Birds of a Feather Flock Together / Rebeca Monzo

Archive photo

Many years ago, while studying journalism, I had a teacher who taught Marxist philosophy, in a totally original way. At the beginning of each class, writing a saying from a popular Spanish proverb on the blackboard and taking that as a point of reference, he would explain the philosophical categories that related to that issue. He also told us that all wisdom was present in the chosen proverb. Thus I also acquired the habit, which I am rarely able to abstain from.

Once again, yesterday, listing to the shortwave, I was amazed by the statements about the dictator Gaddafi made by the Venezuelan leader — “I cannot condemn him from a distance, he is my friend, my friend forever, the friend of our people, Gaddafi is like Bolivar” — and other nonsense. Now that false news that leaked last week that said the country had offered asylum to the tyrant made sense. Then came to mind two very wise proverbs: Where there’s smoke, there’s fire, and another that says, Birds of a feather flock together. Paraphrasing the title of a popular TV program here on my planet, I say: You can draw your own conclusions.

March 2 2011

A Death That Could Have Been Avoided / Iván García

Every time I pass by the sports fan club in Parque Central, right in the heart of Havana, I think I hear Orlando Zapata Tamayo debating baseball matters.

Baseball was more than a passion for him. It was a style of life. The dissident — jailed for three years in 2003 for the crime of contempt, and then later the sentence was extended to 32 years for his rebellious attitude inside the prison — was a Cuban in its purest form.

I prefer the simple type of Banes, who like thousands of fellow countrymen born in the eastern regions of the island, flee from the ‘obstine‘ (frustration) and poverty in their villages and try to find better luck in the capital.

Zapata was one of those. In Havana he worked as an assistant bricklayer in the construction of Parque Central hotel, where at this very moment I’m composing this note. His political concerns were identical to those of the silent majority of Cubans, drivers with old cars for hire, fritura (fried food) vendors, or bicitaxistas who pedal twelve hours a day.

For several years Orlando was an anonymous dissident. It’s possible to investigate how his personal political transition started and when, openly and publicly, he began to desire a collection of freedoms for all citizens.

Zapata was similar to the front balcony neighbor that criticizes the state of affairs in the country. A desperate man of the street who doesn’t see a way, since constitutionally it doesn’t exist, to move Cuba on a democratic path.

There are many on the island like Zapata. Or in Cairo. Ideally this mulatto, who died at age 42, could be shouting slogans in Liberation Square. Or be Mohammed Bouazizi, the 26-year-old who set himself on fire in a Tunisian town far from the tourist brochures.

A memory comes to me of a chat I had on a cold night in February 2010 with one of his Republican Alternative Movement friends. He described to me those days, when unhappy with the arbitrary laws of the government that had imprisoned 75 dissidents in March of 2003, they left the Estadio Latinoamericano and, without a leader to exhort them, they marched from the baseball debating club in Parque Central along the streets, protesting the arrests.

And of course, I remember a short and sturdy opponent, who had suffered in prisons and hidden her emotions like everyone else, crying in silence in the living room of her house, remembering the young man, quiet, almost invisible, who was together with her on a fast, days before the raid of 2003.

I cannot forget the giant that is Reina Luisa Tamayo, his mother, who will not see Orlando, with his duffel bag in tow, coming down the alley of the poor neighborhood section of Banes where she lives.

A year after his death the message of Zapata Tamayo has force. It was precisely his death which led to a series of marches heard through the streets of Havana by the Ladies in White, shouting “Zapata lives.”

The repercussion and global condemnation over his death forced General Raul Castro’s government to negotiate a solution with the Catholic Church. If today a majority of the Black Spring dissidents can walk freely through the streets of Spain, Chile, the United States, or Cuba, it is thanks to this forceful weapon that was the death of Zapata.

A death that could have been prevented. Due to arrogance the regime did not stop it. They gained nothing. A maxim which every statesman must remember is that they should never use the relentless forces of power against an individual, healthy or dying.

It is not about ideology. It is a matter of humanity. The government of Cuba would gain credibility if, at one year after the death of Zapata, they would apologize publicly. Out of respect and decency they owe it to his mother, so shamefully harassed.

Reina Luisa will never recover her son. But it might be an initiation of the unavoidable dialogue that Cuba needs. The Castros should use leniency as a shield. It would be a way to atone for their faults. And believe me, they need it.

