Translating Cuba

The Latin America ICAIC (Cuban Institute of the Art and Industry of Cinematography) Newsreel will be recovered. If I’m not mistaken, it is considered a part of Cuba’s and the world’s heritage of documentary news by UNESCO and will be treated with all the technological marvels that restore the old audiovisuals almost for eternity.

Going to the movies was once important, when we looked through the papers to catch the news of the premieres: Do you remember the theater circuits such as Infanta-Acapulco-Lido-Santa Catalina and Payret-Trianon-Ambassador-Alameda? The Metropolitan circuit escapes me, and I’ve forgotten which circuit the Yara theater was on, what to this day continues to be called Radiocentro.

But when there was a movie premiere, or a second run in the neighborhood theaters, the program included the inevitable Weekly ICAIC Newsreel. The great memories of a different visuality, with music that sounded wonderful to my eager ears. Pello el Afrokán may have shared the soundtrack with Rick Wakeman, Bourke with Aretha Franklin, Hendrix with Tata Guines.

These people were “the latest,” they even wore jeans! No one told me, I saw it myself as I studied very close to the ICAIC and went for an afternoon snack for what remained of sodas at the TenCent on 23rd, directly facing the Atlantic building, the film institute headquarters. Those gods with their great manes of hair (by the standards of the time) snacking there too and I alternately dazzled with Adriano, Tito, Livio. Beautiful and impossible with their royal names and their “swing”.

Those were the golden years of the news, where Santiago Alvarez did whatever he wanted, and Sundays I always went to the movies and waited for the news with and I really enjoyed it (a bad habit I never lost) and without knowing it, but intuiting it, because the news created a new artistic jewel every week.

They covered the most important events in the world, but especially, they documented those years in Cuba. Parades, the latest plan, the hijacking of planes (they called them “diversions” when they came from there to here), all with the unmistakable voice of Julio Batista as corporate branding.

When Cubans saw a Jumbo jet for the first time in their lives, thanks to the black-and-white ICAIC Newsreel, I had been hanging out with my brothers at the airport and from the terrace of the original building in Boyeros the imposing nose cone of that giant “diversion” seemed to me a symbol of modernity; in the end, like a chronicle of the past, of that heroic part I felt we were living in those years, there is also a sentiment of loss, preserved in the testimony that will now be “re-mastered,” digitalized and treated with other technological tenderness; the testimony of the cane we cut, the soil we carried in sacks, the coffee we harvested, the anthems we chanted, and the guns we wielded, the uniquely grey clothes in which we believed we were heading along the path toward a perfect place.

June 27 2012

One more stop against discrimination and prejudice against women

The Click Festival 2012, organized by the Blogger Academy, Spanish Blog Event and State of SATS — http://festivalclick.com — was a complete success. It generated much exchange of knowledge about twitter, blogs and variegated technologies. An air of enthusiasm characterized the event in spite of threatsof imprisonment and seizure of property of participants (http://www.cubadebate.cu).

Among the attendees a friendly andflamboyant musician stood out, who used a hat, better said a pot, with writing in Spanish and English that explained: “This is not a pot, it’s a hat.“

The rest of his companions were a group of at least two women, children of both sexes and musicians of the alternative group OMNI-ZONA FRANCA.

Dr. Flores, a lawyer from the NGO CUBAN LAWYER ASSOCIATION, and independent journalist, during one of the festival recesses,introduced Iris Ruiz, a young women with six boys and baby girls. Immediately the warning signal that any teacher possesses lights up: I wonder if the little ones are well cared for, if they are happy.

Although the observer’s impression may be favorable, some of the subjective causes can be predicted for why it is hard for the institutions of her residential zone and of the township where she lives (East Havana) to considerIris Ruiz, a single mother,”a high priority social case.”

In reality, Iris Ruiz, without intending it, is a transgressor of the values that prevail in today’s Cuba.

Cuban women generally have fewer than two children. Having more is interpreted from several angles. For many it means:

Craziness or mental disorders.

Little academic training.

It is synonymous with poverty.

Being Christian or peasant.

Iris Ruiz confronts other prejudices, too.

She is a white woman who “gives birth” to a black child.

She openly expresses pride in having a large family.

She is a single mother, which in the social imagination places her at a disadvantage.

Her current companion and the father of four of her children is Amaury Pacheco del Monte, coordinator of the alternative cultural project OMNI-ZONA FRANCA, a community project considered extravagant for it artistic projection and a particular spirituality. This heterogeneous group, which with its technique proposes to the world another artist’s view, also has participated in the Havana Bienneal, a very important cultural event. They recently toured the United States.

