Category: Luz Escobar

The director is remembered in Cuba for several documentaries that honestly address social issues and mix journalism and art, such as The Face of the Waters and his first work, Usufruct, for which he won the prize of the International School of Cinema and Television of San Antonio de los Baños, at the Gibara Film Festival.

Jiménez says he has never completely left the country. “On a formal level, the United States is what I want, on a conceptual and spiritual level what I want is Havana, Vertientes, Camagüey.” Something that he corroborates also when he sleeps. “The space where my dreams are developed is Cuba, it is with my father, the cows and in my origin as a guajiro.”

The door of the return to the Island remains open for him. But “it is very difficult to do it because Havana is screwed up and the rest of the country is worse, but on a spiritual level for me it is a nice bath of the  warm water of affection for people who are very grateful,” acknowledges the artist.

In the American academic world he has seen everything. “I have been invited to many universities to give talks about my work in independent and documentary films.” To those who ask stereotyped questions about the reality of the Island, he recommends “living a year” in Cuba, and doing it in the way that ordinary Cubans live. “And then w will talk later.”

“It is very clear to me that all Cubans who live abroad are political exiles. If you leave here because you are hungry, it is because the government did not do something to avoid that, and that is called politics,” he clarifies to those who want to label him as an economic emigrant.

“If you leave because you do not find space for your vocation, it is because there is a government that is malfunctioning and if you leave because you shit on the mother of the ruler, which seems very authentic to me, then it is the same. A governmental mechanism has not been generated. in which all people are included.”

In his five years living in the United States he has been a metal worker, film projectionist, producer, editor and cameraman. “Now in addition to having two jobs I am also a student. I have found a space for myself but I am still more or less the same person.” Because “there are things that change but not the essence, it is very difficult to escape from Cubanness, you can’t.”

In that country he has made six short films and also remains attentive to the cinema that is made within Cuba. Especially those “cimarrones [escaped slaves] like Jorge Molina, Miguel Coyula, Alejandro Alonso, Ricardo Figueredo and Yimit Ramírez.” Audiovisual creators who said that “no one stops them, there is no revolution to stop these people.”

He claims not to hold a grudge because he had problems at the University of Camaguey, where he studied journalism, with two materials considered “conflicting.”

“Then I went to film school in San Antonio with a small grant and wanted to enroll in the regular day course but a teacher warned me that they would never accept me there. I felt that every time I wanted to get put my head up, they knocked me down.”

What he has taken from those years has been productive. “In the end I have been what I wanted to be. Those who insulted me and humiliated me are what other people have wanted them to be.”

In October he met again with part of his Cuban public at the headquarters of Instar in Old Havana, with a personal exhibition that included twelve works, of which six had not been released in Cuba: Now (2016), Elegía (2016), TPara Construir Otra Casa (2016), Semiótica de la Mentira (2019), Mater Dei (2019), and El Eterno Retorno (2019).

These works have also been the result of a great personal sacrifice, stealing minutes from rest and paying a good part of the expenses. “When you get there, the CIA does not receive you, the American Government and Yankee imperialism do not receive you. None of them give out money to produce films, that is false,” says Jiménez.

“You have to do it all with your own means, generate your spaces and your time to do that. What did I do? In my time to sleep I did everything, between the jobs I’ve had, I did the movies and filmed on the weekend, editing at four in the morning, that was my choice. I feel sad when people give up.”

Jimenez would like to see a Cuba where there was an art and rehearsal cinema where he could present his films without anyone shouting “counterrevolutionary” or insulting him. “I am not interested if it is a radical communist who stands up to give an opinion about my film, I appreciate that, now the insults seem to me regrettable.”

“I have two very strong struggles in the United States, one is not to become a cynical and another is to deal with my dreams.”

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“I just want to go in to look, take some pictures and show my husband what is there, so we can decide what we are going to buy,” explained a woman who was not allowed access by the security guard. In the first hours of the opening of these shops, only those who expressed their intention to buy could enter and those who came to browse the brands and prices were turned away.

The scene reminded a retiree who lined up on Sunday afternoon what he had experienced in the mid-90s of the last century when the Cuban economy was dollarized and the first stores in convertible currency, known as shoppings (using the English word), opened . “Then you had to show the green tickets to enter and now the magnetic card is the same thing,” he compared.

