Author: 14ymedio

It Is Forbidden To Sell Cheese In The Cuban Countryside

“Clandestine” cheese making in Cuba. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Bertha Guillen, Candelaria, 11 April 2017 — The milk boils on the rustic stove while on the table the cream is churned to make butter. The whole family revolves around the modest production of artisan cheese, a product targeted by the police and appealing to customers.

Roberto leaves the house every day very early and stands for hours at the edge of the national highway, displaying one or two cheeses to all passing travelers. He hides the rest of the merchandise in the grass to avoid large quantities of that soft and fresh food that they make at home being confiscated.

The patrols that monitor the area are mainly focused on trafficking in shrimp, fish, cheese and beef. From time to time a passenger bus is stopped in the middle of the road and the troops proceed to check each passenger’s luggage. The police are well able to detect that particular smell that emanates from dairy products. continue reading

“I get up at three in the morning for the milking in the dairy,” says Senén, Roberto’s father and a resident of Artemisa province. “When we have the milk that fulfills what we have to give to comply with the state plan, then my wife makes the cheese with what remains.”

Each farmer is obliged to sell most of their meat and milk production to companies and state centers

Each farmer is obliged to sell most of their meat and milk production to companies and state centers. In 2015 the price paid to the farmers for this fresh milk rose from 2.40 Cuban pesos (CUP) per liter to 4.50, less than half of the 10 CUPs (about 40 cents US) that it sells for in the informal market.

Private producers are prohibited from selling milk or any dairy product they produce to other private individuals on their own. However, many homes and private restaurants throughout the island are nourished by this artisanal food, made and transported under absolute discretion.

“My family has been making cheese for years,” Senén explains at midday. They started making it during the Special Period when all the clandestine pizzas were made with the so-called guajiro cheese. Now some private restaurants buy pieces of gouda or Parmesan in state stores or on the black market, but artisanal production remains the most affordable for domestic customers.

A few miles from the house of Roberto and Senén, in the dairies of Cayajabos, Olga begins to cut the milk with a serum made from pork lungs and lemon. This technique ensures a consistent and good tasting cheese. She adds some boiling water “to kill the bacteria” and to achieve a firm, “gummy” texture.

Cuba is experiencing the worst drought of the last half century and the country’s reservoirs are below 39% of their capacity

Today Olga wants to make a piece of about two pounds with ten liters of milk. “At the moment we are making few cheeses because the cows are giving very little milk and we have to fulfill the plan,” she says while straining the fermented milk and recycling the serum to use it again.

Cuba is experiencing the worst drought of the last half century and the country’s reservoirs are below 39% of their capacity. More than 81% of the agricultural area is affected by low water levels in irrigation and the effect on livestock production is especially negative.

Rain is not the only problem. Along with the 120 liters of water a day a cow drinks, it also consumes 10% of its weight in pasture grass, fodder and food concentrate, according to experts consulted by this newspaper.

Grasslands are currently dry and the feed supply is unstable. Farmers juggle feeding their cows with mixtures that also include derivatives from the sugar industry. The deficit directly influences the amount of meat and milk that is produced.

Cuba used to make 200 kinds of cheese but the fall of the Socialist Camp and loss of its financial support nearly killed the industry (14ymedio)

According to Rogelio González, a farmer from Cayajabos, 30 years ago a dairy was capable of producing up to 2,160 liters of milk daily, while now among the 10 dairy farms in the area, they barely reach the 1,080 liters needed to comply with the state plan.

“We had here the trays loaded with feed and purge honey, there were areas of fodder, urea, salt and the milking system was mechanized, all this helped to a improve production,” evokes Gonzalez. “But then everything got destroyed, the grazing fields are surrounded by the invasive marabou weed and the milking systems are pitiful.”

During the years of the Soviet subsidy, Cuba managed to produce up to 200 types of cheese, but the fall of the Socialist Camp ruined production and paralyzed the most important industries in the sector. The authorities are trying to revitalize some of the dairy processing plants, but without foreign investment the project becomes very difficult.

While state production tries to pick up the pace, Senén continues to make progress in artisanal cheese production. All around are small wooden molds made with bits of planks of different sizes to give shape to the cheese. The press that extracts the liquid is used before the work of turning.

Under the structure, a white bucket collects the liquid that is draining. “This is to feed the piglet I have back there,” adds the dairy farmer. “You have to take advantage of everything.”

When the process of pressing is finished “you have to refrigerate the cheese for a few hours so the crown has a nice yellow color and a better texture,” according to Senén.

“Right now, we are making only two kinds of cheese, not only because of the lack of milk but also because there’s not a great cheese culture here, so they eat the artisanal cheeses and the so-called processed cheese, which is sold in the little market for Cuban pesos, and in the store there is only gouda and it’s very expensive,” he says. A pound of the latter cost between 9 and 10 times more than the product made by Senén and his family.

Among the handcrafted products is the so-called guajiro cheese, which is sold on the highway

Among the handcrafted products is the so-called guajiro cheese, which is sold on the highway. Normally it is made from skimmed milk boiled and cut with piña de ratón, a wild seed. The result is a product that is white and more grainy.

To supply the private restaurants specializing in Italian food the process becomes longer and complex, in order to cure the cheese better. There are customers who prefer it with salt and others without salt, details the farmer. It should be avoided at all costs that the milk gets smoky during the cooking.