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Translated by DoDi 2.0

February 24 2011

State Security’s Soap Opera / Claudia Cadelo


Translation of Audio:
Voice of “Carlos”: Claudia, it’s the independent journalist Carlos Serpa Maceira. I’m here in Isla de Pinos where I was beaten and detained by the authorities. Please, my cell phone number is 52914540. Please, I tried contacting Yoani, I sent her a message. Help me with this. Take care, Serpa.
Voice of Claudia: Tell me, what do you think of that? Voice of Yoani: We should send him a message saying ‘what a spy’, ‘what a low life’…

State Security has launched a soap opera entitled “Cuba’s Interests,” and it’s awful. Whoever wrote it — oh my — was included like an extra in the script. Above I’ve posted the message Carlos Serpa — confessed agent — left on my answering machine the day before Saturday night’s premier on Cubavision, which exasperated half of Havana which doesn’t want to hear even one more second of ideological propaganda on television.

I mean really, Villa Marista is in need of an image manager and also a speech therapist. Perhaps they are short on budget and human resources, but it’s important — say I — that people know how to talk, especially when they are giving speeches or launching themselves as tropical-James-Bond-style soap opera actors. Nothing is as depressing as the vulgarity, the lack of education, the trashy accents of the latest characters who have made their leaps to fame from the ranks of State Security. If these are the presentable ones, what do the ones we don’t see look like? The Ministry seems more and more like a zoo, the officials poor classless puppets that the system moves at will, like pawns. The last remaining pawns: The snitches.

Who is paid for being a snitch? That’s the harsh reality facing Power, because the human qualities of those who accept such work at this stage of the championship leave much to be desired: Twisted principles, lacking values, shameless, amoral, uneducated, vulgar and extremely mediocre and envious, two feelings that always seem to go hand-in-hand.

Goose Stepping / Yoani Sánchez

My neighborhood is experiencing a small shock, a change that comes in the form of new asphalt, the workers are removing the pavement and adding a black sticky layer which, in a few days, will once again be solid under the tires. We’re all amazed. The happiness would be greater were it not for the reasons behind this road restoration, the impulse that underlies these works. The whole Plaza of the Revolution and the “frozen zone” where I live is getting ready for the big parade on April 15. A sea of military power seeking to dissuade all those who want change in Cuba.

For weeks, the parking lot at the Latin American Stadium has been the practice site for soldiers testing their goose step. Forty-five degrees of extended leg calling to mind a puppet pulled by its strings, by a cord that is lost somewhere up there in the immensity of power. I don’t know how a military parade can be beautiful, what emotion can be found in these synchronized automatic beings who pass by with their faces turned to the leader on the podium. But the resulting effect I know well: Afterwards they will say the government is armed to the teeth and those who take to the streets in protest will be crushed against the same pavement that is being repaired today. The marching of the squadrons will be a warming to us that the Party not only has militants to defend itself, but also anti-riot troops and elite corps.

The choreography of authoritarianism is what I would call it, but others prefer to believe that this will be a demonstration of independence, of a national autonomy which, in reality, resembles Robin Crusoe abandoned on his Island. But beyond my doubts about uniforms, my allergy to a procession of squadrons marching in unison, today I’m concerned about the tar, that recently-laid asphalt that the tracks of the tanks will damage.

Of Trios and Duos / Rebeca Monzo

Archive photo

They were a deeply rooted tradition in our country, the groups made up of three members, called Trios or Tercetos, which proliferated in the 40s and 50s.

The country’s development took with it the creation and expansion of multiple recreational venues: cabarets, restaurants, open airs, the movies, and later, television. A country of musical greats and different opportunities to develop and express oneself. This made ever more musical groups appear, above all those of this little format, which served to lighten and make long Cuban nights more cozy. Thus emerged: The Matamoros Trio, Trio La Rosa, Trio Taicuba, The Lake Brothers, The Chancellors, The Ambassadors, Voices of America, The Indomitables, to only mention a few of the endless list.

After ’59, they went around closing those venues mentioned earlier, and around the middle of the seventies a sort of dry law popped up which finally shut them down for good; until television was left as the only option for these musicians. Thus they left little by little, most of them abandoning the country; and those who remained dedicated themselves to surviving at unrelated jobs, losing many good examples of our popular music.

Nonetheless, the picturesque creole has brought a new definition that doesn’t appear in Spanish language dictionaries: a trio is a symphonic Cuban orchestra which goes on tour abroad and returns.

