Category: Yoani Sanchez

The literature of Mario Vargas Llosa has been the source of several key turning points in my life. The first was 17 years ago, during a summer marked by blackouts and the economic crisis. With the intention of borrowing The War of the End of the World, I approached a journalist expelled from his profession for ideological problems, with whom I still share my days. I keep that copy, with its cracked cover and yellowed pages, as dozens of readers have found their way with it to this Peruvian author banned in the official bookstores.

Then came the university and while I was preparing my thesis on the literature of the dictatorship in Latin America, he published his novel The Feast of the Goat. My including an analysis of his text on Trujillo gave no pleasure to the panel that evaluated me. Nor did they like the fact that of the characteristic of the American caudillos, I highlighted only those displayed by “our own” Maximum Leader. Thus, the second time a book by today’s winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature marked my life, because it made me realize how frustrating it was to be a philologist in Cuba. Why do I need a title — he told me — that announces I am a specialist in language and words, when I may not even freely assemble sentences.

So Vargas Llosa and his literature are responsible, in a direct and “premeditated” way, for much of who I am today: for my matrimonial happiness and my aversion to totalitarianism, for my betrayal of philology and approach to journalism.

I am preparing myself now, because I fear that the next time a book of his falls into my hands its effect will last another 17 years, and once again slam the door on my profession.

October 8, 2010

Under the seat one could see a patched grab bag, like those given to people who went on missions in the 1980s. Every time the bus jerked over a pothole, many eyes fixed on it to see if its contents had come spilling out through the broken zipper. Nearby, on the road to the town of Candelaria, a police patrol stopped the trip and ordered everyone out with their belongings. At the end of the aisle, along with others equally orphaned, was the mended valise of a one-time State security officer who had been in Europe or some country in Africa. No one made the least move to pick it up.

Two officers searched each row and piled the packages no traveler had claimed on the steps. They opened them with great care, cutting the corners, pulling out the staples, to expose contraband more pursued than arms and drugs: milk,.cheese, lobster, shrimp and fish. A sheep dog, trained to detect seafood, milk products and beef, searched among the packages people had consigned to the ditch, under the sun. “Everyone will be detained until the owners of these packages come forward,” shouted one of the higher-ups as he starts to fill the trunk of the police car with the confiscated goods.

Although they questioned and threatened the travelers at the station, they could not impute any crimes to them as there was no way to prove who owned the pounds of food surely intended for the black market. It was impossible to connect the suitcases “traveling alone” with any individual. Oddly, the buses that cross the country are loaded with these possessions no one wants to claim as their own. Autonomous bags, sacks and boxes who will only find an owner if they make it to their destinations, if they manage to make it safely through the check points, the searches and dogs’ noses.

October 4, 2010

The Water Seller of Seville: Diego Velázquez

The man in the threadbare suit, bowler hat and huge shoes carried pieces of glass on his back. His sidekick, a boy of about five, tossed stones through the windows of shops and houses so the glazier could sell his services to desperate clients. Together they formed a duo of survival, an “emergent” work team, that still yielded barely enough to keep the fire burning in their home. The story, described in the 1921 Charlie Chaplin film, The Kid, has returned to pass in front of my eyes as I read the list of self-employment activities published in the newspaper Granma. Like a repertoire of destitution and dependency, this enumeration of private work seems more in tune with a feudal village than a 21st century country.

Reading through it in one sitting — containing my disgust — it is obvious that there are hardly any occupations directly linked to production. Entrepreneurs would need to be able count on a wholesale supplier to provide raw materials, and the possibility of access to bank loans has barely been mentioned, and without any details about what interest rates would be. Nor is there any talk of the self-employed being able to import merchandise directly from outside our borders, as this continues to be an absolute monopoly of the State. Of the 178 eligible activities, many are already carried out without a license, so being included in this list changes only one thing, being required to pay taxes. Hence the skepticism that accompanies the announcement of these “flexibilities” to let private ingenuity contribute to solving the serious problems of our economy.

