English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 10 April 2019 — On Merced Street in Old Havana a cloud of dust rises that floods the entire block every time debris is thrown off the roof of a house under construction. All the neighbors have their doors and the windows closed, very few show themselves to the block. A … Continue reading “"Do We Have to Launch Ourselves Into the Street to Resolve Things?"”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 18 April 2019 — Sitting at the entrance of his house, Yanisley Valdés blocks the sun on his face with his hand and does likewise and the swirls of dust that rise with the winds of Lent. Since the tornado of January 27 devastated his home, his days are reduced to … Continue reading “The Annoying Wait of the Luyano Residents”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 7 April 2019 — Minutes before starting they were just a few, but more people were joining, coming by foot, by bike, and many of them with their pets. The unusual caravan brought together some 500 participants on Sunday who, in the streets of Havana, demanded an end the the violence … Continue reading ““We are the voices of those who can not speak””
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 22 March 2019 — “Mamita, if something happens to me, you get me justice.” Those words, pronounced by her daughter shortly before she died, in 2015, due to complications during delivery, resonate in the head of Isabel Cristina Cabello López. Besides being a mother, she is a doctor and for her it was a … Continue reading “A Doctor Asks for Justice for the Death of her Pregnant Daughter in a Hospital in Santa Clara”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 21 March 2019 — The US announcement that it will replace the five-year B2 visa for Cubans with one of just three months has fallen like a bucket of cold water on the owners of small businesses that used to travel abroad to supply the Cuban private sector with all kinds … Continue reading “With the Door to the US Closed, Cubans Shop in Panama and Mexico”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 4 April 2019 — “I’m waiting for day someone is going to offer Pablo and the other people an apology.” This phrase, from the recently deceased Sergio Vitier, is part of the documentary Pablo Milanés, which addresses, among other topics, the time in the 1960s that the singer-songwriter spent in Cuba’s … Continue reading “"They Managed to Gather All the ‘Despicables’ in a Concentration Camp"”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 3 April 2019 — “They are tightening the net all around us” laments Heriberto Avila, a driver who plies the route between Santiago de las Vegas and an area near Fraternity Park. “First, they prohibited us from picking up passengers near the Capitol and now they are keeping us away from … Continue reading “The State Increases Pressure on Taxi Drivers”
EFE (via 14ymedio), José Antonio Torres, Mexico City, 28 March2019 — In the 1960s Cuba used its embassy in Mexico to direct movements against those they considered dictatorships in Latin America, according to espionage archives declassified by the Mexican government. In a version of 411 files Mexico has made public on the espionage carried out of … Continue reading “Cuba’s Embassy in Mexico Led the Fight Against Central American Dictatorships”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 15 March 2019 — The residents finish removing their belongings from the apartments at the far end of the building on Rancho Boyeros Avenue that collapsed on Thursday, at the corner of Cerro and Colon Streets. They have been told the property is going to be demolished and that for their … Continue reading “"The Person Who Fought the Hardest to Get the Building Fixed Died"”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 12 March 2019 — Yuderkis Pupo Garcia still spends her days between the shock of the first impact of the tornado and the anguish that causes the desire to return to normal. A resident of the building at 560 Juan Alonso street, between Infanzón and Juan Abreu, as of today she’s watched … Continue reading “Residents of a Havana Building in Ruins Await Official Response”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, February 19, 2019 — There are those who lost everything or almost everything in the tornado, but there are also those who can’t even legally prove that the winds on that January 27 took everything they had. Before that night, Isbet Acosta Valle lived with her daughter in a borrowed apartment … Continue reading “Victims Without Rights”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, February 14, 2019 — Diana Curbelo has spent 15 days sleeping in her neighbor’s entryway. She passes the hours seated on a red armchair that she has put out on the sidewalk of Teresa Blanco street and at nighttime she goes into the entryway to be under a roof. A resident … Continue reading “Building After the Tornado”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, February 10, 2019 — The parents of Laidys Sosa, the Cuban doctor who was murdered last Sunday by her husband in the state of Sao Paulo, traveled this Monday to Brazil to claim custody of the young woman’s baby, as 14ymedio confirmed from sources close to the victim. The doctor, 37, … Continue reading “Parents of the Doctor Murdered in Brazil Want to Bring Her Baby to Cuba”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 5 February 2019 — María Elena López has spent more than a week with her “nerves on edge.” Entrenched in the back part of her home in Luyanó, Havana, she saw on January 27 how the walls were cracked and the rain came through the roof in torrents when the tornado hit. Five … Continue reading “Dealing With the Ruins, The Task of Many Victims of the Tornado”
14ymedio, Luz Escobar, February 2, 2019 — In the living room of the singer Haydée Milanés a group of artists and independent journalists sorts the donations sent by friends and neighbors. Clothing, towels, sheets, toys, shoes, candles, as well as powdered milk, cans of meat, cookies, bread, and bottled water. They have been mobilized via social … Continue reading “"The CDR Always Sends Help to the Same Houses," Protest the Residents of Regla”
