Dragon’s Breath / Rosa María Rodríguez Torrado

It seems that an anti-kissing and anti-closeness strategy has been in place for some days in Havana: toothpaste went missing. The humble consumer who micromanages the pennies in strong currencies obtained from his meager worker’s incentive or received from relatives who have emigrated – workers exploited by capitalism who plan their vacations, travel and invest around the world without permission, and in spite of that financially help their oppressed loved ones in the Cuban paradise – mostly buys strictly the basic goods in the markets that sell in foreign currencies.

But in Cuba we are vulnerable to the dictatorship of anti-consumerism and prey of the State oligopoly, since when they want to get rid of a Cuban product that no one buys, they stop stocking the foreign alternative so that we will be forced to buy the domestic one, which is almost always of poor quality and with a minimal price difference. That is, they substitute domestic products for the imports, mocking the rights of the buyers, whose ability to choose they arbitrarily limit imposing a lack of options: take it or take it! No alternatives. They choose the shortest and most dishonest route instead of working to ensure the excellence of the domestic products.

The State controls all trade and, in a way that is inefficient and unfair to society, prevents competition from the private sector in those businesses. They do not allow the private citizen to set up a store, nor offer what he produces in one of the many State chain stores. So, whether it’s bad or mediocre, we must be satisfied with whatever the State offers, and furthermore reward them with a smile.

After several days using numerous water-and-salt rinses, this September 22nd the citizens of Havana were pleasantly surprised with a domestic toothpaste of the “Sonríe” (Smile) brand. That state-manufactured concoction with scant menthol is not acquired through workers’ merit, volunteer work, diplomas or passwords, but with strong Cuban pasta [money]: the CUC [Cuban convertible currency]. They charge 90 cents for it, which is equivalent to 22 pesos in national currency. As is natural, there will surely be people who will continue gargling in order to be able to smile without having foul-smelling dragon’s breath. When times are bad, put on a happy face, and if you have bad breath – no options – use Cuban toothpaste.

Translated by: Espirituana

September 28 2011

Glass House / Rebeca Monzo

On Wednesday, September 28th, the newspaper Granma published on its front page an editorial titled: New Injustice of the United States against the Five Heroes.

René González, one of the five Cuban spies jailed in the US, will be released this coming October 7th after having served and suffered in its totality the brutal and unjust sentence imposed on him, says the newspaper.

That is the first manipulation. What the editorial does not say is that the sentence includes the three years of supervised release, which logically must be served in the territory where the crime was committed. That would actually be the TOTALITY of the sentence.

It is logical that Judge Joan A. Lenard, of the Southern District of Florida, denied the motion filed by René, in which he requested his return to Cuba to join his wife and daughters.

The Judge’s decision in no way constitutes a deliberate additional reprisal, as the editorial states.

It is not moral in our country to speak of abusive treatment, solitary confinement and extended periods of psychological torture, precisely here, where prison sentences of up to twenty-five years have been imposed on people whose only crime has been to express their ideas publicly. Let us recall the so-called Black Spring, when seventy-five independent journalists were unjustly imprisoned after surprise raids of their residences in which typewriters, pens, papers and other personal effects were impounded as weapons. Neither should we forget the three adolescents who were executed after an expedited summary trial, for attempting to hijack a boat in the bay of Havana, without having inflicted any abuse or injury to its occupants.

To speak of inhuman treatment applied to these five heroes, when they have enjoyed hygienic cells, clean clothes, computers, visits from their families and the occasional famous actor, and have even played chess matches on the Internet with young people here on the island, seems like a mockery. I think we should stop throwing rocks at our neighbor, knowing, as we do, that our house is made of glass.

Translated by: Espirituana

September 29 2011

Cuban Secret Services: Sticks and White Glove / Iván García


The problem is the street. General Raúl Castro will not permit an Arab Spring in Cuba. He will do whatever needs doing to detain irate opponents. He wants to isolate the potential short-circuit that could turn into a street protest.

The island is a petri dish for cultivation of popular anger. The logical erosion of 52 years of ineffective government, with a handful of absurd regulations in the political, migratory and economic spheres, incapable of putting on the table with any stability meat, vegetables, fruit, and other food and a glass of milk, at accessible prices, all provoke annoyances among the population of the heart of Cuba.

It converts the street of certain poor neighborhoods, marginal and primarily black, like San Leopoldo, Los Quemados, Palo Cagao, Zamora, Pocitos, Belen, Colon, Jesus Maria into ticking timebombs.

A sensitive abrasive surface of the matchbox. With the smallest scratch it can catch fire. If one analyzes the policy of Intelligence Services to dismantle, terrorize and silence the street dissidents, we see a worrisome scaling of violence the last few weeks.

Other than beatings and verbal abuse, they use official alternative media to inflame the anger of their sympathizers. The mobilization orchestrated by government bloggers under the label “Twitter #y no saldran a la calle” is condemnable.

It has always been profitable business for the Castro brothers to polarize civil society. Belittle those who think differently. The spent speechifying accusing dissenters of being “turncoats, mercenaries and annexationists” is old hat and puerile.

Fatherland is not synonymous with Socialism or Fidel Castro. Mercenaries, as defined in the United Nations statutes, are those outsiders that through the exchange of money are at the service of a foreign government.