“We have to take the risk of selling it in Havana, because there they pay better.” A pound trades in the informal networks for between 25 and 35 CUP depending on the curing of the product. “We are making contacts and fixed points where they buy from us,” says Roberto, who fears fines and arrests on the highway.

“Every day the police get more strict and if they catch me, they remove the merchandise and take me to the station”, says the young man. More than once he has had to run and abandon the product. “It’s hard work, sometimes I only sell a little and most of the time is in the sun.” For him, the best days are those when some foreigner arrives.

For travelers passing by in their tourist cars the scene always looks nice and with an air of tradition: a man on the side of the road holds a cheese in his hands, as a trophy, while ensuring that it is “home-made.” Few realize the difficulties associated with trying to sell this delicious food in Cuba.

Journalism Student Expelled from University For “Political Reasons”

The 18-year-old journalism student, Karla Pérez González, was expelled Wednesday from Marta Abreu University of Santa Clara for “political reasons”. (Courtesy)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 13 April 2017 — Karla Pérez González was not summoned to the meeting where her future was decided. The first-year Journalism student received a telephone call on Wednesday to notify her of her expulsion from Marta Abreu University in Santa Clara. Her crime? Having contacts with the Somos+ (We Are More) Movement and publishing on digital sites critical of the government, as confirmed by the young woman herself speaking to 14ymedio.

On March 15, Perez Gonzalez was excluded from a student assembly where a video was projected to discredit the independent Somos+ Movement led by activist Eliécer Ávila. “I only found out several days later because they warned my classmates not to tell me anything,” she says. continue reading

On April 10 the situation worsened when the militants of the department’s Union of Communist Youth (UJC) met to present “the evidence” against her, she explains. “Members and leaders of the organization warned that those who were on my side would be investigated. Nor was I not invited to participate.”

On Tuesday, the 18-year-old scientist was summoned along with her parents to the Department of Humanities. “I arrived at 8:30 in the morning and the group of decision-makers were 14 freshmen, 4 professors in the department and 6 members of the management of different organizations, in addition to the dean, Osneidy Leon Bermudez,” she details.

“There were three hours of psychological abuse and they made false charges against me”

The brigade chief of the University Student Federation (FEU), Ney Cruz, proposed the expulsion of Gonzalez from the University. “There were three hours of psychological abuse and they made false charges against me, ranging from recruiting members at the school, to belonging to the leadership of Somos+.”

“I was also accused of manipulating my friends and having a strategy from the beginning of the course to subvert the young, according to leanings of the Somos+ Movement.” The student was also questioned about her relationship with digital sites critical of the Government.

The first secretary of the UJC, Hermes Germán Aguilera Pérez, stood out among “the most violent,” recalls Pérez González. “He used phrases intended to influence the vote” of the students. He told the students that they had the opportunity to demonstrate that they were Revolutionaries because this moment was “your Moncada, Sierra Maestra, Bay of Pigs.” “She is with the enemy,” he spit out during the meeting.

Eight students voted for the expulsion of Pérez González, while six supported her continuing in the department. “Those were the people who really knew my story and who defended me in that hell,” she says.

Later, Perez González appeared before a Disciplinary Commission that inquired about her “projections, actions, membership in organizations and pages in which she published.” The young woman was even asked how much she paid for a rental house in Santa Clara.

“It was a very cordial and respectful meeting [compared to] the string of abuses I had been subjected to,” Karla recalls.

González denounces the political and non-academic motivations for her expulsion; she ended last semester with the maximum score in all subjects except in computer science and also obtained an English certificate that exempted her from attending those classes during her entire program.

The young woman does not plan to make a complaint through university mechanisms, but will “write a letter to the Minister of Education and will denounce what happened to organizations that watch over human rights,” she confirmed to 14ymedio.

The expulsion of Karla Pérez González joins a series of repressive actions against the Somos + Movement in recent days

The expulsion of Karla Pérez González joins a series of repressive actions against the Somos+ Movement in recent days. Last Thursday the General Customs of the Republic confiscated Eliécer Ávila’s laptop computer, which provoked a protest of several members of the organization in Terminal 3 of the José Martí International Airport.

Avila was arrested on Saturday and police searched his home where they seized “hundreds of things from pens, clothes, business cards, books, phone chargers, cables, mirrors, everything they found,” the leader told 14ymedio. Since the raid, he is now being prosecuted for crimes of illicit economic activity and “receiving” unauthorized goods.

This same week the philologist Dalila Rodríguez González, who had worked as a professor for over ten years, was expelled from Marta Abreu University. The academic told the independent press that her departure was due to the university authorities considering her “a bad influence on the students,” in addition to the security forces linking her to her father, Leonardo Rodríguez Alonso, a defender of human rights and an opponent of the government.

Rodríguez González also denounced that she has been harassed by State Security in recent months and clarified that she does not belong to any opposition group and does not participate in activities organized by activists or dissidents.

Last February, a young student of 24, David Mauri Cardoso, was not allowed to enroll in the law school of Carlos Rafael Rodríguez Provincial University, in Cienfuegos, for expressing ideas “against the Revolutionary Process” in a Spanish exam.

Rice Without Pebbles For The Tourists

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Marta Requeiro, Miami, 13 April 2017 — I still have a clear memory of the Cuban TV show Cocina a minuto, every Sunday before noon. It disappeared, of course, when it was no longer possible to make the recipes with what the people had at their disposal in the refrigerator or the pantry and and what they were still given – although with a few more alternatives than now – on the ration book.