The pensioner told 14ymedio everything he had had to do to be in line this Monday. “I stood in line at the Metropolitan Bank for hours last Tuesday and I was able to open the dollar account, in which I deposited 400 dollars that I had saved from the last time my son sent me money,” he summarized. “What I am looking for is a flat screen TV because my old Panda is almost no longer viewable.”

Before Monday, the retiree’s options would have been to resort to the informal market that feeds on the goods imported by the mules from Panama, Mexico or the United States, or pay the highest prices of the state store network, with a smaller variety and more outdated models. “As soon as they announced this option, I decided not to spend a centavo and to wait for the stores to open,” he says.

Niurvis, a woman who is seven-months pregnant, waits near the door to enter with the next group. “What I want is a washing machine that also dries clothes well, because I live in an apartment without a balcony and when the baby is born I don’t know where I can will be able to hang up to dry everything that gets dirty,” she explains.

Just before ten o’clock in the morning, a woman comes out pushing two boxes which contain the different parts of a Sanky brand air conditioner of the type known as a “split” — because one part of it is installed outside and one part inside. She had paid $361 for the equipment which has a ton of power and which in the black market as of this morning was quoted above 600 CUC (over $600).

“Today is the day for throwing flowers [into the sea] for Camilo [Cienfuegos] and I have had to walk a lot so that my grandson would not go empty-handed to school,” says a woman who came running for fear that she would lose her turn.

“It’s a tremendous day they have chosen to open these stores, some remembering the guerrilla and others here showing their card with the enemy’s currency to be able to enter to buy.”

For 10 CUC young couple bought, from another person, a place in line to access the premises, but once at the door the custodian warned them that only one person can enter for each card. “But we have come together and we want to decide the model of refrigerator that we are going to buy, because it is for our house, where we both live,” she insisted without managing to convince him.

“This seems like a military unit,” the young man lamented when he had to stay outside and gestured through the glass to the young woman to decide “together” which refrigerator was the most appropriate for the space they have in the kitchen. Like him, other customer’s companions also made gestures, mouthed words without uttering sound and indicated with the index finger through the window.

Several police officers stayed near the entrance and one of the uniformed men called the customer who had organized the list of names of the people in line the day before. As a general rule, although the practice of organizing the line is something traditional in a country where you have to wait to buy everything from ice cream to a television set, the authorities fine or arrest the “coleros,” those who stand in line for other people and are paid for their services.

There was no lack of cluelessness. “And what are they going to get here?” Asked a teenage girl who passed by the store half an hour after the opening. With patience, a lady explained the new method of buying appliances, auto parts and electric motorcycles with magnetic cards in foreign currency, but the girl just shrugged and said: “Ah, that …”

To her side, quick and fast, another buyer came out who had acquired a Royal brand fridge for his private business. With certain difficulties, he lifted the box onto a pedicab parked in the middle of the aisle of the central shopping arcade and left the place. The state stores do not offer home delievery right now and customers have had to solve it on their own.

Private carriers took advantage of the start of sales to offer their services for a price that ranges between 15 and 20 CUC, provided it is “in the same municipality of Plaza de la Revolución or nearby municipalities such as Cerro, Playa and Centro Habana,” clarified one of them while passing near the line. “But we can agree on a price if they go further,” he added.

“You can only buy two of each piece of equipment: two washing machines, two splits, two televisions …,” an employee repeated over and over to customers who kept asking questions every time he leaned out the door. Rationing by quantities seeks to prevent hoarders from reselling in the informal market and making a profit.

“What if I come back tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow?” a young man with colorful headphones and Adidas shoes joked. “How will they prevent me from buying several refrigerators if I come several times? Or is there a list of customers that they will keep from one day to the next?” His questions remained unanswered before the stunned look of the guard, who had no answers for so many questions.

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She says that then she wanted to bring women together to express the idea that “our nipples are not offensive. They are ours, it is our history, they are our experiences, we give life with these nipples,” and that is where the idea of this exhibition came from.

She explains that the whole project was then transformed into something different. Reguera says that “I also didn’t him to have a discourse only about feminism” because, for the artist, the idea is to talk about equality. “Saying that we all have the same rights to say what we want to say, to do what we want to do, I know it is difficult but it is the universe in which I believe,” she added.

She began to add men as well but it did not seem to complete the idea of what she was looking to express. “I didn’t want something of genders, with women and men, and I thought about including people with disabilities and abilities in the exhibition, with the greatest variety of people possible making the same symbolic gesture of I can, I can also do this.”

