Translating Cuba

Legal case against Hector Riscart still pending…

#FreeÑaño

April 20 2012

Gay Pride Day in Cuba should be celebrated as the Gay Murmur Day. Among thousands and thousands of magnificent queers and dazzling lesbians, among thousands and thousands of plurisexual people, very free in private, not even three manage to come out in the streets. Not even to kiss in the sad backyard of MININT, surrounded by old spies, perhaps already retired of who knows what military organization, plus the bored foreign press that assumes (from naivete or ignorance) that in Cuba they are still possible news.

It is not the fault of the LGBT movements on the Island, it is the parody sponsored by the Hetero-State or the underground micro-factions who wriggle their hips in contradiction to their totalitarian vocation. It’s not the fault of each one of your tense bodies hiding to escape the disgust of authority. It is not the fault of our orgasms outside any organization. It is not the fault of anyone. And it is the fault of everyone, that we don’t know how to narrate it with the beauty it deserves. That we dare not speak from the debacle and encourage the debate (perhaps as performance) in the prison air of our capital.

What rights can a country without heroes boast of? Who are our minorities? What are their faces or their masks? How to they look or walk or presume or court or touch their genitals with an infamous or naive gesture? Where do they talk, to whom, with what language of caution or cauterization? What have they lived in such a supposed succession of generations and communities? Nothing. We are strangled little atoms of obsolete socialism, incapable of chanting a controversial slogan, of raising a fist in public, of paralyzing traffic for a few minutes to take on the most significant institution.

We are nothing. Inertial statistics of a castrating, tired, military dynasty. We are living in an unlikely vacuum of someone else’s biography, where every every every thing is marked by the annexationist paranoia of a perennial paleolithic Premier, of a Vice-nobody who will not survive it, and of a mean bunch of mercenary ministers who, when they’re alone in their offices, without the protection of political death in the name of the Revolution, will come out stampeding to save themselves over our dead bodies, over the tainted memory of those who never left us, the pathetic pariahs of the patria. And then we will be all alone with the invisible iniquitous intelligence that will North-Koreanize Cuba as long as they have all the objects and movements of this country.

There was no Revolution, there will be no Transition. Only whispers. A citizen’s theater without a guild. The first to raise his voice will be putting his neck on the gallows. We are going to kill generously, it’s the only industry that’s ever prospered in Cuba: the legal lynching of the other.

They are right, the thousands and thousands of undefiled gays and lesbians without pedigree of yesterday afternoon. The only Stonewall there will be in Cuba will be stoned. Not go out in the street. Beware. Hide behind your books, as you have up to now and until the end of the históricos, the ancient leaders coming to the end of their days. Get your travel permits and cut-and-pate genitals from CENESEX. But watch the old and green in the Catholiccommunist mass for the centenary of the Revolution on the morning of January 1, 2059.

Each people has the pedestrian poverty it deserves.

Kiss each other alone. Kiss your illegible lips in the bathroom mirror. Come out of the closet but not into the street. Don’t forget to quote the representatives of the press accredited in Havana.

If it’s not too much trouble, don’t involve me. We angels also are a minority, even though we don’t have sex. And I demand, at least in writing, my right not to get into bed with ghosts.

June 29 2012

The 6th Summit of the Americas concluded with the marked intention to add Cuba at the next event in Panama or, it seems, to not hold another meeting.

The theme of the fiftieth anniversary of U.S. embargo against the Cuban archipelago was also called out as a random proposition for after the November elections in the United States.

As the main meeting was held behind closed doors, it’s not known whether they talked about the Cuban authorities signing, as a premise, the Inter-American Democratic Charter. This document, adopted at a special session of the General Assembly of the Organization of American States, on September 11, 2001 in Lima, Peru, is the essential guarantee to rebuild and safeguard representative democracy in our continent. However, we should remember that the current rulers of the island have long experience in signing all kinds of public documents and then archiving them, for example, the Declaration of Viña del Mar.