It was ridiculous that they would broadcast it on television and we would see the host and chef, Nitza Villapol, preparing some exquisite dessert with a can of condensed milk and twelve eggs, when Cubans were only given five eggs per person per month. At home we would say, “But what planet is this woman living on?” Surely this is what provoked the cancelling of the show. continue reading

In June the Varadero International Gourmet Festival will be held, with the participation of ten countries.

The magazine Caribbeannewsdigital.com affirms that it will focus on the search for excellence in tourist services, and will celebrate two of Havana’s most famous establishments, the 200-year-old the Floridita restaurant and the 75th anniversary of La Bodeguita del Medio. This is because Washington and Havana enjoy excellent relations at the moment.

Innovations in culinary techniques and vegan recipes will surely grace the tables; but ordinary Cubans, once again, will not know this

Innovations in culinary techniques and vegan recipes, which are trending around the world, will surely grace the tables; but ordinary Cubans, once again, will not know this.

Dinner table conversations will be enlivened with quality cocktails prepared with the real Cuban rum, which enjoys international prestige, none of those rotgut brands that Cubans drink like Chispa Del Tren (Train Spark) or Hueso De Tigre (Tiger Bone). Fine Habano cigars, chocolates and coffee – real coffee, not the one Cubans get that is half crushed peas – will also be part of the feast, enjoyed and appreciated by the experts.

According to data from the Department of Commerce, collected by the United States-Cuba Economic and Trade Council, the island bought a considerable amount of rice (about 700 tons) in February, something that hadn’t happened for nine years.

We already know who is going to taste that exquisite rice and how many dishes will be made with it. It is for tourists, who can enjoy rice pudding or rice with chicken. Instead, the people will continue to eat the rice filled with pebbles and rubbish that you have to spend hours picking out before you cook it.

Lysandra Does Not Want To Be Reeducated

Lisandra Rivera was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment by the Provincial Court. (UNPACU)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 12 April 2107 — Confined for more than 80 days in a punishment cell, without a single contact with the outside, the activist Lisandra Rivera Rodríguez of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU) received her first family visit this Tuesday, in the Mar Verde Women’s Prison in Santiago de Cuba.

Lisandra Rivera, 28, was arrested after her home was raided by State Security on 31 December of last year. On that occasion, and despite having been beaten by the agents, she was accused of an alleged criminal “attack,” according to UNPACU activists. Her family had not been able to contact her since 17 January when her trial was held in the Provincial Court and she was sentenced to two years imprisonment. On 18 April she will have served four months. continue reading

She had no access to anything, no right to family or conjugal visits, or to receive calls or food brought in from outside

Her husband, Yordanis Chavez, commented in a telephone interview with 14ymedio that both he and her parents managed to be with her for almost two hours. “As of Saturday she is outside the punishment cell and is in a of maximum severity wing of the prison.”

According to Chávez, from now on they will be able to visit her normally. The next appointment is scheduled for the 17th of this month. “We saw her well, quite strong of spirit. She continues to refuse to comply with orders and or to accept reeducation.”

The authorities of the prison used this refusal to accept the “reeducation” regime as a reason to impose the isolation of a punishment cell on Rivera. “The tried to make her stand up and give military salutes to the jailers who conduct a count three or four times a day. When a high official arrived she also had to stand at attention like they do in the military and she refused to do it,” says Chavez.

During the visit, Lisandra told her relatives that the punishment cell is like that of any police dungeon, pestilent and in very bad conditions, without light. She had no access to anything, no right to family or conjugal visits, nor could she receive phone calls or food brought in from outside. “Every Tuesday I was handcuffed and taken, almost dragged, to the disciplinary council,” the activist told her husband.

UNPACU’s leader, José Daniel Ferrer, fears that, in the midst of the difficult international situation, there could be a repeat of the 2003 Black Spring

Yordanis Chavez explained that they have not appealed the ruling because they do not trust the judicial system. “Lisandra has not committed any crime, it is only because it was an order of State Security as punishment for her activism in UNPACU in favor of freedom and democracy in Cuba.”

José Daniel Ferrer, UNPACU’s leader, fears that, in the midst of the difficult international situation, there could be a repeat of what happened in the spring of 2003, when 75 regime opponents were arrested and sentenced to extremely long prison terms. That crackdown, which came to be known as the Black Spring, coincided with the United States’ invasion of Iraq, a time when the world was looking the other way. At present, more than 50 UNPACU activists remain in prison in several provinces, many of them accused of crimes they have not committed.

For its part, the Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation announced in its last report, on the month of March, that there had been at least 432 arbitrary detentions of peaceful dissidents in Cuba in that month. In addition, several dissidents were vandalized and stripped of their computers, cell phones and other means of work, as well as cash.

Ice Cream and Kilobytes

The inauguration of a Wi-Fi zone for internet access seeks to revitalize the Coppelia ice cream parlor. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Marcelo Hernandez, Havana, 10 April 2017 – The large and little-used park around the Coppelia ice cream parlor has a new function as of a few days ago. The inauguration of a wifi zone for internet access is looking to revitalize the ice cream stand, as iconic as it is fallen into disgrace. Now, in the absence of those mythical 26 flavors, the customers will have a serving of kilobytes on side, courtesy of the Cuban Telecommunications Company (ETECSA). continue reading

Under the inclement sun, some curious came this week came in search of a few hours of “free” navigation as had been mentioned in various official media. The state monopoly only allowed access to the web at no cost during the opening day, and then an hour of navigation again cost the same as in the rest of these wireless parks: 1.50 CUC an hour (about $1.50 US, the equivalent of nearly two days pay at the average wage).