The artist, with great experience in photography and making portraits of models, took only two photos of each person although for some she had to do a little more so that they would not be “affected” by the emotions that overcame them.

“It was not a problem, I think it is easy to remember a moment that has marked us and made us feel inferior and small, it is not difficult to remember that. It was just asking them to think about that time. For me it was impressive and people immediately remembered.”

She confesses that the most difficult part of the entire work, which lasted for months, was trying not to be affected with all those experiences picked up by her lens.

“When you look through the camera you are without distraction looking through a black tunnel and simply one person feeling something super strong, it was difficult. I had days in which I finished the sessions and I was very sad. For me #Libre was also a process of growing, this exercise changed me.”

The impact of the work does not end with the printing of the portraits and their mounting in the gallery. Many of those who participated have written to the artist. “I have beautiful testimonies and I want to do things with that. They are very emotional but also very motivating words. Although the exercise was to remember a not very pleasant moment, the feeling with stayed with them was liberation. I feel very happy that it is like that,” she said.

Moving between the portraits that hang together from the ceiling of the gallery, one could often spy the faces of some of the models who were posing in front of their naked torso to take the souvenir home.

The exhibition will remain for a month in the gallery and May Reguera has the idea of including conferences on human rights in social networks.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to practicing serious journalism that reflects Cuba’s reality in all its depth. Thank you for joining us on this long journey. We invite you to continue supporting us by now becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue transforming journalism in Cuba.

Some rivers, such as Caracusey, have overflowed and four dams have had to be opened after exceeding their normal water levels. Tuinucú is at 103%; Siguaney 106% ; Aridanes 111% and Banao II 106%.

In Condado and Caracusey there were heavy rains this Monday, registering 102 and 111 cubic millimeters, respectively, while it measured 81 in the historic center of Trinidad.

Sancti Spíritus is not the only province affected by rainfall, although it is the most affected. In Camagüey it has rained throughout the week, constantly. “As always happens, the streets are flooded and traveling on the road becomes a headache,” residents say.

“It has not happened for more than 30 years, it rained for more than 10 days,” said Ricardo Fernández, a 14medio contributor in that province. “It is a problem to go out, there are no umbrellas in the stores and those that are selling them now charge 13 CUC.”

In Old Havana, although the rains were not so torrential, many families spent the week worrying about the roof of their houses. “I slept with my heart in my mouth, this building has shoring everywhere and the rain gets in through some walls that are cracked.

I have a room full of basins and I had to send the girls to my mother-in-law’s house so they’re not in danger. Until the rains stop, I won’t bring them home. Ugly things have happened with some partial collapses that we have suffered here and it is better to prevent it,” said a young woman who lives in a building “in danger of collapse.”

In Holguin, the rains caused problems in several locations and caused the Mayarí river to rise. Something similar to what happened in Guantanamo, where rainfall caused the overflow in some of its river basins and dams; already at 50% of their capacity last week, 12% more than last month, they continued to increase their level.

The forecasts, as of today, are more optimistic and the showers, which are expected in some provinces, will, at least, be isolated.

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She explained that after that physical examination the doctor was able to determine that the girl was “totally healthy” and they give her the authorization to get the vaccine. “About 10 am she was vaccinated and two hours later the nightmare began. She vomited the first time at 12 noon and then again and again. I got scared and called a doctor friend who recommended I go to the polyclinic to get gravinol to relieve these symptoms,” she said.

When she arrived at the polyclinic the vomiting was decreasing but she says that the girl’s skin “began to get a little red” and she decided to go, without a referral, to the Luis Díaz Soto hospital, known as “The Naval” [as in ‘navy’].

There they did a urinalysis and blood tests, and after half an hour “the tests came back fine,” explains Caballero.

“The doctor who treated us did not want us to go home because she had a fever and now there is a lot of dengue fever out there so despite the good test results it could be something was not going well and that is why he suggested that I go to a pediatrician.

So, also by her own efforts, she went to the Borrás-Marfán Hospital in El Vedado, and there they treated her little girl “with the best care” and when the doctors arrived “they were alarmed that the color of her skin and the swelling of her feet” were due to the vaccine she had been given.

“As of that time no other cases were known and they thought it was that her body had rejected that vaccine that we all know are viruses, all are made with viruses. Well, there they decided to keep her under observation for 48 hours and they admitted her, but little by little I saw that she was getting worse,” she said.

