordination, Operations and Inspection Boards, which were the municipal and provincial governing bodies). With the emergence of the People’s Power they thought that the problem would be resolved, looking to the experiences gained within the Republic and later, but these lessons were discarded, maintaining the inefficiency, now increased with the increase in bureaucracy.
The truly great problem is that, sitting on top of the existing bodies of government, both national as well as provincial and municipal, is the Party. It is no coincidence that every time there is a meeting of any of them, either the National Assembly or the provincial or municipal ones, the Party Plenary is held first and it establishes the scope and limits of what will be discussed and approve by the assemblies.
In this scheme, in reality the Party has the power, and of course it the Party that governs and the government (the People’s Power), are simply administrators. Herein lies its inability to solve problems, national as well as provincial and municipal. It is a duality similar to the two existing currencies where one, though it do not do so consciously, conspires against each other, because they occupy and act in the same small space.
In the capital this is the big problem, aggravated by the presence of the central government and its agencies and institutions, who influence and pressure the administration, which becomes an executor of the tasks of others, leaving its own tasks uncompleted.
The result is on view for all: broken streets and sidewalks without maintenance, abandoned landscaping, chaotic garbage collection, terrible services of all kinds, buildings deteriorating and collapsing daily, poor health and other evils that affect citizens.
As long as our provincial and municipal governments do not have real, strong and resourceful leaders, who perform their duties as such, all this will be insoluble.
18 May 2013
May 19 / Rebeca Monzo
Today is 118 years since the greatest and most timeless of all Cubans fell in combat: José Martí, “the Apostle of Independence.”
The system prevailing in our country for 54 years has been rebaptized him as the National Hero but I, like many, never liked that description, considering it inadequate for such a universal figure, and so we continue to call him what our parents and teachers taught us, when Cuba was a Republic.
The use and abuse of Martí’s thoughts and expressions, taken out of context and applied “conveniently” to reinforce concepts that have nothing to do with his ideology, have only provoked an almost involuntary rejection on the part of many of the citizens in our country, especially among the younger segments of the population, towards the figure of the Apostle, who sometimes even joke about him disrespectfully.
A man of letters, of peace and love, he became involved with weapons, possibly pressured by his own companions, falling mortally wounded, on his first day out on the battlefield without barely having had the opportunity to fight; and this was a man who was capable of uniting all Cubans under the same idea, man who was so desperately needed alive.
So many years after that event that is so sad for most Cubans, his ideas are still the compass that governs the desires of our politicians. Keeping alive our chimera of achieving, sooner rather than later, the chance to see our nation free and sovereign “with all and for the good of all” as Martí dreamed.
19 May 2013
Another Blow to Self-Employment / Orlando Freire Santana
Photo from infolatam.com
For several days the inspectors of the Ministry of Labor and National Tax Administration Office (ONAT) in the Havana municipality of Cerro have been telling the self-employed workers who sell in the doorways of their homes in the area that they must dismantle their shelves and stands. The only way they can continue doing this work is if they move it inside their homes. And this option is open only to a few, mainly the owners of such dwellings. The rest, who have rented these doorway spaces for their work, will have no option other than to turn in their licenses as self-employed.
But those who can continue to offer their merchandise will not find their future path free of obstacles either. According to what some of these vendors of household items who work on Ayestaran Avenue in Cerro said, the inspectors told them they could not sell foreign clothing nor any article that had been acquired by the self-employed in the State retail market. The only things they will be allowed to sell are items the artisans have made themselves, as self-employed, such as tea towels, tablecloths, handkerchiefs and the like.
That provision makes it clear that the reason for the raid was not only about the public image; that is, to rid the streets and avenues of people crowding around the small traders, a kind of informal economy that proliferates in the cities of almost all of Latin America, and that the Castro regime has tried so hard to avoid.
The other target of this attack — and for some the main one — has been what the authorities classify as “resale.” In other words, the fact that these self-employed offered, at prices higher than the official ones, the same articles that would sell in the State stores, and which in many cases were in short supply in these establishments.