With regards to the issue of the decolonization of the hemisphere, apparently, there was a consensus to change the recurring theme of Puerto Rico for the Malvina Islands (also known as the Falkland Islands).

At the end of the day, the importance of this Sixth Summit has been more in what has been quietly announced, than what has been loudly trumpeted.

April 17 2012

By necessity man evolved physically as well as psycho-socially. His awareness and the desire to survive and reach the unattainable, made him stand out among all the animals, each with natural weapons, while man had no defense compared to the rest of the species, he was easy prey.

This easy prey turned himself into the most dangerous animal on the earth by his ambition for power. This arises from the principal of developing his braing, where we start to see signs of leadership as the heads of the tribes, and so on.

Power brought many other riches, absolute control of everything and of the life of a subordinate human being.

Empires rose and as man became aware of the right to life possessed by all humans, to be responsible for their own destiny… he made these empires fall. But there always arose a ambitious man who wanted to be the master of the world, standing out among all leaders with wild thoughts passing over international rights, but these also failed.

Today this ambition is shared among different leaders, that can be replaced by other leaders with different ideas, thanks to the democracy of these governments as they must accept that “The people are what they want to be, not what the governments want them to be!”

The history has always reflected that nothing is eternal, those who tried to be absolute masters of something specific failed. Those who still hope to stay in power forever are mistaken, humanity will not allow it! They may be in power for years, months or days, but the right to change for something new and hopeful will triumph.

July 4 2012

Yes, life seems a dream… I have had to name my universe and at birth there was already a language, a tradition, or more… I am in love with the first man of Creation, but that also is tradition. Becoming an idiot is not an option, an idiot like that movie: The Idiots, of the group Dogma.

How many times in my life have I believed I’ve loved with the same words I say to him? But I discover that for him the words have been rearranged, my breathing changed, and that changes everything. It is the kabbalah of our universe. We have to love this universe that we are creating in relation to everything else, filled with the eros of oneself. Sometimes I’ve cried but now I know I was crying for myself, for my fears, for the absence of my punitive mother, my Medea mother.

What a shame if he were to discover that I have barely a single virgin word to offer him. But he doesn’t understand me when I ask him to renounce the clichés on the periphery of his life, to renounce this promiscuity of words that serves all loves. I need the words for me alone, words surging from the pleasure, destroying the past, bringing me back to a kind of satori, samadhi, existential nirvana. Sufficient to renounce the known and enter into the realm of the unknown.

Language is the death of pleasure: having believed to understand something from that series of words whose reading is always personal was one of the great revelations of my life. Recognizing that I inhabit a country built on an ideology founded on words that with a resistant cynicism were declared to have the character of a “Battle of Ideas” fighting in the consciousness of each of us, lying about the meaning of good and evil. As if one could, pretending not be to an imposter, and when the need emerged, the duty to resist from one’s own faith and knowledge and conscience.

In any event I must be in love because it makes me want to reread this chapter of an almost forgotten novel (to be forgotten is the worst punishment for a novel) as if it had new clues.

“Amor pasaporte, amor pasamontañas, amor llave, amor revolver, amor que me dé los mil ojos de Argos, la ubicuidad, la raíz desde donde se podría empezar a tejer una lengua… Sacas una idea de ahí, un sentimiento del otro estante y lo atas con ayuda de palabras, perras negras… Como si se pudiese elegir en el amor, como como si no fuera un rayo que te parte los huesos y te deja estaqueado en la mitad del patio. Las perras negras se vengan como pueden, me mordisquean desde debajo de la mesa. ¿Se dice abajo o debajo? Lo mismo te muerden. Míralas ahí en ese poema de Nashe, convertidas en abejas. Tengo miedo de ese proxenetismo, de tinta y de voces, mar de lenguas lamiendo el culo del mundo. Miel y leche hay debajo de tu lengua…Sí, pero también está dicho que las moscas muertas hacen heder el perfume del perfumista. Concebir una raza que se expresara por el dibujo, la danza, el macramé o una mímica abstracta. ¿Evitarían las connotaciones, raíz del engaño? Honneur des hommes. Sí, pero un honor que se deshonra a cada frase, como un burdel de vírgenes si la cosa fuera posible.”*