“She started having diarrhea, vomited again and although she drank a great deal of water she didn’t urinate anything and that’s why the swelling,” adds the mother, who is trying to get away from her neighborhood these days, from her routine and everything that reminds her of her daughter.

An hour after being admitted they gave her an IV to hydrate her because she was dehydrating. “Then the fever started because the dipyrone they put her on did nothing and I had to lower the fever with a compress that I applied to her for about two hours.”

Caballero says that doctors never stopped checking on her daughter. “But nobody saw how much it was getting worse, I was scared, very very scared the tell truth,” she confesses.

At five in the morning on Tuesday a doctor passed by who could “see how badly she was doing” who called everyone and they decided quickly to put her in intensive care.

The news fell like “a bucket of cold water” but says she said was filled with courage and went with her daughter as she watched her get worse and worse.

“She was swelling all over and her feet were changing color from red to purple. She had very smelly diarrhea several times in a row and I could see that her arm where she was given the vaccine was red and it was swelling too much and it was very hard and it hurt. It caught my attention and they told me to put cold packs on it but it was getting worse.”

The doctors told her she had to wait outside because her daughter had become “very serious and was in critical condition.”

The wait became “an agony” thinking that she would not see her daughter again. The specialist came out to ask her for permission to open the girl’s arm to drain the infection inside. “Of course I accepted, whatever they did, as long as she was saved.”

She improved a little after the operation but, a few minutes later, “she stopped urinating again and her kidneys were failing and her feet were swelling more and more.”

At seven o’clock on Wednesday night, doctors gave her a blood transfusion and dialysis because “she was very sick” and “her life was in danger.”

“It was only an hour, maybe, when they told me she had died but there was no explanation, only that they had done everything possible and I believe them because I did see them coming and doing everything, even the impossible.

“All the specialist there came together to help her but, well… I had to go in later, like any mother, and say goodbye to her and pick up my things and I decided to have her cremated.”

The mother asked for an autopsy to study and determine what caused her daughter’s death. They told her she would only have to wait two hours at a funeral home in Alamar.

“Many hours passed and finally my little girl’s body arrived and from there we could go to the crematorium and then to her funeral. I am waiting for the Ministry of Health to give me some explanation or, at least, condolences. As of now we know only that she was killed, that’s it. But here I am, standing… I don’t know how.”

Paloma’s mother insists that she has no complaints against the doctors who treated her. She also considers that “it is very unfair” that the nurse who vaccinated her daughter was fired from her job because “she is very competent” and she “does not manufacture the vaccines.”

A few hours after Caballero gave her testimony to this newspaper and almost three days after the death of his daughter, the Ministry of Public Health reported on Saturday that a commission is investigating the causes of the “unfortunate” event.

The health authorities admitted in a statement published on their digital site that between October 7^th and 8^th three one-year-old children were diagnosed “with an adverse event” associated with the MMR vaccination and that all those children had been vaccinated on 7 October at the “Betancourt Neninger” Polyclinic in the municipality of Habana del Este.

The statement added that “immediately after” the symptoms appeared, “they were admitted and received medical attention by professionals of high scientific level in the pediatric hospitals Borrás Marfán and Centro Habana.”

The health authorities also report that “through active research” that included all children vaccinated in that health district, two more children were detected “with symptoms” and were also admitted.

This vaccine is given in Cuba twice during childhood. The first when the child turns one year old and the second at age six. The latter is almost always injected at elementary schools to first grade students.

In 2018, more than 95,000 children were immunized on the Island with the triple viral vaccine (MMR), a figure that the United Nations Children’s Fund highlighted favorably. Currently Cuba has a vaccination coverage of over 98%, with 11 preparations that protect against 13 diseases. At the same time, the “anti-vaccine” trends have not gained space in Cuba as they have in other nations in the region.

In 2002, three deaths occurred on the Island that were classified as errors during the campaign for the elimination of measles when using a non-sterile dissolvent and in 2004 there was another death due to non-compliance with the rules for vaccine delivery, according to reports by that entity.

However, these data can only be read in official reports sent to international health-related organizations; they were never published in the national press. As a general rule, the Government hides and maintains a strong secrecy around any event derived from medical malpractice, the poor state of drugs or unfavorable reactions to a drug.