Of course, the higher prices were not due to the greed of the self-employed, but rather because of their not having a wholesale market where they can acquire their goods, so for them the retail price was their costs, and then they had to add a margin for profit to come to their selling price. Ah, but this was never understood by the hard-line Castroites, who wrote many letters to the newspaper Granma asking that these self-employed workers be done away with, calling them “unscrupulous elements who exploit the working people.”
And those who thought this action was confined to Cerro, learned of their error this past Wednesday, May 15. That day, starting early in the morning, a large group of inspectors, accompanied by a police brigade, blocked the doorways on Carlos III Avenue, in the municipality of Central Havana, where there was commercial activity.
A tour we made along that central avenue, in the section between Infanta and Belascoain streets, allowed us to see the magnitude of the repression: Empty stands, racks and shelves; doorways where yesterday life hummed, today mired in the peace of the grave.
This blow against the self-employed operates like a domino effect, not only because many sellers lose their licenses, but also because homeowners lose the rent they charged for the doorways. Thus, a significant group of people who had found a way to sustain themselves, are very likely to become homeless. One lady, who had to close her business, where her two sons sold things in a doorway on Ayestaran Avenue, said, “It seems that the authorities want the young people to have to steal to eat, and then they have a justification to put them in prison.”
And a friend, an economist by profession, who has been well aware of the changes implemented by President Raul Castro, was adamant about the indication of recurrence said, “With these people nothing is certain. It’s one step forward and two steps back.”
Orlando Freire Santana, the author, was born 1959 in Matanzas, Cuba; he has a degree in economics, is an award-winning author of essays and novels, and is an independent journalist reporting from Havana.
Translated from Diario de Cuba
17 May 2013
Internet Access in Cuba / Lia Villares
See a detail of Internet charges below.
[Note: The following is translated from the ETECSA (the Cuban telephone company) website. 1 CUC, with currency exchange costs, is less than $1 US. Monthly salaries in Cuba for the most part do not exceed $20/month and may be well below that.]
Who can apply for service to access the Internet?
Service to access the Internet is offered to legal persons and foreign natural persons with temporary or permanent residence in Cuba. For now, the service is not offered to Cuban natural persons or foreigners resident in the exeterior who come as tourists to the island (they should access it through the navigation rooms), nor to the Cuban residental sector.
Who can access the Internet in the navigation rooms?
Public Internet access is offered in our country to foreign natural persons (tourists or residents on the island) in the navigation rooms located in airports, hotels and tourist installations, as well as in the [Centers...] belonging to ETECAS’s point of sale network. [A prepaid card is required.]
Who can access the Internet via WiFi?
WiFi Internet access is exclusively for foreign natural persons, residents or tourists…
What are the charges for Wifi in hotels with wireless coverage?
1 hour: 8.00 CUC [more than $8 US]
5 hours: 35.00 CUC
100 hours: 250.00 CUC
Monthly rates for commercial clients (CUC)
| PACKET-SWITCHED |
integrated services through digital web |
Through
Analog-switched network
|
||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| rate | additional hour | rate | additional hour |
|
| full internet navigation |
||||
| Máximo 10 horas |
20.00
|
5.00
|
15.00
|
5.00
|
| Máximo 30 hrs |
35.00
|
4.00
|
30.00
|
4.00
|
| Máximo 40 hrs |
40.00
|
3.00
|
||
| Máximo 60 hrs |
50.00
|
3.00
|
||
| Máximo 80 hrs |
70.00
|
2.00
|
60.00
|
2.00
|
| Only 8.00 p.m. to 7.00 a.m. (night plan) |
70.00
|
70.00
|
||
| International email and national navigation |
||||
| Máximo 15 hrs |
15.00
|
3.00
|
15.00
|
3.00
|
| Máximo 25 hrs |
20.00
|
2.00
|
20.00
|
2.00
|
| Máximo 60 hrs |
35.00
|
1.00
|
35.00
|
1.00
|
| National email and national navigation |
||||
| Máximo 20 hrs |
10.00
|
1.00
|
10.00
|
1.00 |
| Additional mailbox |
10.00
|
10.00
|
||
| International Corporate Email |
||||
| Máximo 20 hrs |
25.00
|
4.00
|
15.00
|
5.00
|
| Máximo 40 hrs |
30.00
|
3.00
|
25.00
|
4.00
|
| Máximo 100 hrs |
55.00
|
2.00
|
45.00
|
3.00
|
| National Corporate Email |
||||
| Máximo 20 hrs |
15.00
|
3.00
|
10.00
|
3.00
|
| Máximo 40 hrs |
20.00
|
2.00
|
20.00
|
2.00
|
| Máximo 100 hrs |
40.00
|
1.00
|
40.00
|
1.00
|
Rates for Commercial Clients (CUC)
[Translator's note: These rates only apply to distances of 4 km. See below for the "add-on" charges for service over longer distances.]