However, on our planet there exists another small format: a duo, which, as its sole option for more than 50 years, is making us dance to the same tired rhythm.

Translated by: JT

February 28 2011

A Wake for Our Cadaver / Francis Sánchez

This February 23 marks the first anniversary of the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo after suffering a hunger strike that lasted 86 days. The official press hastened to say that it was just another fallen mercenary in service to the empire. But not everyone in the general public subjected to this propaganda saw it that way, even some avowed communists revealed their bewilderment in remarks circulated by email: can one give their own life, coldly, in exchange for money?

The old discredited argument against dissent, against differences, continues to transmit the classic standard of proof: supposedly all “others” are lacking not only good sense, true motives, but also lack the most minimal ideal or altruism. But now its lack of logic has left this argument without a leg. This victim was different, he had crossed the vast threshold of the pain of an entire people until he entered into death, carried forth by his own sturdy will, over to where Cubans, because of their culture and distinctive characteristics, do not charge or demand, but instead offer to give themselves freely to their fellow man. Apart from puppets, that other cartoonish idea of masochistic dissidents, that they are looking for ostracism and repression in return for a few perks they are thrown from the outside, does not even remotely fit the case. Zapata gave everything. He gave, and here this word acquires its full meaning, his life.

Absolute power, which is always marked by rigor mortis, does not permit even in theory a social actor who dissents legitimately. Seemingly the most elemental human condition is lost when a person questions or doubts the vertical power, receiving the exclusion that is reserved for monsters, that’s why the revolutionary songbook is full of dehumanizing terms such as “worm”, “scum”, “faction”, it has been used over the long course of Cuban history to institutionalize an overwhelming fear of disagreements.

One might ask the tribunal of untainted pure censors this question: what is the prototypical dissident for which they have planned, do they concede to a life the right to question, that those who choose to live could believe that a monolithic social model is unsustainable or impossible. Given this abundant reality and the ideological contradictions why don’t we see an opponent worthy of minimal respect emerge in the national arena, someone permitted to share the same space with them minus the stigma, and a judge that is chosen who will accept all parties: does some type of a priori approved opponent exist? A person who authentically challenges power and its axioms? Is there an application process to follow, some conditions to be met, at least on paper, which won’t cause oneself to deserve punishment or to have oneself compared to rats? Well no. This very complex reality and national history gives us the answer: it has not been planned for. In a Revolution, supposedly more sacred than the existence of the people caught in its vortex, one where the means disrupt the ends, simply put, a good citizen is “revolutionary” or they cease to be a citizen.

They corner and they crush the “vermin” on the pretext of preventing harm to human beings and the community. Denied as individuals the reasons or lack of reasons of the State that enforces a degraded standard of living, what mark of our uniqueness are we left, what tacit humanism, what borderline is there which can be used to avoid mistaking ourselves for the blind murderous deformities that illustrate the official bestiary. Harming oneself is the extreme attitude test, but also practically the only one that comes to a person already cornered and crushed in order to argue for their harmlessness and their human rights: actions like separating oneself from the sheep kept secure in a pen, the renunciation, the fasting or a tragic suicide… Zapata crossed those boundaries. Clearly, not even that was sufficient: official spokesmen cataloged it as perverse. Without a doubt, he made himself a martyr.

To continue the story starting from the same place. They had also wanted this February 23 to be for Pedro Arguelles’ birthday, one of the few prisoners who are left of the 75 condemned in spring of 2003, in spite of causing the government to promise last year to free all of them in November later that same year. So Arguelles had planned his visiting day, which occurs approximately every month and a half, for this date. Yolanda, his wife, had the bags prepared to bring to him, when she received his call: He decided to renounce this visit in order to pass his birthday in complete fasting as an homage to the memory of Orlando Zapata. He who has nothing, but still finds a way to find the strength and express himself civically, sacrificing the little that he still has.

Yolanda must wait another 45 days to see the man she loves and who makes her feel proud. “Stateless” usually encompasses peaceful dissent, here it’s synonymous with traitor and monster. Arguelles has seen his imprisonment prolonged including after the promise of the government, until arriving at that day which shared his birthday and the first anniversary of the death of Orlando Zapata, precisely for rejecting the only condition which until now they have given to him in order to leave the jail: Abandon his homeland.