In the face of the silence of the health authorities and the official press Paloma Domínguez Caballero is writing letters to send to “every place possible” to get an answer.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.

The authorities proposed a reorganization of the energy supply to avoid blackouts, but in practice this means that a patient can be cut off halfway through a treatment.

“Because of a realignment of hours they made in my clinic now the compressor is turned off [responsible for operating the instruments] at six o’clock. If they cut you off at half, you have a problem,” a dental student in her senior year in the municipality of Cárdenas, in Matanzas, tells 14ymedio. “So you can not do anything right, you know when you start working with a patient but you can not guess when it will end, each case is different,” she complains.

Together with Healthcare, Education is another of the key sectors for the population, in addition to both being the regime’s flag. But here too, the functioning trembles more than usual. Although the Government assured that classes would not be suspended, and shortly after there were partial closures and reductions in the operating hours of the universities, the reality has been even more serious.

The University of Pinar del Río (UPR) has been practically paralyzed for the last two weeks, one of its workers told this newspaper.

“All these measures are avoiding the blackouts programmed by all possible means. The blackout is a symbol of that terrible time of the Special Period, and the last thing that this Government wants now is a protest.” The professor recalled a spontaneous demonstration in the Havana municipality of 10 October that occurred after the passage of a hurricane. At that time many Havanans spent several days without electricity or drinking water.

“This week was also the Caribbean National Competitive Programming Contest in all universities and in the UPR it could not take place. In the next rounds (national, regional and global) there is no way for there to be representation of the UPR,” the teache continues.

But not only university education suffers. This newspaper was able to verify, in a tour of several schools in the capital, that in several of them class schedules were adjusted andsome adjustments were made in class schedules and cuts of some complementary subjects such as Participatory Sport or Vocational Guidance. According to one teacher, activities should be normalized next week.

A resident of Guanabacoa, in the capital, has been going through the wringer to take her son to school in the last two weeks. Her son studies in a school for children with special needs and is always picked up by a minibus very close to their home. “As of last week they’ve cancelled the bus and now I have to invent a thousand tricks to get there early. The boy gets desperate and gets in a bad mood when he has to wait a lot,” she laments.

The savings have even reached the kitchens of the schools. In some provinces such as Pinar del Río and Matanzas, schools are using firewood to cook students’ lunch, according to several testimonies collected by this newspaper. “They cook in the middle of the schoolyard and every day my granddaughter gets home with ashes her hair,” says a retired woman from Pinar del Río who has three grandchildren in her care.

Alberto López Díaz, vice president of the Government in Villa Clara, said there are concrete measures that have been agreed to with the country’s leadership for saving electricity.

“The state centers disconnect the breakers during peak hours, from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm and from 5:00 pm to 9:00 pm. Only 164 centers with vital services and priorities are authorized to maintain electricity consumption, such as the Hospitals, the meat productions plants, dairy products, electrochemistry, among others,” said López in a meeting that took place this Thursday in that city and was chaired by Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermúdez.

In that province 917 patrols have been created from 434 schools to go house to house alerting the 12,505 customers of the Electric Union that consume more than 500Kwh of the need for savings. In addition, 121 command posts have been created to achieve, at the level of the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) a call to turn off 20-watt lamps and 120-watt refrigerators.

Although the Government has spent days pretending that the situation is short-term and the measures adopted will cushion major problems, the lives of citizens show that things have gone remarkably worse. The lack of foreign subsidies and the inability of a stagnant economy without dynamism are far from being solved with the arrival of an oil tanker.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.

“This is not the time,” the agents said, nor did they permit private businesses to rent bicycles, as is always the case with the ‘bicycle events’ organized by the project on the first Sunday of each month, the participant said.

On their Facebook page the members of Bicicletear La Habana explained that this Friday they wanted to “raise awareness about the climate crisis that the planet is experiencing and propose the bicycle as an alternative” but that this desire “was misinterpreted by police and State security agents” who ended up blocking the cyclists. “The situation raises many questions for us as to why our authorities and administration do not help us fight against climate change,” they said.

“The good news is that we still pedal in isolated groups, but with the same desire to infect you with that tingle we get when we ride a bicycle through Havana,” they said.

Between September 20 and 27, young people from many countries are mobilized on the streets to demand solutions to the Earth’s climate crisis. More than 1,153 events have been convened across the globe in support of the strike.