Thelimited solidarity of the neighbors on refusing to provide them water service in a country where dailyillegality shows, probably, not only a reaction of bewilderment before his legal status, but also reproach for his “unusual” conduct.

Each day grows the number of mothers who confronta housingsituationsuch asIris Ruiz is going through, whose case was published February 16 this year in www.cubanet.org under the title The ’squatters’ in Havana increase. She resides illegally in apartment 1 of Building E-83, Alamar zone 9, in Havana, where currently they live without water service or electricity. Her family was declared illegal squatters by Resolution 1608/2011, which records that “in 2004 the housing was confiscated, after definitively leaving their property,” for the United States. That is to say that for more than seven years the place was inhabited.

Jeers and insults, and especially, the little or zero social or governmental support to mothers with several children are an insidious form of violencewhere the helplessness of women in different spheres of society creates an unusual atmosphere.

In the midst of campaigns and efforts to hide the calamity of the gender violence, other ruthless acts of physical violence against women continue to happen, derived from the pure machismo and disdain for feminine dignity.

Being a woman is being mother. A mom would love one single child as much as she would love six of them. Even without the official figures of the women maimed or beaten, every day we hear of stories about such lamentable events of contemporary Cuba.

It is about time for civil society and women, in particular, to take action in an independent way.If Iris Ruiz creates conflict, the Cuban woman who is not to blame, should throw the first stone.

June 26 2012

In its June 22 edition the newspaper Granma published an article from Prensa Latina (Latin Press) entitled “UN Commends Cuba for Freedom of Assembly” in which it expresses “its satisfaction with having been mentioned as an example of good practices in the area of freedom of peaceful assembly and association in the report by the UN Rapporteur for Human Rights in this area, Maina Kivi.” According to Granma the Cuban delegate,Juan Antonio Quintanilla, added that “in our country there are many opportunities for the exercise of this right as exemplified by the existence of more than 2,200 non-governmental organizations in the widest variety of fields possible.”

That the rapporteur stated this, that she might have written her report in a comfortable office in Geneva or in a shady spot in Central Park, is understandable. We are by now accustomed to such slip-ups by the UN. Such a report or some similar resolution, dictated from one of the organization’s sterile platforms, deserves to be treated no better than a piece of toilet paper. It is not surprising that a UN rapporteur would babble on as much as he or she wishes on the subject of Cuba’s freedom of association, but to hear the same thing coming from the mouth of a Cuban always leaves one quite astonished.

To be fair, it must be pointed out that the life of an official from our emblematic MINREX (Ministry of Foreign Relations) is full of trips and diplomatic missions.Señor Quintanillacould be so busy that it is possible he has not been informed about the misfortune befalling a Cuban opposition figure when he wishes to take full advantage of his right to free association. Or perhaps he has not heard about the mobs who attack women who defend themselves with fragile gladiolas*. Or about the scandalous repudiation demonstrations organized by the Communist Party and State Security which take place outside – and even inside – the homes of many dissidents.

There certainly is no visible movement of indignados (outraged people) here, as the Cuban delegate mentions when he refers to the protestors on Wall Street or throughout Europe, who have been the focus of repressive waves, which, incidentally, we know about thanks to press reports from those countries themselves. But what the Cuban delegate knows very well yet fails to mention is that here the matter is resolved in a much simpler and more pragmatic way: If you try to cause similar troubles, you will simply be detained in the very doorway of your house. You will not be allowed to go out into the street and, to top it off, you will have to put up with them telling you that this is being done to protect you from the anger of an “enraged people.”

As for the thousands of NGOs mentioned in Quintanilla remarks, one need only take a quick glance to realize that they all have one element in common. Not one has a political profile. None have the slightest intention of questioning in any way the current system of government in Cuba. At this stage only a crazy person would dare to deny that real civil society exists only in a semi-clandestine form. It is not even officially recognized by our government, which refuses to establish any sort of dialog. The profile of each and every one of these “NGOs” has been knowingly designed and approved under the watchful eye of the Communist Party to reject any inconvenient proposals. To put it simply, anyone talking about freedom of association and of an authentic civil society which enjoys “ample freedoms for the exercise of this right” in this one-party state is hallucinating.

*Translator’s note: The writer is referring to the Ladies in White,a Cuban opposition movement consisting of the female relatives of jailed dissidents who protest the imprisonments by attending Mass each Sunday wearing white clothes and carrying gladiolas.