The state monopoly only allowed access to the web at no cost during the opening day and then an hour of navigation cost again 1.50 CUC

During two busy months, a brigade of construction workers installed benches, planters, lights and three reflectors for the security of the netizens. This last is one of the conditions most demanded in other areas where ETECSA offers its Nauta wifi service, where users report frequent thefts of telephones, tablets and computers, mainly at night.

Little by little word has spread and the place is beginning to fill with faces that stare closely at a screen, people who speak animatedly by videoconference and access resellers who, through the application Connectify, offer a plunge into the great world-wide web for half the state price.

It is hoped that soon, among Havanans, the word “Coppelia” will become synonymous with social networks and digital sites, instead of the mythical ice cream parlor that it once was.

“The Politician Of The Week,” A Citizens’ Initiative

The initiative involves people as different as the filmmaker Carlos Lechuga (above) or Cuba’s Minister of the Interior. (Facebook)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Reinaldo Escobar, Havana, 10 April 2017 — Facing the times that we live in can be an unpleasant task. And doing it without discrimination based on ideological viewpoints and with immediacy, takes visions of daring. This is the challenge that the Center for the Application of Political Marketing and Political assumes with the election of the “politician of the week,” an initiative that approaches the Cuban reality from its protagonists. continue reading

The profiles developed by the independent entity are made in collaboration with the site Primavera digital (Digital Spring), the historian Dimas Castellanos and the journalist José Antonio Fornaris, among others. They are distributed through e-mail and several web pages. Their intention is to summarize, with the fewest adjectives, the biography and significant details of those who mark the events of the Island. Those faces that embody the moments most sublime and most ridiculous of the day-to-day.

The “politician of the week” does not evaluate the person, but rather the events in which he or she has taken part and the decisions for which they are responsible. The brief sheet that accompanies their name doesn’t judge, but it does describe. In a country where most of the time the public debate centers on “killing the messenger” instead of understanding the message, this moderate exercise carried out by the Center takes on hints of the historic.

So far this year, the names included in the classification have ranged from officials in the highest ranks of power to opponents condemned for their activism. This wide range of points of view can only be recognized from an independent perspective, given that the official media only gives space to names linked to the government.

Its catalog of personalities is the closest thing to a democratic exercise, in which there is no discrimination or tendency to stigmatize positions

Thus, this civic initiative has described both Jennifer Bello Martínez, president of the Federation of University Students, and Dr. Eduardo Cardet Concepción, a person Amnesty International has declared a political prisoner of conscience. In its entries it has shed light on the life of the new interior minister, Rear Admiral Julio Cesar Gandarilla Bermejo, as well as Carlos Lechuga, director of the censored film Santa and Andrés.

Nor have they missed, in their accounts, figures such as Vice President Jose Ramon Machado Ventura, a hard-liner known for his partisan orthodoxy, or Havana’s private taxi drivers who demonstrated their dissatisfaction after the imposition of price caps on their service.

The Center, led by the analyst Julio Aleaga, has given space to Tyrians and Trojans. Its catalog of personalities is the closest thing to a democratic exercise in which there is no discrimination or stigmatizing positions, a posture that in today’s times of polarization, does not stop giving some people hives or provoking indignation.

There are those who are upset to not have been included yet, while others cry out to have their names erased from the list. To the extent that it is list of the protagonists of a reality, the “politician of the week” approaches those who are part of events, but the evaluation of their performance will depend on the opinions of each individual reader.

Ten Years, A Blog

Yoani Sánchez received the Ortega y Gasset award for her work on ‘Generation Y’ in 2008, although she was not allowed to leave the country to receive it until five years later. (El Pais)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Generation Y, Yoani Sanchez, 10 April 2017 — Dawn, the sound of the keyboard marks the beginning of the day. I start a blog that will make me experience the most gratifying and terrible moments of my existence. I go out with the USB stick around my neck, climb the steps of the Havana Capitol and mumble a few phrases to get myself into the place with internet access exclusively for foreigners. It is the 9th of April 2007 and I publish the first text of Generation Y… My life has just taken a turn.

A decade has passed since that scene. A time during which I laid bare, post by post, the events that mark the reality of my country and of my own existence. I have filled the pages of this personal diary and left a testimony of the eventful and intense years I have lived. A digital logbook that could well serve as an impressionist portrait of Cuba at the beginning of this millennium. continue reading

There has been a lot of water under the bridge since then. I discovered the immense scope of the written word, the amplifying character of technology, and an authoritarian power’s lack of ethical limits. I owned responsibility for every published phrase and not a few times paid the consequences not for what I said, but for what others believed I said.

I discovered the immense scope of the written word, the amplifying character of technology, and an authoritarian power’s lack of ethical limits

I earned a scolding from a severe leader accustomed to hearing only his own voice, I spent more than one night in a jail cell, and I learned to speak in code to evade the microphones placed in my house. I got used to seeing my face in the official media surrounded by the worst adjectives and lost more than one friend. However, the gratifying moments have far surpassed all the punishments this opinion space has brought me.