It is not the case. All the street dissidents are Cuban born. Even the accusation by the regime that they pour onto the street for money is not compatible with mercenary behavior.

In any event, we could call them “salary men”. But I ask myself – what sensible person would risk beating and prison for 30 convertible pesos, as the government media claims?

It’s one or the other: either they are insane or they are desperate. Moreover, the theory that all opposition sells itself for a fistful of dollars is risible. Is there nobody honest enough to dissent for ideals?

State Security has never seized firearms or C-4 from opposition members. Not even a firecracker. The only things they have seized have been computers, telephones and books. Then, they are peaceful. And have a right to protest in public to show their disapproval of the government.

To speak of annexationism in the 21st century makes us laugh. Annexationism was an undercurrent of the 19th Century, that, by the way, was embraced by many of the fathers of Cuban independence.

Nobody in their right mind wants to raffle away the Fatherland nor tender it to any foreign power. It is only smoke and mirrors from the Castro regime media that seeks to discredit those who oppose them.

If anybody has allied themselves, dangerously, almost in an annexationist way, it has been Fidel Castro himself. Up to 1992, an article in the Constitution of the Cuban Republic recognized the alliance between Cuba and the USSR.

The island had Russian military bases like Study Center #11, or Finca Lourdes, devoted to electronic spying. And nobody in the Cuban parliament stood up to denounce it.

Yes, it is true, the Platt Amendment and the concession of a military base in sovereign territory in Guantanamo elicits repudiation. But the intelligentsia and the politicians of the era expressed their unhappiness in all forums, Congress included.

Beginning in 1959, Castro’s dictates could not, and still can’t be questioned. They are divine laws. Sacred. Absolute. With all its blemishes, the Dissidence is a mirror help up to today’s society and the ills suffered by the governing hierarchy.

There is an opposition sector, banal, corrupt and comfortable. There are also honest opposition members with initiatives of dialog and future.

Lately a certain academic racism has sprung between some of these newly minted dissidents. But not in all. There are valuable and talented citizens in the opposition spectrum. It doesn’t matter whether 30 or 70. Age is not a determinant.

What it is about is not letting one be carried away by excessive ego or craving for the limelight. To come together must be the goal. The carrot and stick strategy that State Security follows is on balance defensive.

On the one hand, they allow meetings, debates and even teaching to certain determined opposition groups, and on the other, they use paramilitaries for verbal lynchings and beatings against those that protest in the streets. They must know why they follow these tactics.

Opposition members, independent journalists and alternative bloggers must set aside conspiracy theories or apparent actions of secret services. They have no proofs in their hands. They are not mind readers either.

Those who publicly oppose the Castros, whether through a blog, web, opposition party or shouting in the streets, whatever their positions they are not enemies.

The enemies are the corrupt procreated by the regime itself and the clans that emerged during 52 years in totalitarian power.

Watch: Video of the clash between opposition members and government loyalist, this last September 24th, in Rio Verde, a suburb of Havanna.  Read: Tomakjian case changes last names of Castro regime in a power readjustment.

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Translated by: lapizcero

September 30 2011

Almost Coffee

Since Raul Castro announced that they would go back to blending chicory into the coffee they sell us through our ration cards and in local currency, I took up this topic; but the repulsiveness of the product they shipped from warehouses which results in a brew that is neither coffee nor porridge, motivated me to consider it one more time.

It is true that many have referred to this product, with its comic luggage from the fiasco – as happens in almost all categories – that was the significance of the announcement.  Along came the “black nectar” with its powdered ammunition to reinforce what we already knew from experience: that they improved the brewing experience, but also reduced it, and hence now we have to serve it in a “tiny container”.  But nobody swallows the pill that comes as with a perfume; on the contrary.  We no longer offer visitors the luxury of a cup of that aromatic grain we used to have, but instead we save it for people who are not always welcome.

With the new despicable potable, they changed even the act of drinking this elixir and introduced an inelegant rite in the form of using both hands to drink it:  one to hold the cup and the other to pinch our nose so the sip is less disagreeable.  If you are feeling in need of a pickup and consider you need a stimulant such as caffeine, I advise you to try an alternative or some other kind of coffee, because that which we obtain with our ration coupons can cause stomach influences that will confine you to the restroom, and maybe chicoryflour is not the invigorator you need.  Recently I advised a friend who wanted to annoy an adversary that constantly threw barbs against him in front of the group, that he make him a present of a package of ration coffee in front of all.  It was in this way – and this is not a tall tale – that the problem was ended.

Something quite different happens when you have the money to pay for a package of the good stuff – if its available – in those establishments that sell in exchange for convertible currency.  It’s been more than a week since the ground fruit-seed is absent from what should be honestly called the “hard currency collection centers” and other such establishments.  There is a rumor in Havana that, as a result of the audits being conducted by the government to the younger of the Castros, 6 tons of the product was found missing at Cuban roasters, and that because of the investigative process, coffee has become absent from the store windows of those places that deal in hard currency.

If you visit these days the home of somebody with economic solvency it is possible that, against their wishes, they cannot share with you a sip of the infusion because of the current deficit.  In my case, if I visit the home of humble persons and they offer me a cup, I will hurriedly drink it, even if the developing nausea brings tears to my eyes, I will pretend I liked it and thank them with alacrity.  But since the old and hospitable “grass” has been converted indirectly into a measure of a host’s esteem, once the coffee supply is stabilized and I visit the home of others who have “good money” and they invite me to a cup of this potage or almost coffee, I will know what awaits me.