Today rereading Rayuela has served to restore my serenity, despite Julio Córtazar’s limitations in warning of the evil time to come hanging over Cuba and generations of Cubans, and he lent his support to it to make it attractive and popular among the intelligentsia of his time. Fortunately the Revolutionary homunculous is going out of style.

I had to feel again the cold fear of being alone in a country where freedom of expression is a crime to again convince myself that as long as I have faith I can overcome all those fears and keep writing and living in Cuba as if I lived in a free country.

I am not totally asleep when he sleeps with me, it is like walking asleep, sleepwalking… Witch. By day I read images in strange figures that appear in the water that only I see on the kitchen floor. These images make me confident and touch the membrane that separates me from the other dimension of time and space. But the final ingredient of this new overabundance is to find Agustín still in my kitchen, in my bed.

He also takes care of me and likes my madness almost as much as me. His skin calms me, my skin calms me. Everything is simpler when he kisses me.

I realize I can never be alone, because there is a language and a tradution, a similarity, that has the character not of repetition but of assistance (almost like the glass of water os those who believe in spirits, but in reverse because it almost always comes from the submerged world) and the guajiro rescues me before I fall into the abyss.

*Translator’s note: This is an extract from Julio Cortázar’s novel Rayeula, which has been translated into English by Gregory Rabassa under the title “Hopscotch.” Liliane has omitted ellipses in her selection and Translating Cuba will not pretend to be able to match Rabassa’s translation.  Here is a fragment of that translation — cobbled together from pieces on the Internet — from the beginning of Liliane’s selection, showing the additional gaps in her text:

…passport love, love, masks, key love, love gun, love to give me the thousand eyes of Argus, the ubiquity, the root from which one might begin to weave a language … You get an idea from there, a feeling from the other shelf, you tie them together with the help of words, black bitches … [As if you could choose to] be in love, as if it were not a lightening bolt that splits your bones and leaves you staked out in the middle of the courtyard… the black bitches get their vengeance any way they can, they’re biting me from underneath the table. Do you say underneath or under? They bite you just the same.

July 4 2012

There are many jokes in Cuba alluding to the stereotypical information provided by the official press. Jokes about the tendency to narrate only the positive that happens in the national territory and to show the rest of the world through a succession of tragedies and negativity. One of the best known of these jokes is repeated when the prime time news begins and some families hang an empty bag under the television. “At least is can be filled up this way from the tons of meat, fruit and foods that show up only in the news reports,” say the cheeky housewives burdened by the shortages. Beside the sarcasm, there are linguists who have noted the use of verbs such as “grow, sow, build, develop” in the headlines referring to our own country, while they prefer to use words such as “die, bomb, prosecute, punish and destroy” for articles about the rest of the world.

Despite the fact that in recent years they’ve tried to offer a journalism closer to reality, triumphalism continues to set the standard for what appears in the mass media. A recent example is the outbreak of cholera that appeared in early June in the eastern provinces. The first evidence that something was happening was a text from an independent journalist. On the official digital sites this news was branded “another hoax from the imperialists.” Only to have to recognize weeks later that there is, indeed, an outbreak of vibrio cholerae in the City of Manzanillo. As people disbelieve so much of what the newspapers say, they even read this note in Granma with suspicion. To the figures of 3 dead and 53 infected, popular rumor started to increase the numbers. And all this speculation is because we have learned to read the news upside down and between the lines, and to distrust almost everything said on TV.

