I’ve been meaning to complete this request for a while. Anier, who lives in Pennsylvania, asked me to do it, and his father asked him to ask me. His ‘old man’ wanted to see the signs, how the modern self-employed sell their things. I know their are wonders, there are very professional people who have truly created ingenious things, simulating the neon and colored stars for the nocturnal hours, but I was able to snap these photos during the daytime in the city of Holguin. The new store owners advertise themselves this way. These are not idealized photos of today’s brightness. They were made by chance so that my friend from Pennsylvania and his father can have a selection of what they asked me for.
Everything is re-sold: coffee, sodas, pastries, varied salads and the best creole food. On the corners of ‘Luz and Caballero’ and Jose Antonio Cardet streets, they sell a delicious pork stew- in my opinion the best in all the area; though I don’t know how they are doing it now with all the elevated taxes and new sanitary regulations for handling food.
I took these photos so that I could pass by here a year from now and see just how far Cuban persistence has gone. For that moment, I would like to see that the landscape has changed. I’d like to see a forest of signs announcing services which have been falsely lent or prohibited from us for decades. I want to be optimistic and think that small businesses will flourish in Cuba. I have taken these photos so that the illusion won’t blind me. I cross my fingers so that I do not have another deception.
Translated by Raul G.
6 August 2012