Translated by: lapizcero

September 20 2011

Dragon’s Breath

It seems that an anti-kissing and anti-closeness strategy has been in place for some days in Havana: toothpaste went missing. The humble consumer who micromanages the pennies in strong currencies obtained from his meager worker’s incentive or received from relatives who have emigrated – workers exploited by capitalism who plan their vacations, travel and invest around the world without permission, and in spite of that financially help their oppressed loved ones in the Cuban paradise – mostly buys strictly the basic goods in the markets that sell in foreign currencies.

But in Cuba we are vulnerable to the dictatorship of anti-consumerism and prey of the State oligopoly, since when they want to get rid of a Cuban product that no one buys, they stop stocking the foreign alternative so that we will be forced to buy the domestic one, which is almost always of poor quality and with a minimal price difference. That is, they substitute domestic products for the imports, mocking the rights of the buyers, whose ability to choose they arbitrarily limit imposing a lack of options: take it or take it! No alternatives. They choose the shortest and most dishonest route instead of working to ensure the excellence of the domestic products.

The State controls all trade and, in a way that is inefficient and unfair to society, prevents competition from the private sector in those businesses. They do not allow the private citizen to set up a store, nor offer what he produces in one of the many State chain stores. So, whether it’s bad or mediocre, we must be satisfied with whatever the State offers, and furthermore reward them with a smile.

After several days using numerous water-and-salt rinses, this September 22nd the citizens of Havana were pleasantly surprised with a domestic toothpaste of the “Sonríe” (Smile) brand. That state-manufactured concoction with scant menthol is not acquired through workers’ merit, volunteer work, diplomas or passwords, but with strong Cuban pasta [money]: the CUC [Cuban convertible currency]. They charge 90 cents for it, which is equivalent to 22 pesos in national currency. As is natural, there will surely be people who will continue gargling in order to be able to smile without having foul-smelling dragon’s breath. When times are bad, put on a happy face, and if you have bad breath – no options – use Cuban toothpaste.

Translated by: Espirituana

September 28 2011

Making an Appearance / Miriam Celaya

My dear friend Marta Cortiza, married to my other friend, the blogger Eugenio Leal, often used the phrase in the title of this brief posting whenever she called me: “Hello Miriam!, How are you? I’m calling just to make an appearance”. And after the usual introduction we would often get entangled in long conversations that covered topics as varied and contradictory as the sociopolitical situation in Cuba and the world, the minutiae of our families, or the exchange of recipes. I found speaking with Martha as easily natural and spontaneous as if we had been born and raised together, and as if we could read each other’s thoughts.

Just a few years were enough to enhance our extraordinary friendship, forged in the toils and blows that being part of the demonized group of dissidents implies in Cuba, running the same risks and having common interests and shared hopes. Marta’s rare personality combines both a strong will and permanent appeal. She is one of those people who, almost without being noticed, with unmatched candor, becomes essential and close in her affections.

Almost a year ago Little Martha, as I call her in jest, left Cuba. She reunited with her children and grandchildren in Miami and left her many friends here part of her cheerful spirit that still accompanies us in our bustle and blogger meetings. She is cofounder of the blogosphere but never started her own blog. She encouraged our work and supported us from its very inception, and I know that she is linked with our destinies so all the alternative Cuban blogs are thus a little bit hers too.

For this reason and because this is the first time that I cannot congratulate her personally on her birthday this September 26th, I wanted to dedicate this small note as a poor present. If any readers walking the streets of Miami recognize this lady with her warm smile, her honest eyes and her white hair, let it be known that she is a friend of the Cuban free bloggers, that she is a part of us, and that we love her dearly. Here’s to your health, Little Martha! May you have many more, and that I will soon be able to hear your voice on the phone often, uttering that phrase, so nice and familiar: “hello, Miriam, just making an appearance!”

Translated by Norma Whiting

September 26 2011

Notes from a Liberating Passage / Luis Felipe Rojas

The sun was burning like never before over Eastern Cuba. It was September 10th when we immersed ourselves in the hills of Baracoa, we had to hide for two days so they wouldn’t notice us. The National ‘Boitel and Zapata Live’ March for Cuba’s Freedom on the 13th of this month consisted of the presence of 36 human rights activists from the Eastern Democratic Alliance. The Orlando Zapata Tamayo National Resistance Front invited me to cover the event.

The Eastern retinue kicked off the March from Duaba Beach, where Maceo and Flor Crombet (Cuban independence fighters) disembarked in 1895. The opening remarks made by Rolando Rodriguez Lobaina highlighted the purpose of this civic action. We were not to respond to the offenses of either civilians or soldiers, nor to the same physical blows usually employed against us, we would not resist arrests and we would not shout slogans or display written ones, and those of us who could were to dress in white. We would be as peaceful as possible, as we ended up doing. When we were just about 20 meters from the police cordon we began to sing the national anthem and turned ourselves in to our captors. That was it, a total of 36 detainees between the 13 of us who participated and those who were jailed before arriving at our meeting spot.

