English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Today is 118 years since the greatest and most timeless of all Cubans fell in combat: José Martí, “the Apostle of Independence.” The system prevailing in our country for 54 years has been rebaptized him as the National Hero but I, like many, never liked that description, considering it inadequate for such a universal figure, … Continue reading “May 19 / Rebeca Monzo”
Five years ago expectations were high with regards to the selection of the new government elite. Many people speculated about who would be the next first vice president. Bets focused on two candidates: Carlos Lage Davila and Jose Ramon Ventura. Whoever was chosen, observers theorized, would suggest Raul Castro’s orientation over the next five years. … Continue reading “Where is Cuba Headed? / Antonio Rodiles”
After giving a lot of thought to Cuban mountains I realized that I have a tremendous obsession with the Escambray, in the center of the island. It fascinates me far more than the famous Sierra Maestra, the mountain range that helped end a dictatorship and start a new one. I really don’t care that Pico … Continue reading “Travel to a heart of Cuba / Henry Constantin”
I’m sorry… I can’t cry victory just because (finally!) Yoani Sánchez, Eliécer Ávila, Rosa María Payá and others who, of course, will do it in the next months, now can travel without the humiliating exit permit. I read that many people are happy and sing victory and sentences abound like, “We won this battle,” and … Continue reading “Cuba Doesn’t Matter, or We Still Can’t Claim Victory… Yet / Amir Valle”
The title of this post is a phrase by Eliecer Ávila, who, while still a student at the University of Computer Sciences (UCI) in 2008, ridiculed the President of the Cuban Parliament, Ricardo Alarcón, perhaps unintentionally. On that occasion, the young man unambiguously publicly questioned the emigration policy imposed on Cubans by their government. The … Continue reading ““The Internet Has its own Soul.” Eliecer Avila in a revealing interview / Miriam Celaya”
Note: A translated transcript of the video can be downloaded here. For years I’ve wanted to ask Eliécer Ávila certain questions. Since I first heard him speak and present himself in January of 2008, I was tempted to ask about what it really meant to be a member of Operation Truth, what role did a … Continue reading “Operation Truth / Yoani Sanchez”
They wanted to keep me from attending the trial of Angel Carromero, the Spaniard who was driving when a car crash killed Oswaldo Paya and Harold Cepero. Around five in the afternoon a big operation on the outskirts of Bayamo stopped the car my husband, a friend, and I were driving in. “You want to … Continue reading “They Tried to Strip Me. I Resisted and Paid the Price.* / Yoani Sanchez”
Subtitled video of the trial in the Ochoa case. My mother, devoted to Fidel, sat in front of the television. A few days later her two daughters understood that a transcendental and irreversible change had come over that compulsive thirty-something. A former militant in the Young Communist Union, she had suffered a degree of ideological … Continue reading “The Day My Mother Lost Her Faith in Fidel and the Revolution / Yoani Sánchez”
Last Thursday the call went out for an event on new technologies and social networks that will be held in Havana on June 21-23, 2012. Under the name CLICK Festival, we want to meet to discuss new trends in Web 2.0 and also to address the challenges that lie ahead in the use of these … Continue reading “CLICK to turn on… never to turn off / Yoani Sánchez”
TU NIÑA… Infinitely more lucid, more 20th century, less cowardly than he. Infinitely more beautiful, more slutty, less reactionary than she. Infinitely better than he and infinitely better than the woman with whom he would contract marriage out of fear. She was a Virgo of 17 years. A Latin American virgin, (not by whim is … Continue reading “TU NIÑA… / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
When a political personality, in the exercise of power, is fired from or retires from his job, to refer to his opponents or whoever does not share his ideas or opinions, to use insults, disrespect, derogatory adjectives, taunts, insults, rudeness or even personal character attacks, shows, as well as bad manners and lack of ethics, … Continue reading “A Bad Example / Fernando Dámaso”
The term “national security” is fashionable in the world: in Mexico violence is an issue of national security; in Columbia it’s the narco-guerrillas; in the U.S. it’s illegal immigration. But here, not to be left out, we talk about it too. Issues of national security are important for countries, and so their governments dedicate preferential … Continue reading “One More Wildcard / Fernando Dámaso”
Men rarely recognize the shortcomings of those they love, nor are they accustomed to appreciating the virtues of those they hate. Confucius For some years there is painful and frequent news in various journalistic media, print and digital, which questions the ethics of teaching professionals in Cuban schools. Some teachers or teachers eat their students’ … Continue reading “Ethics in the Cuban Schools: Little of Confucius and Much of Puss in Boots / Dora Leonor Mesa”
(Work originally published in number 9, Voices magazine) Several weeks ago an interview appeared in the virtual space cubaencuentro.com. The two-part interview was conducted by Luis Manuel García Méndez, and the person interviewed was the young American scholar Ted Henken. Titled “Mapping Blogolandia” (May 2011), Henken traces, with remarkable objectivity, his map of the Cuban … Continue reading “Cuban Blogosphere: Stings and Irritations of the Internet in Cuba / Miriam Celaya”
Soon, May 19, will mark the anniversary of the fall in Dos Rios, former province of Oriente, of José Martí, the most universal and transcendent of all Cubans. Poet, writer, critic, journalist, humanist, diplomat, politician, revolutionary and the main organizer of the independence struggle of 1895 which, after fierce fighting, allowed the emergence of the … Continue reading “The Fall of the Apostle (Jose Marti) / Fernando Dámaso”