What will come as a consequence of this slowness in applying the necessary changes? Citizens will continue to swell the long lines in front of consulates so they can leave the country, or they will fully immerse themselves in illegality and the diversion of resources. If our authorities believe that this trickle of transformations will keep the system from falling apart in their hands while they try to update it, they are underestimating the sense of urgency that runs through the Island. Such a half-hearted approach to applying long-delayed openings weakens the social situation and no one can predict how the frustrated “kids” — those disadvantaged by the massive layoffs and lack of expectations — will react. Hopefully they won’t end up breaking out all the windows.

September 29, 2010

A long line of people waits in the sun outside the telephone office on Obispo Street in Old Havana. Some passersby ask about the latest news for those hoping to open a cellphone contract.

Many of them carry some old device with a monochrome screen, bought in the black market or sent by relatives abroad. But there are others with a sophisticated iPhone, Blackberry, or the latest model Motorola. Such modern phones and all their features can barely be used on the island, because of the technical limitations of the country’s only telecommunications company, ETECSA. But this doesn’t paralyze us, as we Cubans have a marked predilection for circuits and little flashing lights even if we can’t use their full capabilities.

The appetite for electronic gadgets feeds off precisely material shortages and the control maintained by the State over their distribution. What’s remarkable is that even with rudimentary technology we have been able to do so much. Imagine what we could do if Cuba’s isolated citizens had access to the technology and innovation that spawned the Internet revolution across the Florida Straits.

We have always been able to turn to illegal market networks, which offer everything from computers and all their accessories to electronic messaging. It is in this underground market — persecuted but essential — where every type and model of cellphone is offered today. Phones are the most common product on the censored webpage Revolico.com, a sort of Cuban Craigslist where the ads are free.

Meanwhile, on the streets of Havana, it is rare to walk a hundred yards and not see someone texting. According to official statistics, the number of mobile phone users nationwide is exceeds one million. Considering the growth in cellphone use in other Latin American countries, it is a low figure, only about one Cuban in twelve. Nevertheless, one could say that no element of our economy has grown as fast, in recent months, as mobile phone use. Moreover, despite the technical limitations and the difficulties in purchasing modern and inexpensive phones, the symbol of modernity represented by this little gadget has begun to change our lives.

When, Raul Castro allowed us to contract for prepaid mobile phone service in 2008, no one would have imagined that two years later these devices would be used to broadcast news censored by the official press. Through text-only messages we inform ourselves and send news out to the world. Since August 2009, some in Cuba have begun to use Twitter for small alerts, or S.O.S. calls sent from cellphones.

And independent journalism and the alternative blogosphere have realized an old dream, long deferred: immediacy. Once the Cuban networks were ready to transmit multimedia messages, the vast World Wide Web welcomed the first videos, audio and photos able to travel from the “Island of the Disconnected” to the world at large. This, despite the fact that none of the people sending these dispatches had a cellphone connected to the Internet, not to mention that the cost of sending a text message abroad exceeds the salary a professional earns for four days work.

An added difficulty is that this explosion in cellphone use is not matched by a corresponding development in ETECSA’s infrastructure. The number of clients grows, but the number of antennas and the satellite capacity does not keep up. Thus, we get frequent messages telling us “there is congestion on the lines,” and on holidays it becomes impossible to send or receive messages. Trapped between excessive costs and poor services, users cannot choose to switch to a more efficient company, because the state monopoly does not allow other companies to compete.

Thus, the request to President Obama from the firms Nokia, AT&T and Verizon, asking for an easing of the embargo and trade with Cuba, is a ray of hope for us. If we have managed to do so much with so little, what will happen when having a cellphone, sending a text, connecting to the Internet, all become as easy as talking, walking, shouting a slogan?

Note: This article originally appeared as an op-ed in the The Miami Herald on Sept. 21, 2010.

It’s two in the afternoon at the Department of Immigration and Aliens (DIE) on 17th Street between J and K. Dozens of people are waiting for permission to leave the country, that authorization to travel that has been given the name “white card,” although it might better be called “the safe conduct,” “the freedom card,” or “the get out of prison order.” The walls are peeling and a notice to “be careful, danger of collapse” is posted next to a huge mansion in Vedado. Several women — who have forgotten how to smile and be pleasant — wear their military uniforms and warn the public that they must wait in an orderly fashion. Now and then they shout a name and the person called returns some minutes later with a jubilant face or a strained pout.