The Arrest

Eliecer Palma, Jose Triguero Mulet, and I were taken on a Jeep to the Operation Unit towards Moa. We spent nine hours in that unit, sitting on a concrete bench waiting for the supposed decision of the Holguin G2 about our destiny, just for them to later decide to send us to the filthy cells of that center of horror.

As we waited to be locked away there, activists Annie Carrion Romero, Milagros Leyva Ramirez, and Lewis Fajardo showed up to check on us and they were quickly detained. After keeping them for a few hours, the women were sent off to Mayari and the man dropped off in Cueto.

The food was more of the same: an acid and foul smelling ground beef, a transparent water with some noodles floating in it, rice with rocks and other pieces of trash, and a piece of a viand.

Among the detainees that I was sharing a cell with, there were two young men accused of killing and selling a cow. Those in another cell nearby mine had been caught in the illegal game of ‘lottery’, known as ‘La Bolita’, and I saw others who had been stripped of their conditional freedom for not working- they owed fines they could not afford or had bought some item of suspicious origin.

The chief of that Unit, Major Claudio Zaldivar Matos, a thug who is well known in Moa for his aggressiveness towards detainees and even his proper men, put on a show of ‘toughness’ so that I would get off the bunk bed and get in the line of prisoners who were to be inspected on that morning. The intervention of another police official kept him from beating me as he had promised, though we were able to exchange a few words: he stated that he did not care that I was a peaceful dissident and I assured him that they were all violators and that I did not follow orders, much less from soldiers.

I found out that he (Zaldivar) had paralyzed a man after a supposed accident in the municipality of Sagua de Tanamo. At 2 pm sharp, they released us without charges, contradicting the farce of the previous day when they tried to sign a document which stated we were carrying out acts of Public Disorder. They did not confiscate anything from us, and at that time others who had joined us in the march were already in the warmth of their homes savoring a cup of coffee. We left behind the squalor of that place, though I can still feel the pestilence of that dungeon on my skin, which is nothing more than an instrument frequently used by the regime in an attempt to impede what is inevitable, although many may doubt it because of distance, blindness, or a paralyzing fear.

Translated by Raul G.

September 30, 2011

Citizen Evening: First Free Territory of Cuba / Angel Santiesteban

A group of civil rights activists gather every Tuesday and Thursday between 6:00 and 8:00 PM in the park at 31st and 41st, at the corner of the “League against Blindness” hospital, very much in tune with the function of activists to tear off the Cubans’ blindfold and teach them to overcome their fear.

To carry on his example and in memory of one who was vilely murdered, they began to meet the same day the dissident Juan Wilfredo Soto (known as “The Student”) was buried, and branded this day as the birth of the Citizen Evening.

In the beginning there were three who started the Evening, then five, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen defenders of a free space, who have resolved to pay the highest price.

They come from all directions, with saddened faces. It’s time for those who have heard the call. They don’t know what’s in store for them for the rest of the afternoon. On previous occasions they have been arrested, beaten, threatened. But despite everything, they find a glimmer of nobility invades them and they embrace each other.

“We came to have a contradiction,” José Alberto Álvarez Bravo, the principal organizer, told me. “Every time we would get to ten people, they beat us. Sometimes we saw we had reached the number nine, we didn’t know if we wanted the next one to join us or not; but the conviction we have chases away the fear, the beatings don’t matter. They break our heads, we go to the doctor, get sewn up and return. They break our bones, we get a cast and come back. They lock us in a cell, we wait, at some point they will have to release us, and without another thought we return. It is our conviction. Despite the suffering we have to bear, we want a hundred, a thousand, a million to join us, all the people of Cuba to demand their rights.”

While members of State Security remain on the lurk, the dissidents help to chase away the fear by conversing on specific topics, “The concept of possible unity”; “The need to implement the affective element in civil society”; “Tolerance”; “Absolute respect for individual freedom”.

“We try to learn to be citizens,” one of the youngest people, Yaroslan Tamayo Rueda, told me, without losing sight of the two agents who pretended to be chatting.

“We train ourselves,” continued a girl, “on how we will live in a democratic Cuba, at least theoretically.”

The agents move around us, looking nervous. They are awaiting the order to proceed or to remain “passive.”

I look over the faces of the group of dissidents, looking for the answer that summons several generations to meet, what motivates them to run the risk, despite the harassment and abuse: professionals, workers, a peasant woman, blacks and whites. I talk with them and learn the reason that unites them: CHANGE. They need progress, freedom.

José Alberto Álvarez Bravo, as his second surname attests, has suffered six arrests. Threats to send him to prison, even death.

“The political police stole two cellphones from me,” Jose Alberto told me. “On July 12 several police raided my house to steal my laptop and all its components. They took my books,” he continues calmly while I take notes, “worth 64 CUC. They are common thieves, plain highway robbers.”

He pauses, looks around or into the void, trying to let his eyes rest in the distance.

“But having understood that nothing they do against me is going to intimidate me, they have decided to plant fake “dissidents” that have said that in the search they found 20,000 dollars under my pillow that had been donated, and that I had not reported it so that I wouldn’t have to share it,” José Alberto smiles sadly. “I haven’t seen money like that even in films.”

And he calls to Inés Antonia Quezada Lemus, one of the courageous Ladies in White.