| SPEED (Kbps) |
CONTRACT (IN YEARS) |
Cost OF instalLaTiOn |
MONTHLY COST |
|---|---|---|---|
| 64 | 1 año | 1.500,00 | 9.000,00 |
| 3 años | 1.500,00 | 8.500,00 | |
| 5 años | 1.500,00 | 8.250,00 | |
| 10 años | 1.500,00 | 8.000,00 | |
| 128 | 1 año | 1.500,00 | 13.000,00 |
| 3 años | 1.500,00 | 12.500,00 | |
| 5 años | 1.500,00 | 12.250,00 | |
| 10 años | 1.500,00 | 12.000,00 | |
| 256 | 1 año | 1.500,00 | 22.500,00 |
| 3 años | 1.500,00 | 22.000,00 | |
| 5 años | 1.500,00 | 21.750,00 | |
| 10 años | 1.500,00 | 21.500,00 | |
| 512 | 1 año | 1.500,00 | 30.500,00 |
| 3 años | 1.500,00 | 30.000,00 | |
| 5 años | 1.500,00 | 29.750,00 | |
| 10 años | 1.500,00 | 29.500,00 | |
| 1024 | 1 año | 2.500,00 | 46.500,00 |
| 3 años | 2.500,00 | 46.000,00 | |
| 5 años | 2.500,00 | 45.750,00 | |
| 10 años | 2.500,00 | 45.500,00 | |
| 2048 | 1 año | 2.500,00 | 72.000,00 |
| 3 años | 2.500,00 | 71.500,00 | |
| 5 años | 2.500,00 | 71.250,00 | |
| 10 años | 2.500,00 | 71.000,00 |
The local urban distance refers to a local perimeter (up to 4km). If the distance to the International Center is farther than 4 km, corresponding sums are added to this rate corresponding to the distance of the interconnection, defined in the rates of the national link.
For example, a Point-to-Point international circuit of 2 Mbps for one year, between Cuba and Canada, would have a monthly rate of:
72,000.00 CUC + 27,000.00 CUC = 99,000.00 CUC
(Cuba stretch) (Canada stretch) (Total)
Cuban Diary XIX: What the UN Rapporteur Should See / Angel Santiesteban
If the Commission on Human Rights in Geneva saw through a crack the horrors that occur in Cuban prisons, surely it would do two things:
1 – Expel Cuba from the United Nations.
2 – Knowing the alleged violations that are occurring in the prison of Guantanamo Bay, according to accusations from the Castro government, they could send the directors who lead the prisons in Cuba — true concentration camps — to pass a course at Guantanamo, in order to improve their behavior.
The dictatorship, always obsessed with attacking the United States, transmits TV images denigrating what is allegedly happening in Guantanamo Bay.
It’s not my job to defend it or make value judgments about it, this is the role of the American people; my obligation as a Cuban and intellectual is to denounce the terrible tortures that take place in the prison where I have been held and of which I am not a witness.
At present, in the cell, there is a young man with his mouth sewn shut with wire. Today he passed through the prison before the frightened looks from the other inmates.
There are daily fights between prisoners and between them and the guards. I guess this is common in any prison in the world but I am not a specialist to confirm that. But here, when the guards confront a prisoner, the ratio is ten to one, along with their batons and pepper sprays.
The food they serve is a tiny amount and badly prepared. It consists of a few grams o rice, a boiled egg, and a colorless and odorless but always disgusting soup.
The barracks are populated by prisoners who have completed their sentences, and who, because of bureaucratic problems, remained locked up without any consideration. The constant beatings and dungeons are increasing their sentences along with the blackmail to not demand their “rights.”
Silence is the only ally of the Cuban prisoner; talking could lead to a new condemnatory charge in the most arbitrary of decisions.