Finally they call me to tell me of the eighth denial of permission to travel in barely three years. Specialists in stripping us of what we could live, experiment, and know beyond our borders, the officials of the DIE tell me that I am not authorized to travel “for the time being.” With this brief “no” — delivered almost with delight — I lose the opportunity to be at the 60th anniversary of the International Press Institute, and at the presentation of the Internet for the Nobel Peace Prize in New York. A stamp on my file and I was obliged to speak by telephone in the activities of Torino European Youth Capital, and to communicate with the publisher Brûlé to launch Cuba Libre in Montreal without my presence. The absurd immigration has inserted itself between my eyes and the full shelves of the Frankfurt Book Fair, between my hands and the compilation of my texts which will see the light at the Nonfiction Literature Festival in Poland. I will not go to the Ferrara Journalism Fair nor to the presentation of the documentary in Jequié, Brazil, much less be able to participate in the Congress of Women Leading the Millennium based in Valencia, nor in Cuneo, during the City Writers event. My voice will not be hear at LASA, which sent me an official invitation, and I will have to enjoy from a distance the appearance of my book Management and Development of Contents With WordPress.

All this and more they have taken. However, they have left me — as if it were a punishment — along with the basic raw material from which my writings come, in contact with that reality which would not forgive me were I absent.

September 26, 2010

The radio I got for my last birthday rests on a bookshelf, covered in dust. Because if I turn it on I can barely hear a thing. Not even the national broadcasts can be heard well in this area full of government ministries and the antennas they use to block the shortwave broadcasts that come into the country. I had the illusion I would be able to listen to Deutsche Welle to keep my German language alive, but instead of the hoped-for “Guten Tag” all that comes out of the speaker is a buzzing noise.

We live in the midst of a real war of radio frequencies on this Island. On one side we have the broadcasts of the station called Radio Martí — banned, but very popular among my compatriots, they are transmitted from the United States — and on the other side the buzzing they use to silence it. The radio receivers sold in the official stores have had the module that allows you to hear these transmissions removed, and the police are in the habit of searching the roofs for the devices that help to better capture these signals.

Meanwhile, inside their houses, people look for the place — it could be a corner, near a window, or stuck to the ceiling — where the radio manages to ignore the annoying beeping of the interference. It is common to see someone lying on the floor while they locate the exact point where local programming is overshadowed by what comes from abroad. It doesn’t matter what they’re sending from the other shore, whether it’s a boring musical program, the news in English, or a weather report from somewhere else in the world. What matters is that it is a balm for the ears, that it sounds different, that it is something other than that mix of slogans and prose without freedom that is transmitted daily on Cuban radio.

September 24, 2010

Exclusive to the Huffington Post.

Two weeks ago, on a Monday, the State newspaper Granma published a note from the Cuban Workers Center (CTC), the only union allowed in the country. Some thought it would be one of those calls to “work with sacrifice,” or to support the path chosen by the leaders of the Revolution. But no. It was the dreaded news of massive layoffs that would soon throw the first half a million workers into the street; layoffs that are expected, within three years, to see one and a half million workers leave their State jobs. Overnight, the guarantee of full employment – one of the most publicized benefits of the Island’s socialism – has come to an end. And so, their own official propaganda apparatus announced our authorities’ worst nightmare: the day the system collapsed.

The drastic measure was justified as a part of what has been called “the perfection of the Cuban economic development model,” a euphemism intended to mask the growing application of market forces to the workings of the economy.

The panic extends to all sectors, except those traditionally short of labor: agriculture, construction and education. The government’s solution is to move laid off workers to options defined by “new forms of non-state labor relations”; translated, this means launching them into the competition of private or cooperative ventures.