“Show him,” he begs her, “the bruises you received at G and Calzada streets.” She, without much interest, shows some marks that refuse to go away.

Inés calls José Ángel Luque Álvarez to come over.

“It was worse with him,” and she hugs him. “He is a real hero; he put up with as much pain and humiliation as Christ.”

The shy young man shows me a string of cuts on the arms. He states that the military men, in exchange for granting gifts, would incite the common prisoners to beat him.

“I was raped,” he told me and the news hit me like a blow on the chin. “The officers penetrated me. One by one while they repeated that I would never again think of yelling ‘Down with the dictatorship’ and ‘Fidel is a murderer'”. They would assure him that he was going to know what a real dictatorship was. (But this is for a future post that I will do in the form of a reminder. The denunciations will never be sufficient.)

In solidarity, a girl watching from a nearby bench alerts us to the fact that they are taking photos of us.

“Don’t give them an importance they don’t deserve,” says Leidi Coca, another of the Ladies in White.

Someone in the group says that, sadly, we need to break it up because it’s 8:00 pm.

“And now we wait again, five days, to revive this space of freedom not governed by the Castro brothers,” laments Inés Antonia.

Each of us expresses the feeling, the experience that goes through our bodies and minds as we inhabit a space, miniscule for now, of total freedom.

Finally we give a parting embrace to those mentioned before and to René González Bonella, Florentina Machado Martínez , Pedro Larena Ibáñez.

We go away fearful, but with the firm determination to return the following Tuesday and bring that space of freedom back to life .

José Alberto Álvarez Bravo has been detained since September 20th, when he was on his way to participate in one of the Citizen Evenings.

September 28 2011

Any Old Registry Office / Rebeca Monzo

Waiting during recess.

The Registry Offices on my planet have become human concentrations or people’s saunas. The long lines overflow to the outside of the building, most of them ending on the street, sidewalks and curbs, where those who aspire to be assisted hang around, waiting for the hoped-for moment. At lunch time, the office is closed and everyone must leave and wait outside. It should be noted that so far none of these sites has a computerized database.

None of them provides enough seats to accommodate everyone; insufficient ventilation is guaranteed. Of course, there is an exception that confirms the rule: the Central Havana Registry – perhaps the only one that works well, based on my personal experience.

I think I have visited almost all of them in the capital, including the one in Santiago de las Vegas, which like all of their species are located in houses and apartments, abandoned for several decades by their former owners and later by the State, which took possession of them without giving them any maintenance in all these years (including cleaning them).

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Here there were once seats

The people who work there do not enjoy appropriate working conditions and generally display a very bad temper. They do their work as if they were doing a great favor to the applicant, even making an effort so that it will not go unnoticed. This forces many users to arrive at the place bearing some small gift. If not, sit down and wait! In the end, whether they do their work well or badly, they will receive the same meager salary.

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Here is where there once was lighting and there was also an air conditioner.

After waiting for more than three hours to be helped, I was able to notice one of the possible causes of the delay: the long silicone nails, green and with small raised flowers, of the employee who took care of the applications. It was to be expected that she would take more than twenty minutes with each short four-line form to be filled out, in addition to the innumerable times that she would leave her work station for just a moment, to go deal with some small matter in another department, and not taking into account the friends who are allowed to go first, cutting into the line.

I was finally provided with a copy of my application on a recycled piece of paper, written exactly on the previously printed side, almost illegible, but even so I left the place relieved, and even happy to have been able to file my application.

Translated by: Espirituana

September 25 2011

Realism, yes. Magic, well, not so much / Regina Coyula

This picture was take in the lobby of the Luis de la Puente Uceda Hospital in La Víbora.

PRE-SURGICAL

OPERATING ROOM

THE PORK HAS ARRIVED.

THE SALE STARTS AT 8:30 AM UNTIL 12:00 AM

CONTINUES AT 2:00 PM UNTIL 4:00 PM

THE COST IS $47 IN CUBAN CURRENCY.

I DO NOT ACCEPT CHAVITOS (convertible currency) OR EUROS.

I CANNOT DELIVER IT UNTIL TOMORROW.

TRY TO BRING EXACT CHANGE.

I CANNOT WAIT UNTIL YOUR NEXT SALARY PAYMENT.

I CANNOT PICK OUT A PACKAGE FOR YOU.

THE LAST DAY IS FRIDAY AT 4:00 PM.

IN THE DINING AREA THERE IS A LIST OF THOSE WHOSE TURN IT ISN’T AND THE REASON.

ENJOY AND CELEBRATE THE 26 OF JULY.

THANK YOU.

Translated by: Espirituana

September 5 2011

CDR, Castro’s Popular Weapon / Iván García

Photo: Carlos Alkim, Flickr

On September 28, 1960, while homemade bombs and firecrackers were being detonated by his political opponents, an angry Fidel Castro created the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR). From the balcony of the north wing of the Presidential Palace, the guerrilla commander, recently returned from a tour of New York, argued the need to monitor all the blocks in the country for the “worms and disaffected,” to protect the revolutionary process.

It was one more step in the autocratic direction in which he was now navigating the nascent revolution. Another deep stab towards the creation of a totalitarian state.

From 1959, Castro had struck a mortal blow to press freedom when, methodically, between promises and threats, the main newspapers of Cuba were shut down. He eliminated the rights of workers to strike and habeas corpus. The legal safeguards for those who opposed his regime were almost nil. He concentrated power. And he made political, economic and social policies by himself, without previously consulting ministers.