I watched innumerable voices be born and gain strength, voices that made the Cuban blogosphere a more plural and inclusive space. I met many, like myself, who in their respective countries grabbed ahold of the new digital tools to try to better their societies. I received the support of my family and discovered the profession that I exercise today: journalism.

Each text that has come out in Generation Y shows that personal path, marked by obstacles and gratifications. If I could go back in time I would only amend the moment when I decided to open this blog. I don’t forgive myself for having waited so long to express myself.

Young Cuban Filmmakers Challenge Official History

Young directors present their work in the “Moving Ideas” section at the 16th Young Filmmakers Show of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC), in Havana. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Luz Escobar, 8 April 2017 – Were the events like the books tell us? Is the official story a report of what really happened? The attempt to answer these questions inspires the documentary and two fictional shorts that were presented Wednesday in the ‘Moving Ideas’ section of the 16th edition of the Young Filmmakers Exhibition of the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry (ICAIC) in Havana.

Under the motto “Forgetting does not exist,” the filmmakers approached collective and family memory to show a point of view often ignored by the epic of Revolutionary discourse. The works probe those memories for what Cubans treasure about moments in national life, beyond the gilded frame that the institutional version attaches to them.

Economic disasters, a war on a distant continent and the drama of family separation after exile, were some of the issues addressed by this new generation of film directors, who show a special interest in looking back. Children of indoctrination and official silence seem willing to shed light on the darker areas of what has happened in the last half century. continue reading

Director Pedro Luis Rodríguez offers the short Personal Report set on the eve of the Revolutionary Offensive of 1968 — when all remaining private businesses in the country were confiscated, down to the last shoeshine boy. It was a watershed moment in the economic life of the nation that brought profound effects on commerce, supply and even the mentality of those born after that massive closure of private businesses.

Were the facts as they are told in the books? Is the official story a report of what really happened?

In less than half an hour, Rodríguez shows the conflicts experienced by Ricardo, an analyst on the Planning Board, who is preparing to present a report to his boss on the consequences of the measure that is about to be taken. The protagonist defends his right to participate in the decisions that are made in the country or at least to be heard, but everything is in vain.

Personal Report presents that look from below on a historical event where the decision was taken “on high.” An offensive about which the government has never offered a public self-criticism, although a quarter of a century later the private sector was again authorized to operate. Today, more than half a million workers are struggling to support themselves despite strong legal limits on their activities and economic hardships.

Screen shot from ‘The Son of the Dream.’ (CC)

In the discussions with the audience after the screening in the Chaplin room, Rodriguez acknowledged that his film is “a wink” at the current phenomenon of self-employment. His desire is that the work serves to “reflect on this present” and to meditate “on participation and the need to be heard and to be consistent with oneself.”

The flood of memories and questioning continued with the fictional short Taxi, directed by Luis Orlando Torres. Taxi addresses another of the many themes barely touched on by the fiery speeches from those in power: Cuba’s involvement in the war in Angola and its aftermath in society; the plot centers on the physical and mental wounds left by that conflict outside the island’s borders.

‘Personal Report’ presents that look from below on a historical event where the decision was taken “on high.”

Torres focuses on the effects on families and establishes a parallel with the internationalist medical missions that now send Cuban healthcare workers around the world, and their consequences here at home. The film develops a suspense story that begins when a taxi driver picks up a passenger in a seemingly casual way. A brief conversation will suffice to call into question moral aspects of a war, one which the Government has always defended as an act of solidarity.

Meanwhile, The Son of the Dream, directed by Alejandro Alonso and filmed in 16 millimeter with a Bolex camera, relives through family letters and postcards the filmmaker’s memories of an uncle whom he was unable to know due to the separation caused by the Mariel Boatlift. The material is the result of a workshop given at the International Film School of San Antonio de los Baños by Canadian director Philip Hoffman.

Beyond the aesthetic and artistic values ​​of each of the projects presented in ‘Moving Ideas’, it is clear that much of the young cinema that is being produced on the Island is not trying to please institutions or accept pre-established truths. It is an uncomfortable, irreverent, questioning and willing movement to belie an epic story that has been shaped more with silences than with truths.

Eliécer Ávila, The ‘New Man’ Who Became An Opponent

Eliecer Ávila, leader of the Somos+ (We Are More) Movement (CC).

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, Havana, 8 April 2017 – Walking along the streets with Eliécer Ávila can be a complicated task. His face is well known thanks to a viral video broadcast almost a decade ago. However, before fame came into his life, this young man born in Las Tunas was a model “New Man”: the most finished product of ideological indoctrination.

Like all Cuban children, Avila shouted slogans during his school’s morning assembly, participated in countless repudiation activities “against imperialism” and dreamed of resembling Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara. But while, in school, they taught him the social achievements that the Revolutionary process brought to the population, at home reality was stubborn and showed itself to be something quite different. continue reading

The residents of Yarey de Vázquez are poor, the kind of poverty that grabs you by the throat

The residents of Yarey de Vázquez – the Puerto Padre municipality of Puerto Padre where the leader of the Somos+ (We Are More) Movement was born – are poor, the kind of poverty that grabs you by the throat. A place lost in nothingness, where many families still use latrines for their bodily needs, and live in houses with roofs made of palm fronds.