They wait and resign themselves. They have no alternatives.
That is the stark reality of the Cuban prisoner, who lives without guarantees of his rights or the chance to make demands. Even without reviewing the records of those processed in light of international guarantees applied to the condemned, I can say without any fear of being mistaken that if that were to happen half of the prison population would be freed.
A court that has before it a young man without hope, who, unfortunately, is a part of the children nobody wanted, who has left school and has no place to be nor can he be offered a reliable life project that invites him to get on track that isn’t emigration, the place he can best be held is in jail.
A great part of Cuban youth that has not found a way to go into exile is in prison; and I say this with total confidence, they are following there a criminal course for their future as thugs.
Hopefully the Rapporteur who is sent to Cuba will be able to meet with the people who so greatly suffer the need for him.
Ángel Santiesteban-Prats
Prison 1580
May 2013
18 May 2013
Cuba: Sex, Taking All Comers / Ivan Garcia
There is still the ration book. Potatoes are scarce, the price of fruit is going through the roof, and drinking a natural orange juice is a luxury. Sanitary pads are only distributed every two months — a package of ten to menstruating women. And connecting to the Internet is still a science fiction story for a large part of the population.
However, sex is liberated. A national sport. According to some, the infidelity between couples is a gene human beings carry. If those verse in it give a tour of Cuba, we can confirm their strange theories.
And they confirm that teenagers of 12 and 13 are “experts” in the field. Unaware that Australian is a continent, or that Henry Lee was in independence fighter in the American Revolution and not the creator of Lee jeans. But when it comes to sex, they have countless stories to tell. For many boys, their fathers teach them from the time they’re small, that the more women they have the more macho they are.
It’s the ABCs of a Cuban father to his son; life is dick. Men don’t cry. And the boss of the house is the one with balls. If in the 19th and 20th century fathers paid prostitutes to de-flower their sons, today it’s not necessary.
Most children are more up-to-date and more promiscuous than their parents. Having a “honey” or a lover is synonymous with masculinity. An athlete of sex. A son of a bitch of the street.
The more lovers, the more drinks friends pay for. In the bars they offer “wise” council about how to get into an impossible female. For hours, they tell sex anecdotes without ceasing to drink like Cossacks, beer and cheap rum.
Sex in Cuba is messy, but it has its hierarchies. Not like the neighborhood pimp that manages a five-star hotel. A capital that’s a general. A boring and monotonous deputy to parliament that’s a mandarin.
The “honeys” of the superiors respect them. Secretly they look at their breasts or butt, but desist from the rude compliment or indecent proposal. A boss can fire you or make your life impossible if he finds you prowling around his woman.
Meanwhile, the more stars on your epaulette or if your photo appears among the members of the Central Committee, the more chances you have to give major luxuries to your lovers. You can even choose: blondes brunettes, mulatto or black. Or have a collection with one of each. As all are stunning, with pride and discretion we see you on the weekend in exclusive recreational villas for senior officers, or at parties their wives don’t attend.
Being the “honey” of a major character in Cuba, is synonymous with social status. As if rocket-propelled, you climb the ladder at work. All over Havana everyone is talking about the meteoric rise of a famous television report, who is both beautiful and talented. According to the rumors, the lucky guy who sleeps with her is the “boss of the bosses.”
It’s still remembered that in the 90s, when Carlos Aldana was the third strong man on the island, in charge of the ideological sector of the Communist Party, came to have three “darling” journalists, the three well-known.
Even Fidel Castro, between sips of Jack’s Daniel, liked to talk in private about his sexual exploits, like the affair he had with the German Marita Lorenz and she told about it in a book. In a macho-Fidelista Revolution like the Cuban one, having amorous adventures in bulk sets you apart from the pack. A rogue, a pimp. A hallmark of virility that makes the difference.
In a note from Juan Juan Almeida published in Marti News, told about the debauchery of Cuban officials in Angola. He gave a figure, taking from the Ministry of the Armed Forces: 40% of the woman who were on the mission in Angola were harassed or raped. That figure has never appeared in the newspaper Granma. For me, Almeida Jr. is a highly credible source. He lived among the creme de la creme of the Cuban hierarchy. His father, a great person in the opinion of his relatives, took to his bed every woman who stirred his pleasure.