The process of establishing himself as the top pontiff in olive green culminated in 1961, with the radicalization of the revolution and the strangulation of the pockets of citizens who dissented against his government.

The CDRs are and have been one of the most effective weapons to collectivize society and get unconditional support for Castro’s strange theories. And one way to manage the nation. They were also the standard bearers at the time, shouting insults, throwing stones and punching the Cubans who thought differently or decided to leave their homeland.

The CDRs are a version of Mussolini’s brownshirts. Or one of those collective monstrosities created by Adolf Hitler. More or less. Over 5 million people are integrated into the ranks of the CDRs on the island.

Membership is not mandatory. But it forms part of the conditioned reflexes established in a society designed to genuflect, applaud and praise the “leaders”.

Although many people have no desire to take part in revolutionary events and marches, or to attend the acts of repudiation against the Ladies in White and the dissident protestors, as if they were on a safari, in a mechanical way at the age of 14, most Cuban children join the CDR.

It forms part of the greased and functional machine of the Creole mandarins. A collective society, where the good and bad must be doled out by the regime.

Two decades ago, with a state salary you could buy a Russian car, a refrigerator, a black and white TV and even an alarm clock. If you surpassed your quota in cane cutting, you were demonstrating loyalty to the fidelista cause or you were a cadre of the party or the Communist Youth.

The others, those who rebuked Fidel Castro’s caudillismo, in addition to being besieged and threatened by his special services, did not even have the right to work.

The CDRs played a sad role in the hard years of the ’80s. They were protagonists in the shameful verbal and physical lynchings against those who decided to leave Cuba.

It can’t be forgotten. The crowd inflamed by the regime’s propaganda, primary and secondary students, employees and CDR members, throwing eggs and tomatoes at the houses of the “scum”, to the beat of chanted slogans like “down with the worms” or “Yankee, you’re selling yourself for a pair of jeans”.

Among the dark deeds of Fidel Castro’s personal revolution, the acts of repudiation occupy first place. In addition to monitoring and verbally assaulting opponents, the CDRs perform social tasks.

They collect and distribute raw material. They help deliver polio vaccines. And, from time to time, less and less, they organize study circles where they analyze and vote to approve a political text or some operation of the Castro brothers.

That bunch of acronyms generated by the sui generis Cuban socialist system, CTC, FMC, MTT, UJC and FEU, among others, are “venerated NGOs”. According to the official discourse, those who by sword and shield support the regime.

In this 21st century, the CDRs, like the revolution itself, have lost steam. And their anniversaries and holidays are scarce. The night guards are rare birds. But the CDR members still keep their nails sharp.

They are the eyes and ears of the intelligence services. Snitches pure and simple. In one CDR a stone’s throw from Red Square in Vibora (which is not a square nor is it painted red), some of the species remain.

Now one has died. A lonely old man and childless, a factory worker, who was noted for his daily reports about “counter-revolutionary activities on the block”.

Two remain active. They have antagonized the neighborhood by their intransigence. All who dissent publicly in Cuba know that there is always a pair of eyes that watch your steps and then report by telephone to State Security.

Over time, you get used to their clumsy maneuvers of checking up on you and interfering with your private life. They inspect your garbage, to see what you eat or if you bathe with soap you bought in the “shopping”. Sometimes they make you laugh. Almost always they make you pity them.

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Translated by Regina Anavy

September 27 2011

The Strings of the Piñata / Yoani Sánchez

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I remember very well the children’s parties that ended with the pushing and shoving and laughter of those who wanted to grab a candy or a gift. The piñatas, shaped like a clown or a boat or resembling some cartoon character, were the funnest part of every birthday. But that time has passed and what is being distributed now in our country is not sweets or balloons, but properties. Like the Nicaraguan Sandinistas once did, or the leaders of the Communist Party in Russia, Cuban leaders are distributing — at their convenience — rental properties, cars, businesses, houses.

Yesterday’s publication of Decree 292 — for the ownership transfer of motor vehicles — has been the culmination of a several decade’s wait. For far too long obtaining a car has been a perk earned through unconditional ideology. Now, they have added a few pinches of this ingredient called “market” to a mechanism that has been ruled for half a century. Even with this new legal reform, however, the great majority of citizens are only allowed to buy a used car, which in Cuba means vehicles more than 15 years old, and in particular Russian Ladas or Moskvitches, or Polish Fiats, which were previously marketed through a meritocracy. Some modern cars in State service will be sold to those who meet the strict requirements of belonging to an institution and demonstrating their fidelity to the Government. And those impeccably new ones, recent imports, are destined for a Revolutionary elite that has in their pockets money sanctified through official channels. To drive a shiny Citroen or a late model Peugeot will continue to be a sign of being a member of the powers-that-be.

Another revealing detail in this resolution is the emphasis given, in its pages, to the concept of “final departure” for those who relocate abroad. If, as Raul Castro himself has said, we are committed to migratory reform, what is the significance of not repealing this shameful category? Those who leave may not sell their cars before departing, they may only transfer them to their closest relatives. The penalization of emigration, then, remains in place. But what is most worrying is the already visible composition of the piñata, the structure of a sharing out among equals, embodied in cars taken out of tourist or business use which will be marketed to a very select group of people. The existence of such a mechanism will undoubtedly feed corruption, “socialism,” and put into the hands of government sympathizers the fattest strings for when it becomes necessary to pull on them in unison. I have no doubt that to this party, which they have already begun to prepare, we Cubans will not be invited.