Surrounded by pigs, chickens and tedium, Avila realized that his life did not resemble the official version he was being taught. Born in 1985, in the middle of that “golden decade” when the Soviet Union was propping up the island, he was barely walking a year later when Fidel Castro ordered the closing of the free farmers markets in the midst of the “Process of Rectification of Errors and Negative Tendencies.”

Eliécer Avila reached puberty during what was called the Special Period. With the voracity that still characterizes him, he faced many days of his adolescence with his plate half full, or almost empty. He hand stitched the shoes he wore to school, invented all kinds of “outfits” from his grandfather’s old shirts, and turned off the light when it was time to strip down to his underwear, so no one could see the holes.

Surrounded by pigs, chickens and tedium, Avila realized that his life did not resemble the official version he was taught. He was born in 1985, in the middle of that “golden decade” when the Soviet Union was propping up the Island

With a natural leadership quality, in which a certain humor mixes with an undeniable histrionic capacity to narrate anecdotes, the young man made his way through those years without climbing aboard a raft to escape the country or ending up in jail. Those who knew him predicted a future in politics, because of those “fine lips” that helped him in student meetings and in romantic conquests.

A little bit later, luck smiled on him. He was able to enroll in the University of Computer Sciences (UCI), founded in 2002 in the middle of the Battle of Ideas. UCI was located on the site that had once been the Center for Exploration and Radioelectronics Listening, known as the Lourdes SIGNIT Station, where until 2001 Russia – and the Soviet Union before it – had had its largest spy station outside its borders. UCI was a school for trusted young people to become computer soldiers for a Revolution that fears the Internet.

While a student at UCI, Avila led Operation Truth. His task was to monitor digital sites and blogs critical of the Government. In those spaces, the young revolutionary sharpened his arsenal of tools for political struggle that included everything from hacking to the execution of the reputation of anyone who opposed the Plaza of the Revolution.

Little by little, like acid that filters through the cracks, those anti-government arguments he read on the web began to sink into his mind and mingle with his own disagreements. Restless, in 2008 he took his turn at the microphone during a visit to UCI of Ricardo Alarcón, then president of the National Assembly. The minutes of that public appearance that followed marked the rest of his life.

The video of the collision between Ávila and Alarcón jumped to first place in the hit parade on the clandestine networks that distributed audiovisuals. No one wanted to miss it, especially the moment when the leader of Parliament justified the travel restrictions imposed on Cubans by saying how congested the skies might be, if everyone were allowed to board an airplane.

Avila led Operation Truth while studying computer science; his task was to monitor digital sites and blogs critical of the Government

Now, nine years later, the young activist prefers not to be called “Eliécer, the one who debated with Alarcon,” but for the rest of his life it will be his most important letter of introduction to millions of Cubans. His challenge of power, with simple questions and a firm voice, has been one of the most accurate and best documented gestures of rebellion in almost six decades of Castroism.

After that, he received his punishment. After graduating, the authorities sent him to a remote Youth Computer Club to purge his audacity. It was the decisive moment in which he decided to cross the red line towards independence. He left the state sector, founded the Somos+ Movement and relocated to Havana. One audacious act after another.

The attacks rained down from all sides. State Security raised the level of pressure on his environment, traditional opposition leaders threw darts at the upstart, and there was no shortage of those who claimed that he was only a mole for the political police disguised as a dissident.

Since then, Ávila has tried to give shape to a civic discourse that uses new technologies and a less politicized language, closer to the concerns of ordinary people. But, like every dissident, he is caught in the grip of charges of illegal action, subjected to constant vigilance and assigned the halo of demonization imposed on anyone who does not applaud power.

Nothing is more disturbing to a system that has played with social alchemy than the fact of a creature from its own ideological laboratory turning against it

The numerous trips abroad that he has made since the Travel and Immigration Reforms of 2013 have allowed him to know the world, only to discover that the most exciting and indecipherable of the territories that await him is located in the future Cuba. That country so many have dreamed of and that is taking so long to arrive.

Recently he went a step further and announced that he was prepared to represent the electors of his constituency as a delegate. A somewhat remote possibility, given the oiled mechanisms of control over the People’s Assemblies maintained by the ruling party where, by show of hands, the attendees must nominate the potential candidates.

This week, the guajiro of Yarey de Vázquez has crossed another line. A public protest at José Martí International Airport has resulted in his house being searched, and him being arrested and charged with “illicit economic activity.” The trigger was the seizure of his laptop at Customs when he returned from Colombia.

Now, it is expected that the siege around the young leader and his Somos+ Movement will continue to close. Nothing is more disturbing to a system that has played with social alchemy than a creature from its own ideological laboratory turning against it. Eliécer Ávila will be doubly punished because power acts with more fury against its own, when it rebels.

More articles in English by and about Eliécer Ávila can be read here.

Police Arrest Activist Eliécer Ávila and Raid His Home

The video shows Eliecer Avila and other human rights activists at the Jose Marti International Airport in Havana, protesting the confiscation of Avila’s laptop when he returned to the country from abroad.

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 8 April 2017 – Some fifty uniformed members of the National Revolutionary Police and the Ministry of the Interior raided the home of the activist Eliécer Ávila, leader of the Somos+ (We Are More) Movement this Saturday morning. The police seized documents and home appliances, in addition to arresting the opponent, according to detailed information from his wife, Rachell Vázquez, speaking to 14ymedio.

The police search began at six in the morning and lasted about four hours during which the troops did not allow access to the property located in the neighborhood of El Canal, in the Havana’s Cerro municipality. “We were going to eat something when they knocked on the door,” says Vázquez.