3 July 2012

Cristopher’s 4th birthday was celebrated at his nursery school, together with the celebrations of three other pre-schoolers (two girls and a boy). The custom of celebrating the birthdays of preschool and elementary school students at their day cares or schools is very popular, because the “guests” are their little friends and the teachers.

The parents of the students are the organizers of the happy ceremony, but in Cristopher’s case the nursery school’s teachers surprised all the families involved in the party with the expensive hiring of a professional clown.

Although Cristopher’s’s family is very humble, a very special purpose is satisfied by the kindness of such an expense for the children’s party. Cristopher will go to a normal school next year, despite the fact that he suffers from a strange and dangerous disease: Simpson-Golabi-Behmel Syndrome. He is one of three cases of this disease reported in Havana.

Simpson-Golabi-Behmel Syndrome* is a genetic disorder characterized by gigantism. The patients show distinctive facial features and anatomical abnormalities that are specific signs of the disorder. Some of these dysmorphisms include macroglossia, “enlargement of the tongue”, heart problems, bone abnormalities, etc. The literature even reports frequent cases of premature deaths among patients.

The child’s parents have always had faith in the qualifications and competence of the medical team that treats their only child, including the specialist and the doctor’s office near their home. But the greatest merit, in my view, are the educators of “Los Maceítos” nursery school, and especially, the owner Deysi, a talented woman with long experience in State day care centers.

Deysi’s nursery school has had, for many years, an excellent reputation in the community. Even so, she hesitated when confronted by a mother accompanied by a child whose tongue does not fit in his mouth. But far from refusing to receive him, she had compassion on both and together with the teachers Yaneisit and Damaris they encouraged the youngster to keep his mouth shut and made him feel “as healthy” as other toddlers, who also helped by telling Cristopher: “Cusi, close your mouth!”

In May 2011, members of the Cuban Association for the DEVELOPMENT OF PRIMARY EDUCATION (ACDEI) began working in Los Maceítos pedagogically, with the objectives of social program called “Educate Your Child”, which in the past decades in Cuba has been developed in early childhood care. Other novel methods are also used, with recyclable material and other resources. In a relaxed and fun atmosphere we managed to develop Cusi’s cognitive and physical skills. Today he is one of the most advantaged students.

In sports, specifically in physical education, Professor Miguel García “former athlete on the national gymnastics team” develops motor skills in toddlers, and without the child noticing, he avoided tiring Cristopher out.

Children’s parties are part of the activities of the members of ACDEI. It’s a time to talk with parents, exchange views, “capture” the less concerned parents, and so on. We also record videos and take pictures of the party. Later we edit and deliver the DVDs to the honorees and the nursery school, as a reminder of the work undertaken.

The biggest surprise for the parents is that they get to appreciate the unexpected moments of celebration mixed with scenes of the classes taught and the activities of their children in situations that they didn’t even imagine.

Cusi celebrates his birthday and his good medical condition to begin school next year. The child still has limitations, but the progress is remarkable. Despite scarce resources, physicians recommend the nursery school to parents of other patients.

Meanwhile ACDEI advances, ready to face major challenges, although it means more work and study. As the prestige of the nursery schools grows, our work need to improve. No wonder ACDEI battles for legal recognition as an NGO. We have to help other Cristophers and improve the performance of private nursery schools in Cuba.

* (Dueñas Gonzalez, Alfonso et al, 1998; http://jcb.rupress.org/content/141/6/1407.full.pdf)

June 26 2012

On the front page of the newspaper Juventud Rebelde (Rebel Youth), a review about Guantanamo on the 26th carries the suggestive title: “Revolution in the Plaza.” It reports about the work being done under pressure (as always) to ready the Mariana Grajales Plaza of the Revolution, where the national ceremony will be held this coming July 26th, celebrating the anniversary of the attack on the Moncada Barracks led by Fidel Castro in 1953, considered the starting point of the Revolution. The description is interesting because there is another reality behind it.