We are having a wake for our cadaver and, at the bottom of the deep future, trembles a flame, an idea much more daunting than the open eyes of a dead man: the soul in torment from the nation “with all and for the good of all.”

Translated by Dodi 2.0

February 24 2011

Reply, After the “Battle” / Miriam Celaya

I have taken some time to reply to the many comments to the post “Fantasies and realities of a virtual rebellion”, but I had good reason to do so. The reactions from readers, in the face of what might have seemed like a cold shower, were diverse, but expected. They did not disappoint or surprise me. The truth is that such participation shows that the topic was interesting to many … The lords of certain “leanings” that are scattered around here would love to see Cubans show such interest in debating them! Thank you sincerely for nurturing this little forum with your ideas.

There’s been everything, “as in a drug store”, like my grandmother used to say. Some comments show some misunderstandings, I’m guessing due to reading too fast. There are also those who respectfully offer opinions that don’t agree with mine, which offers the opportunity to incorporate different perspectives about matters that affect all of us, while some that do agree with irrelevance or with few possibilities to achieve a demonstration or with little prospect of achieving an Egyptian-style uprising on the Island not only provide arguments, but they also suggest other avenues for action. I won’t even bother to respond the offenses, of course.

In general, analyzing the compliments readers have honored me with, I could not help feeling like that perverse childhood friend, who, with malicious intent, not only told us that the Magi were not real, but –- in addition — took us by the hand with evil pleasure to prove it by showing us the hiding place where our parents, almost with the same enthusiasm as ours (or maybe even more enthusiastically) kept our new toys hidden until the camels’ expected arrival. We felt both a passing anger towards the illusion-breaker that, with his clean stabbing, smashed a beautiful childhood dream, we would end up being grateful for having shown us the deceit. Better yet, after the bitter pill of disappointment, we had the advantage to negotiate directly with our parents for toys each year, according to the possibilities, without going through the hassle of writing the necessary letter –- also full of deceit — to Melchior, Gaspar and Balthazar in order to demonstrate that we were worthy of their grace.

I use this parable also quite deliberately, because most of the time, when facing difficult situations we behave with the immaturity typical of a kid who doesn’t want to see reality. Behold! this time, I was the evil friend who opened the closet door and showed the hidden toys while, knowing our reality, I insisted that no protest would ever come to fruition in Cuba. Some reactions were so ardent in their fury that I was even accused of spoiling the successful achievement of the uprising with my “pessimistic” attitude, without considering that it is not about what I want or don’t want, but about the Cuban reality, such as it is. Those who think that way are overestimating my extremely limited (almost nil) influence over the opinion of a people who in their majority does not have Internet access and — as a result — does not know my blog. I truly believe that I am more useful in helping to sow the little civil seed than encouraging revolutions of doubtful outcome. In any case, civil awareness promotes men, while revolutions unleash beasts. You can bet that, hypothetically, if I had the power to influence the thoughts and actions of my countrymen, I never would have called for any exercise that could lead to violence, in the same way that I never suggested to Cubans living abroad to stop helping to maintain the regime with their family remittances or with their trips to the Island. I understand the powerful reasons of those whose parents, children or siblings are still living here, though I also know of some opportunists on this side of the strait who live without the slightest effort, waiting for the manna that comes from the sacrifice of his relatives abroad. I have spoken: there is a bit of everything.

I digress at this point to place an unavoidable marker. To my personal satisfaction, and to respond to a dart someone threw at me which I did not deserve, I maintain that I am one of those Cubans who does not receive any remittances, either from individuals or from institutions, for which I congratulate myself more every day. My income stems from my own work, though — given the circumstances in Cuba — I don’t just work for the money, but also for the satisfaction of helping to bring on change, doing what I consider useful. I accept handouts from absolutely no one; therefore, the possibility of rubbing that in my face does not exist. This does not mean, however, that I haven’t accepted cell phone account refills from some of my friends and supporters, internet cards I’ve been given and other items like flash drives, discs, etc., that have supported my work as blogger. I’ll be eternally grateful for this.

Another reason why I delayed in writing this reply, possibly unnecessary, judging by the experiences life has taught us, was to miss the date of the alleged revolt to which so loudly and for so long before we were being summoned, giving both the rebels the opportunity to prepare and the regime to prevent it. Just as we knew beforehand, on February 21st there was no protest at all. And it was clear that there couldn’t be one, not only by the limitations that I indicated in that controversial post and that numerous commentators have expressed, but because the better part of those who might have joined the protests were detained at police units, or under house arrest by the repressive forces; not to mention the deployment of the instruments of the regime throughout the area of the Avenida de las Misiones (across the street from the former Presidential Palace) — selected location for the start of the action — with the task of preventing any demonstration attempts.