During the search, the police were accompanied by two witnesses of the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR). “All they left us was the TV,” adds the wife. “Right now Eliécer is missing, because no one knows where they took him,” he says. continue reading

Hours earlier, the couple was at Terminal 3 of José Martí International Airport, where Avila staged a protest to demand the return of several of his belongings retained by the General Customs of the Republic. Last Thursday, when the activist returned from a trip to Colombia, his personal laptop was confiscated.

After being arrested this Saturday Ávila made a phone call to his wife to inform her that he is being held at the Police Station of Aguilera and Lugareño

The opponent remained at the airport for more than 36 hours and insisted to security agents that he would not leave the place until they returned the computer. Other members of his organization joined in the protest.

After being arrested this Saturday Ávila made a phone call to his wife to inform her that he is being held at the Police Station of Aguilera and Lugareño in La Viñora. “He asked me to bring the deed of the house and 1,000 CUP,” says Vázquez, but “the police took the money in the drawers.”

In a video posted on the Somos+ website, Avila is seen in an airport lounge with two activists carrying posters with the phrase “No More Robbery.” The opponent denounced in front of the camera that the authorities “gave no explanations” and have not told him the reason for confiscating his computer.

Police searches and raids on dissidents’ homes have become common in the last year. In its report for March, the Cuban Commission on Human Rights and National Reconciliation (CCDHRN) denounced this procedure.

During that month “there were innumerable cases of dissidents deprived of their computers, cell phones and other means of work as well as cash,” the report adds. These actions are aimed “to prevent the work of peaceful opponents and to make them increasingly poor,” said the independent entity.

Cuban Photographer Wins Two Major Prizes for Photo of Air Force One Landing in Cuba

Cuban photographer Yander Zamora observes his snapshot ‘Arrival of Air Force One’ during a visit to the headquarters of the EFE press agency. (EFE)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Madrid, 6 April 2017 — Cuban photographer Yander Alberto Zamora de los Reyes was awarded the Ortega y Gasset Prize for Graphic Journalism this Thursday, just fifteen days after receiving the King of Spain Journalism Prize from EFE Agency for his photograph of Air Force One flying over homes in Cuba in 2016.

The snapshot, published by Reuters, is titled “Arrival of Air Force One” and captures the historic landing of Barack Obama’s presidential plane in Havana on 20 March 2016, on the first visit of a US president to the island In 88 years.

The jury of the 34th edition of the King of Spain Awards unanimously recognized that the photograph reflects “a historic moment in relations between the US and Cuba, after the serious divergences maintained for more than half a century.”

For its part, the jury for the Ortega and Gasset prize, which is awarded by the newspaper El País, described the image of “pure photojournalism, capable of capturing the moment.”

Several Opposition Leaders Detained On Their Return To Cuba

Eliecer Avila detained at the airport on his return to Cuba (Somos+)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 6 April 2017 — Cuban opposition leaders were detained at Havana’s international airport on Thursday, when they arrived from Colombia, according to sources in the political movement Somos+ (We Are More) speaking with 14ymedio.

Eliécer Ávila, president of that movement remains “in open protest” at the capital’s airport after the authorities’ attempt to confiscate his electronic devices. continue reading

“Immigration has not allowed us to pass, it seems there are signs on the computers that say: interested in confrontation,” Avila explained in a message addressed to his movement. Later they were allowed to enter the national territory but in the face of the attempt to confiscate their belongings, the opponents rebelled.

Carlos Oliva, a member of the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), is being held at the police station in Santiago de las Vegas. Eliecer Avila has said that he refuses to leave the airport without his laptop. The opponent has been there for more than seven hours.

Customs Officer in the process of confiscating the belongings of Eliecer Avila. (Somos+)

The order to seize his computer was issued by Carlos Pons, Chief of Confrontation at the airport.

In the case of Marthadela Tamayo and Zuleidy Pérez, they were subjected to a “rigorous search” and their personal computers siezed.

Cuban Hosts Complain About Airbnb’s Payment System

By the end of 2016, at least 34,000 self-employed people were engaged in renting homes to serve the growing numbers of tourists. (Airbnb)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Luz Escobar, Havana, 6 April 2017 — Airbnb hosts in Cuba, who were so enthusiastic at the beginning, have been complaining recently about the delays in receiving the payments made by the tourists who have stayed in their homes. The discontent is clear from the complaints published on the platform of the American company and the interviews conducted by 14ymedio.

On the Airbnb site a couple claims to have experienced repeated delays in payments. “Between January and part of February 2016 we had a serious delay in receiving the payments through the agency VaCuba,” complained Ileana and Rolando, who have had problems again in early 2017. “We are already behind in the dates scheduled by Airbnb; we haven’t received the payments and right now we’re waiting on three more payments,” they explain. continue reading

The Miami-based courier company VaCuba, with headquarters in Miami, is in charge of bringing the payments to the hosts who rent out their homes, rooms and spaces through Airbnb. In any other country, these payments are made in the ordinary way through internet transfers, but the banking system in Cuba has hired this agency to send the cash to get the money to the Airbnb hosts.

The growth of Airbnb in Cuba during the last year has been remarkable, making it the country where the platform has grown the most thanks to the extension of licenses of that allows Cuban hosts to attract clients from all over the world, not only from the United States, like at the beginning.