For their part, other young Cubans, grouped under the Fridays For Future initiative, wanted to join the global call and requested permission to sit in the Plaza San Francisco de Asís in Old Havana.

Rubén D. Herrera, part of that initiative, explained that after requesting permission from the authorities “in August our wait for an official response has continued to be extended and the day arrived without our receiving any response the result of which was to prevent today’s activities.”

Despite not being able to undertake a collective action, as individuals many of the activists took to the streets with signs asking for support for the planet. With the hashtag #fridaysforfuture many people shared images of their messages on the Facebook plage Fridays For Future.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.

“Here is the recording of the meeting, listen to it and then we can talk. I’m going to walk away because I don’t want to hear it again,” says Ruiz Urquiola.

The audio, about fifteen minutes, records the words of Sergio Peña, rector of the Higher Institute of Industrial Design (ISDi), to fifteen teachers who are enough to conclude that, when Ruiz Urquiola leaves the meeting, the official had already given all the details: “That was the information, I’m all ears,” says Peña.

In the audio the rector explains that for the coming course he cannot “defend” the current staff of the ISDi and that the institution will hire based on the needs it has. “To all of you, we will give you a letter of recommendation so that, if you want, you can find a new center,” he says. In addition, he adds that the new structure was made at the end of the semester and will materialize in the month of October. Peña also clarifies that they did not want to give this bad news through a message or a call, and that is why they had called the meeting even though the teachers were enjoying their vacations.

During the meeting, the rector argued that Omara Ruiz Urquiola was among those affected because last year she had only 32 hours of classes in a semester and had not participated in design-related events, such as the Forma congress, which the ISDi organizes every two years.

Ruiz Urquiola refuted this statement and clarified that she had been involved in the congress, as the paper published in the catalog indicates, but that she could not go physically because she was sick with the Zika virus (transmitted by mosquitos).

“At the meeting, while I was dismantling Sergio Peña’s points one by one, the department head who wrote the report about me not only did not say anything, but she lowered her head. She did not even confirm the Zika, which she was very aware of because I called her and explained myself, and she even told me how bad it had been for her when she suffered that illness on one of her trips to Guyana,” she says.

Milvia Pérez, dean of the ISDi and one of the people who have hindered the teacher’s work, was also present at the meeting. “Milvia went to see my department head and demanded that she assign another teacher to my classroom to monitor what I said. My boss said no, that she would have done that if she had wanted to but that it violated academic protocol.

“They cannot reduce my fixed position status when my evaluations have all been positive, not a single point has been made against me. They have visited me in many classes and all evaluations are satisfactory. It is too forced, and that is why I believe that there has been the reaction of solidarity that has been seen, because my students say it.

“It is inconceivable that I am in that situation, it is a great, great nonsense, a rudeness to get rid of me under any pretext. The problem they have is that I haven’t given them the pretext, they don’t have it and they have to invent it,” she denounces.

For Ruiz Urquiola, her dismissal is a maneuver of State Security and has a political background, as evidenced, she believes, by her exclusion from a new professional meeting.

“Four days ago I was informed that I am banned from participating in the Bauhaus Centenary, which is organized by the Palace of the Second Cape: Center for the Interpretation of Cuba-Europe Cultural Relations, to which I was going as a panelist. This event is sponsored by the German Embassy in Cuba and the Office of the Historian of Havana, and the latter is the one who vetoed my participation,” she says.

Now, Ruiz Urquiola’s idea is to demand her rights in the ISDi, although she has already been warned of the likely futility of that, with previous examples such as those of actress Lynn Cruz and biochemist Oscar Casanella. Her only option for now is to file a wrongful termination claim with the labor appeals court: “My health comes first, also the psychic damage is already noticeable; in me it is physically reflected by the weight loss, my body is feeling it.”

Ruiz Urquiola’s goal is to get her job back and the professional privileges that go with it. She is also demanding moral compensation for damage to her image. “They’ve use social media to make and corroborate crazy, fraudulent accusations, including professors who were at the meeting and are directors of the institution. I knew they gunning for me,” she laments.

She is also demanding that those directors be investigated and removed from their positions.

“They have lied, thay have abused their power, they have no way to undermine my judgment and have used their power to bully me. The day all my demands are met, then I will return to ISDi but otherwise no, because, simply, the social and psychological damage is great and irreparable. I have not done anything to be in this situation,” she defends herself.