As a palliative for the massive layoffs, Raul Castro’s cabinet plans to create room for private initiatives, expand the number of self-employed, and eliminate several of the absurd prohibitions which function as a straitjacket over the creativity of Cubans. Among the options that will be offered as an incentive to “be your own boss,” is one that will allow the unemployed to earn a living by renting rooms in their homes. It is easy to see, however, given the country’s excruciating housing shortage – where it’s common for three generations to share a tiny apartment – it is highly unlikely that many of these laid off workers will have spare rooms to rent. On the other hand, taxes for the permitted self-employment occupations will be extremely high, possibly reaching 45 percent of earnings.

It is also worth nothing that the herald of this bad news for the working class has been the workers’ own union, the CTC. Not only did it take on the role of justifying the layoffs, this organization wasted not a single word about the fate of the half a million union members it will lose: thousands of Cubans who will not have anyone to represent them before the State boss, which will now impose high taxes on the production of goods or services which they are expected to be engaged in going forward.

These measures, which represent a true shock therapy, are absolutely critical; if the current government leaders didn’t take them they would probably be among the first items on the agenda of those who will come to power after them. Contrary to how it was presented by the regime’s propagandists, the rocks against which the ship of the Revolution is crashing, with all its conquests on board, are not along the far shore where the sirens of capitalism sing, but here, in the illusion of Utopia, on this shore.

September 23, 2010

How do I connect a mobile phone to Cuban Twitter?

1. First you must connect to the Internet and and get an account at http://www.twitter.com

2. Keep the user name and password you are given in a secure place.

3. Add to your mobile phone address book a new contact named Twitter with the number 119447624801423.

4. Send four messages to that number. Each message will include a command and it is important that you send them in the order listed below, without spaces in front of or after the words, and without putting accents and “ñ”. If you make a mistake you must start again, from the beginning:

start
username
password
ok

5. Of course, where it says “username” put your Twitter username.

6. The four messages must be sent one after another. Before you begin you must verify that you have enough credit on your phone to send all four message.

7. As soon as you are done, you may send text messages (SMS) of no more than 140 characters to the number 119,447,624,801,423 which is already added to your cell phone address book.

8. Every text message sent to that number, once you have completed the procedure above, will be published on the Internet automatically.

9. Each text message sent to Twitter will cost 1 convertible peso, so prepare your wallet.

Source of text: http://twitpic.com/2pqj3q

September 22, 2010

Excerpt from documentary by Fabian Archondo and the
Foundation for New Latin American Cinema.

My son is at that age where he could eat the columns of the house if we didn’t keep an eye on him. He opens and closes the refrigerator door, as if he believes that this appliance could produce — just for him — food. His appetite is so insatiable and so difficult to satisfy, in the midst of shortages and high prices, that we’ve nicknamed Teo after that voracious fish, “La Claria.” His ravenousness reminds us of this species which some bright person brought to our country to promote fish farming, and which is now a pest in our rivers and lakes. Of course this is just a family joke, because even our fretful adolescent is incapable of wolfing down the things that enter the mouth of this walking fish.

Blue-gray, with a pronounced mustache and the ability to survive up to three days out of water, this African Catfish has already become a part of our country, both rural and urban. One of the few animals that can survive in the polluted Almendares river, it has managed to displace other, tastier, specimens in the fishmongers’ freezers. Not even its ability to adapt, nor its ugliness, however, have aroused as much alarm as its extreme predatory nature. Clarias eat everything from rodents and chickens, to puppies and every kind of fish, frog or bird.

As a solution to the food problems of the so-called Special Period, after the collapse of the Soviet block, our authorities imported this foreign species and so precipitated colossal damage to the ecosystem. Similar irresponsibility had already occurred with the introduction of tilapia and tench fish, but the results were incalculably more dramatic with this dark and elusive creature which today reigns in our waters. Whether nestling in the mud, emerging from a manhole in the middle of the city, or crawling along the side of the road, its spread demonstrates the fragility of nature when faced with ministerial directives. I have no doubt that this fish will be with us for a long time to come, long after those who introduced it into the country are only a memory, as fleeting as crumb in the mouth of a claria.