Jorge Ignacio, an economics student who rents out a house in the town of Soroa, in Artemisa, told 14ymedio that in February of this year, “there’s nothing from Airbnb.” Now he says he’s “looking for alternatives” to collect for the stays of his guests because VaCuba, the only money distribution mechanism offered by Airbnb has collapsed, “because there are so many customers” and it can’t continue “counting the ‘kilos’,” he comments. “I get the full amount of the payment but always with a big delay,” said Jorge Ignacio, explaining that it’s not an isolated case “because the whole world is in the same situation.”

Rebeca Monzó, a Cuban artisan and blogger who has a room to rent in Nuevo Vedado, has a different complaint but adds to the discomfort generated in recent months. “The payment delay is almost a month, I never receive the full amount, they bring me 19 CUC when they actually owe me 500.” Monzó says that a messenger from VaCuba explained that “the Cuban bank is behind with the transfers” and that “it cannot get the full amount at once” and that is why they prefer to “make partial payments.”

“I wrote an email to Airbnb to comment on the delay of the payments and not only did they not answer me but they returned the message”

As a retiree, Monzó says the situation is not easy because she doesn’t see the result of her efforts and she only receives a fraction of what she spends on daily supplies that allow her to “maintain a functioning business.” The payments are not the only thing she needs to stay afloat. Monzó does her best to earn the good comments that clients place on her profile. Each morning she prepares the breakfast for her clients with great care and when they arrive at her house, she receives them with a welcome card she makes herself.

“I wrote an email to Airbnb to comment on the delay of the payments and not only did they not answer me but they returned the message. I have also asked other hosts who have been in this for a longer time and they have told me that it is not possible to receive the money by any means other than VaCuba.”

She says that Airbnb always makes the payment “in less than two days” and that the company notifies her by email. Monzó confesses that she does not want to leave the platform because “it is very safe” and sends “the type of clients that you ask for.”

“I refuse to take in the tourists just off the street because I do not want to take risks, I want it to always be through a company that guarantees me the seriousness of the customer,” says Monzó.

Other users of the platform say they have found a solution to the problem by using AIS cards to send and receive transfers, which can be found in any branch of the state-owned company Financiera Cimex.

“You can ask VaCuba to start sending the money to the AIS card,” explains an Airbnb host.

By the end of 2016, at least 34,000 self-employed people were engaged in renting homes to serve a growing number of tourists (4 million last year). To do so legally, they have to get a license and pay taxes, which are levied even when their rooms are not rented.

Connectify Will Be Free in Cuba to Share Internet Access

The app converts an internet-connected computer into a virtual repeater and is widely used on the island to share web access from the wifi zones. (Connectify)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Havana, 6 April 2017 – The managers of the Connectify application have announced additional benefits for Cuban users who will now be able to access the tool’s premium features free of charge. The app converts a computer connected to the internet into a virtual repeater and is widely used on the island to share access to the web from wifi zones.

A statement on the company’s official website says that it will continue “to fully support Cuban citizens with free Connectify Hotspot MAX 2017 licenses.” The statement also announced the release of a Spanish version of its program. continue reading

Along with the features available in the free version, such as creating a Wi-Fi hotspot, using the ad blocker and customizing the hotspot name, residents of the island will also have access to the premium functions of Connectify Hotspot, among them the repeater mode.

Connectify for PC has gained users in Cuba in recent years in the country with the opening of wifi zones and is used by many to share the bandwidth of their connection

Connectify for PC has gained users in Cuba in recent years with the opening of public wifi zones and is used by many to share the bandwidth of their connection. It has also generated a lucrative business of reselling access to the web at a price below the 1.50 CUC for each hour charged by the Telecommunications Company of Cuba (ETECSA).

This is not the first time that the company offers an advantage to Cuban clients. In the middle of 2015 the company launched a special promotion for the island that allowed the free download of the professional version of the software for three months. Until now, most of the versions that were used were hacked copies.

Invasive Marabou Weed Arrives at the Plaza of the Revolution

Marabou in the Plaza of the Revolution. (14ymedio)

14ymedio bigger14ymedio, Yoani Sanchez, NYC, 6 April 2017 — Resistant and thorny, the invasive marabou weed has inundated Cuban fields and threatened to displace the national shield’s royal palm. The shrub has become a plague spreading across the country, covering previously arable land, and worming its way into a topic for the speeches of senior officials. But the tenacious invader is not exclusive to rural areas and has also reached that symbol of power that is the Plaza of the Revolution in Havana.

On one side of the José Martí National Library, among the ruins of a building that would have been used to house patients for Operation Miracle – an eye care program – but that was never finished, grows a spontaneous garden with tiny yellow flowers and powerful pods loaded with seeds. The marabou raises its defiant branches there as if it were pointing to the huge tower popularly called “La Raspadura” – The Scratch. continue reading

Without adequate machinery or chemical defoliants to help stop the plague, across the island many country dwellers use old machetes and makeshift axes to cut the trunks. However, on both sides of the highways and in any vacant lot, the marabou continues to display its excellent health.

In 2007, during his speech on the anniversary of the attack on the Moncada Barracks, Raúl Castro joked about the panorama he had found on his trip to the city of Camagüey: “What was most beautiful, what stood out to my eyes, was how lovely the marabou was along the whole road.”

Now, the implacable enemy is approaching the presidential office in the Palace of the Revolution. Stealthy and steady, the marabou has won the battle.