Incidentally, similar measures were taken throughout the Island for days prior to February 23rd to prevent public commemoration of the first anniversary of the death of Orlando Zapata Tamayo. There have been arrests in almost all provinces. In places like Banes, for example, the town was literally taken over by the political police and troops were placed at strategic points. Reina Luisa Tamayo’s house was surrounded from all accessible points by soldiers with rifles. Government fear has been so impressive on the face of the symbolic stature of Zapata that even they, paradoxically, have helped to increase it with such excessive deployment.

But, back to the original topic, I would have preferred that the passion had not blinded the good sense of some readers. You can be in disagreement of certain criteria or positions (I enthusiastically welcome the lack of unanimity), but I insist that we must not confuse our desires with reality. I live here, how I wish for change! I don’t know if somewhere in the world what people want will occur exactly; I allow myself to doubt it. I do not pretend to pontificate on political thought, since I have no capacity for it, but to exchange criteria by offering my views. I cannot, however, share absurd generalizations as someone who holds that “all dictatorships are the same” –- the truly shocking example of Pinochet — Chile’s economic benefactor who saved the country from communist ruin, but over whom weigh thousands of deaths and disappearances; nor can I consider as a “minuscule sum” the deaths of “10, 20, 30, or maybe 100 Cubans”, especially when those who seem to consider them a kind of collateral damage is safe from risk. I really prefer to not label such an attitude: the epithet would not sound pleasant.

Finally, I have not chosen to “wait.” In my own way, I do what is possible for me to do to contribute to changes in Cuba. I’m not sitting around, waiting. I’m doing, as my fellow travelers are, and also those beyond the reefs, who support and encourage us. Personally, my wish for Cuba is a process of gradual and orderly changes, whose synergy will arise from the maturity and coherence that all social components would achieve. It would not be a 15-day process, but neither is it expected to be too long. After 52 years of totalitarianism, any hint of an aperture would accelerate the changes. More than a century of improvisations and patches have proven to be fully ineffective, and if we want to ultimately attain a strong and lasting democracy, we also need to have citizens, just like Estrada Palma stated in the early faltering and truncate Republic. I have no answers but I do have hope, which negates any presumption of pessimism about me. I also have the will and perseverance to continue, as do my measured energies and meager talents, doing my tiny job just like a polyp piercing the wall. Believe me, this is an exercise of pure faith nurtured on the most resounding optimism.

Translated by Norma Whiting

February 25, 2011

Message from Loly Estévez / POLEMICA: The 2007 Intellectual Debate

Respected colleagues:

I have learned, by email, about part of the exchange of opinions stirred up by the appearance on the Cuban TV program “Imprint” about Luis Pavón and Jorge Serguera, interviewed in “The Difference.” I don’t know the contents, and now I’m actually in Spain invited by the Ateneo “Jovellanos” de Gijón. I confess my surprise when I saw in some of the messages I received that Quesada’s appearance on “Open Dialogue” several months ago was equated with the mentioned “events.” I explained to two friends who asked me about it that this was a program designed to assess the five years of work on the program, and that it included a previously recorded opinion about Quesada in his capacity as adviser to the Directorate of Programming for Cuban TV, as the Manager of “Open Dialogue” and other programs.

The fact that the emergence of Quesada several months ago was linked to refer to a matter that was specific and technical, with the inclusion of Luis Pavón in a space dedicated to people with an intellectual work accepted as capable of making a mark, and with Jorge Serguera’s presence and statements in “The Difference” didn’t seem too strange to me.

What does surprise me and motivates me to write these lines is that the Secretariat of UNEAC endorsed a Declaration where he admits sharing “the righteous indignation of a group” on three television programs and mentions “Open Dialogue” first, which automatically implicated him in “expressing a tendency outside the cultural policy that has guaranteed and guarantees our unity”; in the valuation of the Presidency of the ICRT that “in its conception and execution they committed serious errors” and in the “stupidity” that they can be exploited to harm the Revolution. I wonder if they took the time to review the “Open Dialogue” that they so “generously” describe. Before giving an opinion – and publishing it – you have to investigate.