29 September 2011

I Know the Writer Angel Santiesteban Whom Cuba Wants to Punish / Angel Santiesteban

[This text is from the website Incredible Universe]

Manuel Fernández reveals in Incredible Universe how, when he met the Cuban writer Angel Santiesteban, State Security recorded the conversation.

A Spanish citizen, Fernández was the manager, at that time, of one of the hotels in Havana.

A few days ago we talked to him about the regime’s campaign against Santiesteban and he was inspired to recount to us what happened at that time, a sincere testimony about the struggle for life.

These are the words of Manuel Fernandez. He lives in Spain. He continues to admire the Cuban intellectual and warns of the government’s maneuvers to totally silence him by sending him to prison.

Testimony of Manuel Fernández Manero

I met Angel Santiesteban like most of his current best friends, through his books. Through someone I can’t remember, his books came to me, and I then decided to meet him. His literature overwhelmed me, but especially his knowledge of the Cuban reality.

In Cuba I was devoted to tourism, I was the manager of the Deauville Hotel, and could rub shoulders with all strata of society, knowing that many wouldn’t risk talking in the light of day for fear of the consequences.

I told a mutual friend I wanted to meet him, I wanted to talk with that writer who scoffed at the canons established by the system. Writing in this raw way within the system was certain suicide.

Honestly, I imagined someone half crazy with the airs of an alien, but above all with talent and determined to write the Cuban reality and that was what interested me.

When I met him he wasn’t what I’d imagined. He conversed calmly and the whole time it seemed to me that he knew what he wanted, where he wanted to go. We talked of common themes: literature, society, ideology, the dictatorship, the future of Cuba.

And at that time — it was six years ago — Santiesteban was pessimistic about a democratic solution in the coming years, because in those years, in Cuba and in the world, there was little evidence of the Castro brothers abandoning power. He said no, they adjusted to the times.

He assured me that Fidel Castro had become a specialist in playing for time and in manipulation. All he wanted was not to lose power. At times he seemed disposed to make concessions, to appear to be preparing the changes the country needed, particularly for democracy.

And time has proved Angel right. Fidel and Raul are still in the same place after more than fifty years, feigning change to gain the time necessary to ensure “tranquility” for the rest of their lives. This supposed “tranquility” is nothing more than continuing in government, betting on Alejandro and Mariela Castro, Raul’s children, as the racehorses they’ve allowed to play a different game, a measuring stick to gauge the desires and wishes of the Cuban people. And at the same time to save their fortunes and to gain time to get their family members out of the country.

I said goodbye to Angel, assuring him I would return in a few days, and even promised to bring him a book by the journalist Jose Manuel Medem who had recently ended his contract as a reporter in Cuba for Spanish Television.

I couldn’t return, they didn’t let me return. I learned that State Security had recorded my conversation with Angel that first time we’d met and that I was definitely not welcome in Cuba.

Since then I’ve followed Santiesteban’s life, thanks to email, and after they closed down his account we sustained our conversation on Facebook, which is like sitting at home carrying on a natural conversation.

I have supported Angel in the advocacy campaigns every time they’ve abused him. I have always been at his side and always will be. It’s a promise that I made to him and to my son. I will never abandon him.

Every outrage has been a pain in my own flesh. I suffer it double because I want to be in his skin, to receive these injuries in his place, I can’t be at his side physically to ease it every time State Security decides to hurt him.

My cry for Angel goes out from Spain to every corner of the world, I do it for our brotherhood, my family has already accepted him as one of us, very special of course; but I also do it for the intellectual that he is, for his work and for the need Cuban culture has that he continue to develop his talent and enrich the literary landscape.

Also for the natural fighter that he carries within, for all he sacrifices so that Cubans can be free and obtain the rights defended by the Constitution of the Human Rights Organization of the United Nations.

Of course we are worried about the General Prosecutor of the Republic’s request for 15 years for Angel, we know that it is a campaign, first to intimidate him, and then to discredit him internationally so that his denunciations in his blog will not be believed.

They know that Angel is a strong writer, that he has made his talent into a powerful weapon against the system. And for this they try to destroy him, to make him give way with these dirty media tricks.

Angel is going to continue writing his blog with the same strength with which he began it. He is going to continue to delight us with his literature. We will not allow him to be imprisoned. These are the convictions with which we support him and with which we will do everything within our power, and more, because justice must prevail once and for all, the Castro dictatorship must understand that there are men who can overcome fear.

Manuel Fernández Manero

September 28 2011

Welcoming Review of a Different Blog / Miriam Celaya

The independent Cuban blogosphere has had an impressive growth in its few years of existence despite low Internet connectivity on the Island. Most blogs that have been set up and kept open during this time are autonomous spaces arising by the spontaneous free will of their respective administrators and, although the authorities insist on including almost all under the generic label of “dissidents,” (in Cuba the slightest sign of independence automatically implies “subversion”) the truth is that at least some of them are not particularly concerned with political issues, with accusations or with the social criticism of the Cuban reality.