Urquiola graduated in Art History in 1996 and taught at the Higher Institute of Art (ISA), where she was head of the Department of Scenic Design for the Theater Arts major. In 2009 she arrived at ISDi as a contract professor and in 2011 she became part of the permanent staff of the institute, where she passed her assessment as an assistant teacher of higher education.

That same year she received the recommendation of her students and won the Golden Chalk Award for “the quality of her teaching, her professional preparation and her role in the training and improvement of younger generations.”

Those who are or have been her students, in addition to some teachers of the institution, have come out in defense of Ruiz Urquiola on social networks and have launched a request for the teacher to return to the institute which already has more than 600 signatures and dozens of support messages.

For Glenda Álvarez, a graduate of ISDi, Omara Ruiz Urquiola is “a jewel,” and her Semiotics classes were a “relief” within “the torments of the basic cycle” of subjects.

“Omara was my Cuban Culture teacher and the truth is that I could not imagine a better teacher for the position or a more appropriate subject for her. Omara taught us to love Cuba. The passion with which she gave her classes and the ease with which hours and hours of precious information about our country came to mind, combined to keep a class of 60 tired design students, alert and listening, “says Javier González, another of her students.

Yenisel Cotilla, also an ISDi teacher, said: “Being a teacher goes beyond knowledge, it is about making a mark on students, changing their lives. ISDi students deserve a teacher like her, that is more important than anything else.”

“From the first day I was captivated with Omara, the first class left me so full of emotions that I could not help telling her (…) She never influenced us in any way with her political ideas, quite the contrary, she showed us things that we didn’t know about our own history, things that made our sense of patriotism grow, with it I discovered a story that encouraged me not to miss a class…” said another student, Flavia Cabrera.

These messages are now a source of relief the Ruiz Urquiola. “Everything the ‘kids’ have done,” drives her to continue forward.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.

“Officials get off at every stop to make sure that no one leaves the train, not even the smokers,” recounted one surprised passenger. By the time the train departed Havana, children were still excited by the new seats and the train whistle but some passengers were already feeling uncomfortable.

“The trip itself takes fourteen hours to Santiago but it was delayed,” complains Alfredo. His own journey lasted almost eighteen hours, during which time his family went from euphoria to discomfort, desperately wanting to get out of the car and stretch their legs.

In another car, whose seats are cheaper because there is no air conditioning, sat Maricela, a woman who had been employed by the railroad company for twenty years but had never boarded a train in all that time. “The trains now are not like they were when I was young and was a transportation engineer for the Western Railroad Company,” she recalls.

“Back then the cars were nice, very comfortable, but that didn’t come as a surprise to anyone,” notes the 67-year-old retiree. “Now everyone wants to take photos as though this were the Eiffel Tower. I don’t know what all the happiness is about. It’s just an ordinary train, with not a lot of comforts,” she adds skeptically.

One of the few novelties the new vehicles have is a cell phone app that tells passengers and family members the train’s location in real time and its estimated time of arrival. But the app does not allow travellers to reserve or purchase tickets. “In the old days you didn’t need that. Trains arrived at every station right on time,” says Maricela.

The new train does not have a separate baggage car. Passengers must store their luggage and other packages in the space above their seats. After numerous complaints, rail employees informed passengers that the company is considering imposing restrictions next month on the size of suitcases, which would be limited to roughly 62 inches.

The size seems small to passengers accustomed to traveling with bulky luggage — typically filled with food, gifts and accessories — which they carry on their backs when they go on vacation.

When the new trains first went into service, passengers were not allowed to bring food from home onboard but now they can, though employees ask that they take special care to keep things clean. “In the car where I was, there was a cold water fountain which the attendant said had more than enough of water for the entire trip,” says Alfredo.

Although TV news reports had indicated that the new trains would have a dining car, it is not operational at this time. “They don’t think it even works,” adds Alfredo, who wonders how passengers are going to eat if they are not allowed to walk between cars.

A seat in a car that is not climate controlled costs 70 Cuban pesos while one that is air conditioned costs 95. For 20 pesos more you can get a snack consisting of a medium-sized ham and cheese sandwich with a canned soft drink that the attendant hands out during the trip.

Each car seats seventy passengers and there is adequate space between seats for them to stretch their legs. But as the rail attendant points out, “The cars are very long and they put a strain on the locomotives, which aren’t new.” This combined with train tracks that are in poor condition contribute to frequent delays.