As director and founder of “Open Dialogue,” I affirm that for six years we’ve been off the air with respect to Cuban culture and its protagonists. Our daily feeds are not the award for its category received by the program at the First National Festival of Cuban television with the theme “Where is the newest trova?”; nor the Special Prize awarded by the critics at the Second Festival (2006) for the space devoted to “cultural criticism in the media”; our difficult struggle for the complex task of making Cuban television breathe, thanks to viewers who respect us and personalities who, by their means and zeal for collaboration, turn up in our studio to give us the prestige of their presence and words. There have been National Awards from different specialties, experts on plenty of categories, officials of the culture and the media, established artists and intellectuals, and artists who will be the stars of the future.

I declare that I’m happy to have been for 27 minutes of my life together with people whose existence and work guarantee culture and unity.

I didn’t mention names not to incur oblivion, but I suggest that those officially charged with “assessing” and “declaring” and those who would exercise their right to give an opinion request criteria about “Open Dialogue” from people like Reynaldo González and Miguel Barnet (they themselves have been invited to the program). those who managed to turn into a work of true imprint the time of regret that a period that now is symbolized in Luis Pavón caused them.

I suggest that we don’t mix that which – like oil and vinegar – will end where it belongs according to natural and social laws.

I suggest that we don’t state that the outrage is only from “a group,” but that we remember Hemingway and his tip of the iceberg.

I suggest that the cycle of conferences scheduled for the singular and penetrating Desiderio Navarro be united with the voice of Dr. Isabel Monal, who along with Fernando Martínez Heredia (and other Marxist-proof mediocre, opportunistic and superficial people) might remind us how much the so-called “real socialism” cost us, like ignoring the concepts of Antonio Gramsci; or the time that Lenin devoted to the cultural debate with the poet Mayakovsky; or artistic achievement in the Paris of the avant-garde and not in the Moscow of the October Revolution of the talents turned away by the ignorance and irresponsibility in terms of cultural politics that followed Lenin in the then-besieged and admired Soviet Union.

I suggest, above all, that we don’t pretend to put an end to a necessary debate. From such discussion light is born: this was taught me by my mother, a woman raised in an Asturian home among the prejudices of the first half of the twentieth century, who was a volunteer teacher, a founder of the CDR and the FMC, and who decided to marry a Gallician immigrant, known as “Idiot” for his communist and trade-union militancy, in the days when Machado assassinated labor leader Enrique Varona.

I thank those who have read me to the end. And those who continue giving their opinions.

See you soon.

Loly Estévez

January 22, 2007

Translated by Regina Anavy

A White Experience / Regina Coyula

On Wednesday the 23rd, as announced on Twitter, I dressed in white, bought some gladioli, and walked around the city. An unforgettable experience. As soon as I left my house, I stopped to greet a clueless friend who didn’t even notice my outfit, but two neighbors on the sidewalk in front did comment. Before I was “the Human Rights one,” and finally, “with the Ladies in White,” for my two neighbors it was a confirmation, they “didn’t see me” when they passed right by. This cloak of invisibility was a curious note on walking through the neighborhood where I’ve lived for 53 years.

At the bus stop I felt many eyes upon me, I felt very nervous and wanted to appear normal. Once in the bus, full as usual, a man of about 40 offered me a seat; I had to push my way through almost 6 feet of human material to get to it, but the man pointed me out above the rest of the people. When I got off there was a young girl in front of me, very pretty, with a portfolio of the kind that are used to carry laptops, she stopped me about 15 feet from the stop and asked if I was a Lady in White. I said no, and explained that I was dressed this way in honor of the anniversary of the death of Orlando Zapata. By her look I knew she didn’t know who I was talking about. I tore one of the blooms from my gladioli and put it in her hand, and while I closed her hand around it I reassured her saying it wasn’t witchcraft or anything bad, but to keep the flower and remember the date.

I continued my half-penitent walk, I was in a neighborhood where no one knew me, I hadn’t even told my husband what I was going to do, remembering at that time the stories about how they could arrest you and take you to a police station far from your house, all this without knowing that at Laura Pollan’s house there was a repudiation rally underway, closing off Neptuno Street from Belascoain to Infanta. I think if I had known my determination wouldn’t have been so firm. A Police patrol passed by my slowly, making my heart jump.