In spite of that and without denying that inspirations for criticism abound in a reality such as ours, the continuing growth and diversification of the blogosphere into themes and interests that have nothing to do with the ideological over-saturation we have endured for over half a century is something to celebrate. For that reason, among more powerful ones, I wanted to dedicate a brief overview of the recent birth of a peculiar blog. As far as I know, Cuba did not have a personal blog devoted to culinary and gastronomic topics, irrespective of some, like the blog “Through the Eye of the Needle“, where my friend Rebecca Monzo sometimes inserts one or another recipe. The new space (Voy Caliente), with strong interests in fusion-kitchen; with dietary proposals in line with current world trends and also the bearer of a refreshing ideas segment of young Cuban restaurateurs, brings a little spice to a blogosphere that continues to grow. Each new blog is a sign of the health of the spirit of a consolidated online community.

And if some of my readers find it surprising that a blogger so stubborn and free thinking would pay special attention to a blog seemingly far removed from her everyday comings and goings and her strong voice, I must say that I have reasonable grounds for this, not only because Jorge Ortega Celaya, principal of the new blog, is a great young chef who aspires to someday have his own restaurant with the personal seal of his talent, and whose creations I have often enjoyed, but because this blogger is my oldest son. So the adage “the testimonial is up close and personal” is fulfilled to a T.

Thus, just like I welcomed my son to the world in January 1980, today I want to welcome the blogger, born to the same virtual space I have dwelled in for a few years; a place where – just like he did in real life — he must carve a course for himself. I wish him, of course, all the luck in the world.

Translated by Norma Whiting

September 23 2011

Remembering 9-11 from Havana / Iván García

Photo: Petri Setälä, Picasa. Havana in 2001.

There are dates that leave their mark forever. The attack on the Twin Towers of New York is one of them. We probably all remember what we were doing at the time. How did we learn about it? What did we experieince?

September 11, 2001 appeared to be a Tuesday like any other in Havana. Dawn had come without clouds and with a full sun. At 8:45 a.m., when the first aircraft crashed into the Word Trade Center, I was still sleeping.

Around 9:20 a.m., I began my routine. Reviewing some notes to send to Encuentro en la Red (Encounter on the Web). Combing through the news on Cuban radio. In the afternoon, listening to the news from the BBC, Radio Exterior of Spain, Radio France International or Voice of America. Then going out and talking with people on the street.

I remember that Radio Reloj was going on and on about the state of the economy on the island. About 10:00 I received the newspapers, Granma and Juventud Rebelde. With more of the same. Briefly it was recalled that September 11 was the 28-year anniversary of the Pinochet coup in Chile.

I was alone in the house. My sister Tamila was working. My niece Yania was in school. My mother Tania Quintero, a freelance journalist, had gone early to “forage” for food in several agromercados.

Around 11:00 a.m., a neighbor in the hallway of my building shouted: “It looks like there was a huge accident in the United States; they’re showing it on Channel 6”. I connected the TV. National television, something unheard of, had linked to CNN, and in the background, two reporters commented on the news.

The images were horrifying. Again and again they showed the airplane hitting the structure of concrete, steel and glass, like a knife going into a stick of butter.

The telephone began to ring insistently. Friends and relatives were stunned. We could not believe what we were seeing. Those with relatives in Miami were trying desperately to call them for more information. The phone lines with Florida were jammed.

I still have on my retina the powerful images of desperate people who threw themselves to death from the top of the towers. When the buildings collapsed, leaving a huge cloud of dust and soot, and a chilling roar that the people of New York would never forget, we who followed the news knew that the world had changed.

In the space of the afternoon we knew that a plane had hit the Pentagon. A fourth plane crashed in a Pennsylvania forest, thanks to the courage of the passengers, who by a phone call knew what had happened in the Big Apple.

That night, Fidel Castro spoke in the Sports Coliseum to numerous medical students. The Cuban government authorized American planes to fly over Cuba and use the island’s airports and air corridors. The sole comandante offered medical aid.

The United States was under a terrorist attack. We all knew intuitively what would come next. War. In those days, a large part of world was in solidarity with the northern nation. It did not know how to capitalize on that support.

Perhaps the best option was not planes and smart bombs buried in rubble, caves and hideouts of the Taliban in Afghanistan. I am one of those who think that an operation of special services, operating with close international cooperation, would have had better results.

But the Untied States wanted revenge. Some 6,000 people were injured and about 3,000 people lost their lives. Many families couldn’t recover their remains.

War will never be a good option. Ten years after the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers, the victims total more than one million dead and wounded. The world has not been made more secure. There are fewer dictators and rogue leaders, but democracy at gunpoint has not brought order in Afghanistan or Iraq. Quite the contrary.

Thousands of U.S. troops are bogged down in those nations. Almost a decade after the attack on New York, it took a special forces operation to hunt down and kill Osama Bin Laden.

Al Qaeda is still alive. The autocrats and tyrants continue trampling on the basic freedoms of their peoples. It’s good that the United States and other nations demand democracy and respect for human rights in countries where they are violated.

But not from the cockpit of an F-16. Undoubtedly, blood, devastation and fire are rather strange ways to learn lessons on democracy.

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Translated by Regina Anavy

September 9 2011