September 20, 2010

Exclusive to the Huffington Post

For a long time when I heard the word teacher, it brought to mind the word respect; it was one of those unconscious associations from which the psychoanalysts draw surprising conclusions. I associated the noun that indicated this profession with the names and faces of all those who taught me from elementary school through the university, men and women endowed with patience and wisdom.

Now in Cuba, the word teacher calls forth other associations. I read in the newspaper Granma, the official organ of the Communist Party, that an official from the Ministry of Education said, “As parents we want the best teachers for our children, but we don’t like the idea of their deciding to be teachers themselves.” The fact is that the shortage of teachers has become a real crisis at almost all levels of education, due to the growing desertion of those who hold these positions and the reduction of those who enroll in schools of education. The problem has become so bad that the State has now created a class of what is called “emerging teachers,” who train to be the teachers of other children starting in the 11th grade, at age 16.

There are many causes that have led to this crisis and so far the solutions applied have only served to exacerbate the loss of prestige of this noble profession. The secret is that almost no one in Cuba lives on the salary they earn, but must rely on what they can find to steal, what we call “the diversion of resources,” from their workplace, be it time, materials or equipment. Teacher have no chance to earn some extra money this way and their salaries do not differ from others who do.

Now, when I hear the word teacher, what I feel is pity for those who are educators, for their students, and for the future of our country.

Steps to activate Text Messaging service:

1. Enter the code *#06# and immediately the phone will display your IMEI code which is a 16 digit number.
2. Send the first 8 digits of the IMEI number by Text Message to 4222.
3. You will receive a Text Message that will tell you if your phone model accepts the activation of Text Messaging. It does not work on a Blackberry or iPhone; recommended phones are the Motorola K1, Motorola U6, Motorola V3 and Nokia models that are not too modern.
4. If the phone accepts the Text Messaging service, you will receive a second message that says “Accept” or “Install.” When it gives you one of these two options it will ask for a code, you should enter 1234.
5. When the application is installed, you may need to shut down and restart your phone.
6. When you turn it on, you will see, next to the signal coverage icon, if you have a Motorola, a pair of green diamonds; if you have a Nokia you will see the same thing next to the capital “G.”
7. You can now send images by Text Messaging to another Cuban mobile phone with the Text Messaging service activated, at a cost of 30 centavos a message.
8. You can also send an image to an email account at a cost of 2.30 convertible pesos (about $2.50 U.S., 1.90 euros), which is very useful for sending images overseas.

Source of the text: http://twitpic.com/2pqktq

September 19, 2010

One of the most frequent topics of discussions when talking about Cuba, is whether the reality in which we live can really be called “socialist.” For my generation, which grew up with books on Marxism, manuals on scientific communism, and volumes of the writings of Lenin, it is difficult to find the Cuban model in those works. When someone asks me about it I say that on this island we live under state capitalism, or, as one perhaps could call it, on the Party’s plantation… the family clan’s plantation…

My theory derives from those ancient books I was forced to study, where there was one factor essential for characterizing a society as socialist: the methods of production were in the hands of the workers. But what I see around me is an “omni-proprietary” state, owner of the machines, the industries, the infrastructure of a nation and of all the decisions made about it. A master who pays the lowest possible wages and demands applause and unconditional ideological fealty from his workers.

This miserly owner now warns that he cannot continue to employ more than one million of those working on the public payroll. “To advance the development and actualization of the economic model,” we are told payrolls must be drastically reduced, while opportunities for self-employment will see only the smallest and most controlled expansion. Even the Cuban Workers Center — the only labor union allowed in the country — reports that the layoffs will come soon and we must accept them with discipline. A sad performance for those whose role it is to represent the rights of their members vis-a-vis the powers-that-be and not vice versa.

What will the antiquated owner, who has possessed this Island for five decades, do when his unemployed of today become the dissatisfied of tomorrow? How will he react when the labor and economic autonomy of the self-employed turns into ideological autonomy? Then we will hear cursing and stigmatization of the prosperous, because any surplus — like the presidential chair — can only be his.