June 26 2012

On the Radio Rebelde program Memorias they reiterate it, over and over, every Sunday between each and every musical number. It is a type of slogan, a political cliche, about the difficulties our blockaded and besieged island suffered in the 1960s, along with all the vicissitudes and the thousands of kilometers the regime’s officials had to travel, time and again, to obtain the vinyl disks on which to record our music. This is something they say so that we do not forget.

But it is the members of the program themselves who seem to have a faulty memory. They repeatedly forget to play Cuban music performed by the likes ofOlga Guillot, Celia Cruz, Magie Carlés, Willy Chirino, to name but a few, who are banned from the radio for the simple fact of having gone into exile. There is also the sad case ofErnesto Lecuona, whose name went unspoken on our radios for many years because of statements he made in the years immediately after the triumph of the Revolution when he was on tour outside the country. He was only rehabilitated in the 1990s after receiving tributes from around the world for his genius as a composer.

Since we are talking about not forgetting, what seems to have been forgotten are the revolutionary purges to which a countless number of our artists, musicians, comedians and acrobats from radio and television – all of the highest professional caliber – were subjected merely for the act of political dissent.

I would suggest that the program Memorias start taking heavy doses of Fitina* or eating foods rich in phosphorous to help jog its memory. They then might not come up with lame excuses like the one they gave me when I insisted they play music by the great Olga Guillot, putting forth the argument that they did not have records by this wonderful Cuban singer because all of them have been damaged.

It would be great if someone, who had a collection of some of the numbers performed by this glory of Cuba, could send it to the broadcasters to see if it might jog their memory.

*Translator’s note: A dietary supplement advertised as a memory booster.

June 26 2012

A few days ago, between June 21-23, the Click Festival was held, a completely independent event without ties to any government institution, whose principal content was to learn about and debate the technology used on the Internet. At the same time, technology displaced the political although, undoubtedly, the fact of holding the event itself confers on it a political character.

Everyone interested in the subject was invited to participate freely, both independents as well as “organics-governmentals,” although the latter, of course, did not make an appearance, perhaps by their own decision (they would have been within their rights to attend), or because indications from superiors suggested they not ask for trouble. suggested they not ask for trouble.

Among the many participants there were surely undercover agents (which is normal), to report about what was happening. If their report was objective the interesting presentations would appear in them, from both national for foreign guests, who updated and expanded our technological knowledge, and showed us how to make the best use of existing methods, as well as the wide-ranging debates that broke the bounds of the exterior embargo as well as in the interior blockade, which the majority of Cubans are subject to.

There was also a Children’s Festival, where the children who attended (whose parents were not afraid to bring them) enjoyed using the various technologies at their disposal, without slogans or statements for or against anyone on their screens, as well as the existence a piñata, balloons, candy and gifts.

What happened in these three days, had nothing to do with the hysterical, threatening and provocative editorial on a government website that — and it couldn’t have been otherwise — stated that it was a festival sponsored and funded by the CIA, the FBI, and the United States Interest Section in Cuba; I think it was only for lack of space that they didn’t include the Israeli MOSSAD, the former Soviet KGB, the former German STASI, and the British M-5 as well as other agencies of destabilizing objectives, not to mention counter-revolutionaries, two little words essential to official language.

Continuing the manipulative escalation, yesterday the newspaper Granma reported on its front page that more than 100,000 people had attended a Cuban information festival, held in 600 Young Cuban Computer and Electronics Clubs. Undoubtedly, this ghost festival was farfetched and the 600 clubs doubtful, because it’s public knowledge that most of them have obsolete equipment, much of it damaged and out of service, and that they don’t have an Internet connection.

As if that weren’t enough, on page 5 there was an article about the millions of dollars that come from the United States to fund subversion in Cuba, repeating the same accusations against so-called cyber-dissidents and independent journalists.

It is noteworthy that the site, like others, was invited to participate, in an attempt to dialog, something that has always been a constant and that will continue to be practices, but they responded with the editorial cited. With these cavemen, who don’t know if they act out of radicalism or opportunism, who see conspiracies everywhere, the dialog necessary to resolve our problems and restore the unity of the nation seems practically impossible. I think that not all who write on these government sites share such intolerant opinions and that sooner or later they will discover the truth.

In short, the Click Festival, despite the gloomy predictions of some pessimists, the distortions about its true objectives from government spokespeople, the pressures and absurd attacks, was a complete success, and we participants learned a little more about technology, as well as widened the circle of our relationships with people with different viewpoints (a single vision is not enough), showing our mutual respect. What matters is that it was a Festival that ended happily, without crafting accords, signing agreements, or making declaration and this, in our country, is a lot.

Photos: Top/Rebeca. Others/W. López

June 26 2012