It’s a well-known and common practice of the authorities to build something and then to forget about it, fail to maintain it and let it self-destruct. With the plazas, as with everything else, the same thing happens. They build one in the capital city of each province, more as a reflection of totalitarianism than out of real need (they’re barely used and it might have been more beneficial to dedicate so many resources to repairing and building housing, to cite one example). The plazas languish for years until the day comes to use them. Then they rush around.

The case of Guantanamo is a good — negative — example. To make it usable, according to the newspaper, they are replacing all the woodwork of the underground rooms, fixing the bathrooms, changing the broken tiles, fixing the broken electrical system, and paving the streets around the site.

In addition, they are rejuvenating the indoor garden with ferns, planting hibiscus, red roses, oleanders and East Indian screw trees in the outside gardens, they are refurbishing the Friendship Forest with new trees and planting six palms to replace those that withered.

As if all this weren’t enough, there’s a new audio system, air conditioning for the meeting room, changes in the external lighting and a team of artists will be painting new murals in the themes touched on by the painter García Peña whose originals were destroyed by the damp.

As a citizen I have to ask myself: Why was all this allowed to deteriorate in this way? Why wasn’t it given proper maintenance every so often? Does there have to be some national event to fix it? And meanwhile, what is the purpose of these plazas that so many resources are spent on?

I don’t understand how, given the disastrous situation in the main plaza, obvious to everyone, Guantanamo was chosen as the site for the national celebration. I suppose there are other plazas in the same condition, waiting for the July 26th celebration to come to them. Meanwhile they continue to languish.

I don’t know why the mythic Spanish film “Welcome, Mister Marshall” comes to mind. It’s been years, when the initial enthusiasm still existed and the designation of the annual site awoke some interest, and at least the people appreciated it: in those days they increased the supply of products; something people hadn’t been able to buy for months would reappear, they sold more rum and bear, some national orchestra playing popular music would show up, they would renovate a few businesses, streets and parks, and the boring daily monotony would change a little. Today no one’s very interested, most people are bored by the annual repetition, without new material or spiritual offerings.

The title of the article is symptomatic: if there are things left to destroy, after having made a Revolution to rebuild them, they then are left to self-destruct again until the next Revolution. I prefer evolution from day to day, without these sudden leaps into the vacuum.

July 2 2012

From June 21 to 23 the CLICK Festival was celebrated in Havana, organized by the Blogger Academy, led by Yoani Sánchez, Estado de Sats, headed by Antonio Rodiles, and Spain Blog Even (EBE).

The Click Festival — consisting of panels, workshops, discussions, film showings and exchanges — was an important step in the interrelationship of several diverse actors in Cuba’s alternative civil society.

The attendees included bloggers, musicians, independent journalists, political activists and members of a variety of alternative civic and cultural associations from the provinces of Santiago de Cuba, Camaguey, Villa Clara, Sancti Spiritus, Matanzas, La Habana and Pinar del Río, and two delegates from EBE in Spain. The audience for each session numbered some sixty people, and the closing session was attended by more than 100. In total, some 200 people came.

The three days brought a panorama of the Web 2.0 in the world, the democratization that technology generates in musical production, movies, journalism and other areas of society. And we developed a small exchange on progress being achieved in the management of technology in Cuba.

In the evening of Friday the 22nd, the film “How Facebook Changed the Arab World” was shown, about the role played by these new technologies in the events in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, etc.

The authorities’ “tolerance” of an event of this magnitude is not common in the conditions in Cuba. The organizers were determined to it under any conditions, and behind the permissibility could be the decision to opt for verbal repression through the media. This happened with the editorial in the official press on the Cubadebate site — which charged the planners with being mercenaries in the pay of foreign governments — and with the surprise scheduling of a Cuban Festival of Information to celebrate, according to the newspaper Granma, 25 years since the opening of government Information Centers, a date that won’t be reached until September.

Hopefully we are witnessing a change in attitude toward these activities that are not developed by the government itself and do not represent its interests.

July 2 2012