At Santa Clara the train had to change engines. Employees explained this was due to the extra weight of the cars, which the engine could not handle. This technical maneuver further delayed a trip whose departure had already been pushed back by an hour.

Before getting off at the final destination, passengers had to present their tickets with their names, surnames and identity card numbers as well as their seat numbers. “It’s so that, if something is lost or broken on the train, they have someone to look for or investigate,” Alfredo speculates.

The train finally pulled into the Santiago de Cuba station. After it had stopped, the car doors opened and a surge of humanity spilled out at full speed. Relieved and tired, passengers were eager to get away from the railcars and locomotive as quickly as possible.

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.

“There is a shortage of uniforms in the district. The staff at [the Ministry of Domestic] Commerce made the decision to announce when uniforms will be for sale through the media, in other words through the press and television. You can come back and buy them once they notify you,” he said at the beginning of a speech that was not well received by those present.

“We told you they would be for sale starting today because that was the information we received but that’s all changed now,” he adds. “Since the uniforms have not yet arrived, we cannot sell them.” That’s when the avalanche of anger and complaints begins.

“It’s all about communication. Why didn’t they put up a sign? There are people like me who have been waiting here since 1:00 AM,” says the first mother to raise her hand.

“It’s the same lie, the same old story we’ve heard for years. They are toying with us. There are a lot of working mothers here who have asked for the day off to take care of this. There are pregnant women. It shows a lack of respect. You said the uniforms would be for sale starting today and that’s why we’re here. The minister herself said there would be uniforms, that it was all guaranteed,” shouted one mother.

“They said so on television, that they would begin selling uniforms starting August 1,” says a tiny grandmother in a thin voice.

“This means I’ll have to become a TV news addict,” says the husband of one the women waiting in line, with a hint of irony.

In an effort to calm things down, the store manager comes to the employee’s rescue.

“We had a meeting with the vice-minister and the Commerce director and the problem is that the Playa district in Havana has less than 50% of its supply,” she says.

“Although we were prepared to begin selling uniforms, we are not authorized to do so if the store has not received at least that amount, as is the case with La Gloria,” she explains.

The manager is sympathetic and provides a new date to appease the parents, which they take it with a grain of salt. “Indications are that it will be on Monday, that the sale of school uniforms will begin on Monday,” she says, adding that if that happens, the store will remain open as long as necessary.

She gives those present the store’s telephone number as well as her personal phone number, promising to provide information or confirm Monday’s sale. She warns, however, that tenth grade boys’ uniforms may be unavailable until further notice “because there aren’t any.”

In a statement to 14ymedio the minister of Domestic Commerce, Betsy Diaz Velazquez, confirmed that uniforms would be for sale starting on Monday at the Plaza of the Revolution.

“I just left in the middle of a meeting to come give you the explanation,” she said, admitting that the previous information had been very incorrect.

The sale of school uniforms usually begins sometime between May and June, but this year the vice-minister of Domestic Commerce, Nancy Valdes, announced that they would not be available until the end of June or beginning of August.

Though they had to work longer shifts, trying to finish on time and make the almost three million uniforms required this year, factory workers were still not able to meet the official deadline.

Official press reports indicated on Sunday that uniforms sales had begun in towns in Artemisa, Mayabeque, Sancti Spíritus, Camagüey, Las Tunas, Holguín, Granma, Guantanamo and Isla de la Juventud provinces, adding that sales in the remaining provinces would begin gradually, “most likely in the second half of August.”

“It’s always the same old thing. The higher-ups make mistakes and underlings like us are the ones who pay the price because I am the one who has to face you,” said the manager of La Rosa yesterday. She confirmed that sale had begun in other towns where supplies surpassed the required 50%.

“But you still have to buy the item from your designated outlet. I take responsibility for making sure you get it, for making calls to other stores to find the right size. I’ll even go there to pick it up, no matter where it is,” she promises.

Before leaving, one of the first mothers in line snapped at the employee. “You have tell the leaders they have to inform us about this on the same day they are reporting on the Pan-American games. They could have easily told us yesterday during the Round Table program. If they had done that, we wouldn’t have had to wait in line.”

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The 14ymedio team is committed to serious journalism that reflects the reality of deep Cuba. Thank you for joining us on this long road. We invite you to continue supporting us, but this time by becoming a member of 14ymedio. Together we can continue to transform journalism in Cuba.