September 14, 2010

The line at a home-based private “pizza parlor” — takeaway only — in Havana.

Exclusive to The Huffington Post.

Under the strict canons of the socialist economy — planned, centralized and subsidized — self-employment has always been seen as an undesirable species of pest that periodically needs to be abated and occasionally even exterminated. One day the specialists will write the history of the correspondence between the performance of the macroeconomy, the pace of foreign trade, and the response from the corridors of power in loosening or tightening the reins of this denigrated, but successful, creature.

Cuba once had a long tradition of small private businesses: bars, restaurants, shops, kiosks, repair shops and others, unimaginable. On the long night of March 13, 1968 they all disappeared at the exact moment in which, from the public square, Fidel Castro proclaimed the Revolutionary Offensive that confiscated everything.

In the mid-seventies there were a few small openings, but it wasn’t until 1994, under the crushing impacts of the fall-out from the collapse of the Soviet block, that self-employment and the establishment of small private businesses was authorized on a major scale. The country filled with places where you could eat a beefsteak or a Neapolitan pizza. The straitjacket that had controlled creativity began to loosen. Surprised, but happy, we Havanans saw how our city filled with little enterprises and houses converted into restaurants. The euphoria was short-lived, however, because faced with high taxes, a law that prevented the hiring of employees, and the long list of forbidden products, many of these entrepreneurs eventually gave up and shut down.

Now, Raul Castro’s government has announced that half a million State employees will be terminated and that self-employment will be expected to pick up the slack, with a broader authorization of licenses and more flexible contracting mechanisms.

My neighbor Humberto is relieved. In his private restaurant he serves more than a dozen dishes on the sly. Few know that on brilliantly white tablecloths he offers his customers lobster, shrimp and beef. These three products are highly penalized by Cuban law and their possession, “without papers,” can lead to a long prison term. Hence, they are not listed on the menu. But if trustworthy looking clients whisper in his ear, the forbidden delicacies emerge from the kitchen, far from the watchful eyes of the inspectors.

As the law, to date, has prevented Humberto from hiring anyone outside his own family, he tried to convince his daughter to marry — only on paper — an excellent chef who had recently left his job in a tourist hotel. When he discovered that his daughter was making secret plans to elope with her boyfriend, he thought he might have to surrender his license and trade the saucepan for an illegal taxi. Now, the government’s words have offered hope that he might not have to marry off his daughter to gain a chef. Who knows whether the new flexibility could also allow him to openly offer the proscribed menu items which for now he keeps hidden in his kitchen.

September 14, 2010

My friend Miguel left, tired of waiting for a sex change operation, and knowing full well that he was never going to get a better job. He left the red wig to a friend who worked in the same hospital and sold, illegally, the room he had in Luyanó. The day he asked permission to leave he put on a suit and tie, which made him roar when he looked at himself in the mirror. At the immigration office he tried to keep his hands off the fold of his trousers, so that the last gasp of homophobia wouldn’t spoil his departure.

He escaped before they closed the river of Cubans which, for a brief time, flowed to Ecuador. His was one of some 700 marriages contracted between citizens of both countries, many of them with the sole objective of obtaining residency in that South American nation. Miguel paid the equivalent of $6,000 and in return got a wedding in Havana with a woman from Quito he’d known for barely a couple of hours. He faked pictures of the honeymoon, paid an official at the Ministry of Public Health so he would give him his “release”and even handed over a little cash so that his white card — the exit permit — wouldn’t be too delayed. He pretended to be what he was not which was easy for him, because those of us born on this Island are good at putting on a mask.

Now he expects difficult times because the Ecuadorian police have started to investigate the 37,000 Cubans who entered that country in recent years. He doesn’t seem scared, however. He is gay, one of those they loaded into police trucks under a rain of blows, and for years he was also monitored for his critical views. After experiencing both edges of the blade of censorship, nothing frightens him. When called to testify — if he is called — he will go wearing the red dress he always wanted to wear here. Nobody is going to stop him from gesturing while they interrogate him, because already Miguel has escaped that Miguel he once was, to become — happily — Olivia.

September 13, 2010