And I pardon their children and wives. The great difference between being the “honey” of a leader and dying of hunger, are luxuries and comforts. The guy with few resources invites you to a movie and buys you popcorn or peanuts. The “bigwig” puts a roof over your head. And if you really satisfy him he buys you a car. And in addition, you climb the ladder in your profession.
There are women who live off their lovers, like the pimps off their prostitutes. And sometimes they have more than one “girlfriend,” they compete to see who gets more and remains preferred. Recently I heard an argument between two hookers. One said to the other, “Yeah, I’m a monster, I bought my boyfriend a motorcycle and three gold chains. The others just give him shirts and sneakers.”
You can live in tile house in Carraguao, or a residence in Miramar. But if you were raised to it, you have to have a “honey.” In a conversation between “tough men,” if you don’t talk about the “girlfriends,” “honeys” or lovers you have, they might label you Catholic or retarded. A bore who doesn’t know how to use the penis God gave you. That is, taking care not to mention or even look at the boss’s lover.
Ivan Garcia
16 May 2013
From Saguton to Zaragoza / Miguel Iturria Savon
If in every dream the dreamer is the author of the fable that he lives while he sleeps, in every journey the traveller interacts with his own emotions, the landscape, some passengers and with cities that evoke events and personalities of the past that enrich his memory and the pleasure of travelling.
In my case, traveling through Spain, land of my father, grandparents, siblings, and wife; it is more than just a way of doing provincial tourism, I’m entering an amphitheater of dreams with geography as auditorium, the train or bus as a form of set design, and the people traveling or transiting are the authors.
The name Sagunto takes us back to Hannibal’s audacity, the Cartaginian General that turned the ancient Iberia in an operations base to dominate the Mediterranean and left Sagunto to occupy Rome, whose inhabitants persecuted the Carthaginians and settled in the Iberian peninsula.
Turned into a Roman province like the neighboring Tarragona, Sagunto was more important than Valencia, the current provincial and autonomous capital of which it was subject. Besides the huge Roman castle by the railroad tracks, other monuments recall events and legends that inscribe Sagunto into Spanish history, among this the military uprising of General Arsenio Martinez Campos, considered “the restorer of Spanish monarchy” and “Cuba’s pacifier,” in 1875 and 1878 respectively.
As Sagunto to Zaragoza is almost 180 miles, the traveler crosses the villages that look like picture postcards and is engrossed in orange groves, vineyards, olive trees, pines, poplars, leafless phantasmagoric trees, windmills in the mountains and tunnels that link fields, farmhouses and industrial silos that precede cities with stops. Segorbe, Jérica, Barracas, Sarrión, the celebrated Teruel — Mozarabic modernist capital of ham — Monreal del Campo, Caminreal, Calamocha, Cariñena and others that weave a map of movement adorned at times with snow.
Zaragoza, the fifth largest city in Spain after Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia and Sevilla, impresses the newcomer with its gigantic modern railway and bus station. Upon leaving we expect the magical encounter with the banks of the Ebro, fertilized in January by the abundance of rain that threatens to overwhelm the bridges.
The Ebro valley with its desert landscape and cold winds in the urban layout of the ancient kingdom of Aragon, natural scenario of Iberian people, Celts, Romans, Goths and Arabs. Around the current Zaragoza — urban and administrative center of the autonomous community of Aragon — are circled dozens of villages in two provincial capitals: Teruel and Huesca. A short distance away are Navarre and France in the Pyrenees and the cities of Castilla la Mancha, Catalonia and Castellon.
When touring Zaragoza we are amazed by the beauty of the Plaza and the Basilica of Pilar, La Seo Cathedral, the Roman stone bridge, the iron bridge of the nineteenth century, the Aljafería — the Moorish palace of joy — as well as the Plaza of the Bulls, the Imprente Blasca and statues of transcendent characters like General Parafox, the heroine Agustina de Aragon, the painter Goya, the writer Baltasar Gracian, Dr. Ramon y Cajal,the filmmaker Luis Buñuel and the Cuban intellectual and patriot José Martí, who lived and studied in the city of Zaragoza.
31 January 2013