Talking that evening with the wives of Chepe and Biscet, founders of the Ladies in White, I told them what had happened, how just now, and in the smallest way, I could imagine what all those women felt. I remembered Blanquita, Raul Rivero’s wife, when Raul was in Canaleta prison, and she came to my house and cold hardly eat more than a piece of papaya or some juice, because the tension had upset her stomach.

On the way home I almost had a heart attack when a civilian car with two people stopped to ask me for directions. When I was in the bus, a woman offered to hold my bag and when I asked for it back to get off the woman handed it back saying, “God bless you, ma’am.” Once again Harry Potter’s cloak walking the familiar streets to my mom’s house and then to my house, exhausted. Very stressed, very afraid, and this is me whom many consider brave for writing without protection. The brave ones are the Ladies in White. No Carlos Serpa of the world could convince me to march for money.

February 28 2011

Protected Soap Opera / Yoani Sánchez

I run into a neighbor in the elevator, we exchange greetings, comments about the weather, questions about whether eggs have arrived at the corner shop. We are still on the sixth floor when, in the protected and momentary privacy of the cabin, she tells me that thanks to me she’s been able to watch a Colombian soap opera. I don’t understand. What relationship could there be between this skeptical blogger and the dramatic soap operas skilled in wrenching tears from people on the other side of the screen. But the woman insists. With four floors still to go before we reach the ground, I begin to think of the scripts of the old Félix B. Cañet.

The answer comes to me in the most unexpected way. As the elevator signals Floor 3, she tells me that her fear of the dark park — on one side of our building — was an obstacle to her going to a friend’s house every night to watch an episode of her soap opera, captured by an illegal satellite dish. But now, she said with gratitude, that strip of concrete and vegetation is guarded 24 hours a day. I look like I don’t understand, but she stresses that the Interior Ministry agents that surround my house have made the neighborhood safer. I would prefer to believe that those shadows I see from my balcony are the fantasies of someone who consumes too much fiction, but the woman returns to the charge. She won’t let me hide behind a smile, rather she wants to emphasize that she owes it to me that she can get to the other building safely.

I’m unexpectedly overcome by horror, someone just thanked me for being raw meat for the surveillance machinery, the target of guards. I’ve never seen a more lighthearted way of understanding repression, but I laugh with the neighbor, what else can I do?! Not wanting to seem distant, I ask her about the plot of the soap opera I have “helped” her to enjoy. She details it with delight. It’s a re-creation of the eighteenth century, with slaves on the run, matrons hiding their illegitimate children from their husbands, the sound of whips landing on backs, dark narrow paths guarded at night by overseers with dogs.

28 February 2011

Notes From Captivity X: The First Letter / Pablo Pacheco

Photo from Internet

As soon as I started writing I lost the will to continue doing so. But after various hours of trying, I managed to write:

“My love,

I still harbor close memories of all the joyful days together, unified by love and respect for one another. Without any warnings, life twists our destiny. It would be selfish of me if I hide the fact that I think of you in every instant: your scent, your feminine figure, and all your love which fills my existence. All these memories are present, despite the fact that you are not physically here with me. At times, I feel as I if I am delusional, but then I think of you and I once again feel like living.

Life goes by slowly here, but it marches on nonetheless. Out there, life goes on. You must be strong, and don’t become discouraged because of the situation we are going through. If you do, that would hurt you, and it will also hurt our child, and we can’t allow that. Now, while I’m in captivity, I trust even more in your strength, willpower, and dedication. Jimmy needs more of you than of me, and besides, those who try to play the role of God in our country will not allow me to participate much in our child’s life. My love, you must be mother, father, friend, sister, and the guiding light of our little one. And you will achieve it.

One day, what we are currently living through will be part of the past, and we must keep our convictions strong if we wish to succeed. This place is not the end of the world, and we must remember that no sacrifice in the name of Cuba is too much. We must keep in mind that, at any time, hate and intolerance can attempt to challenge our lives, for this is the price of freedom, but now we must confront this with honor and dignity.

You must try all that you can so that our son does not see you crying, for although he is very young, he will notice that your tears are for my absence, and this may very well affect him. He trusts in you as much as I do. Now that I mention this to you, I have remembered the last words I told the prosecutor during that trial held against me on my 33rd birthday, “All the children in the world, including your own if you have any, would wish to have the parents of Jimmy Pacheco Garcia.” Do you remember those words, my love? You were very brave. You did not shed a single tear in front of the henchmen, and you urged family members of other dissidents to take the same stand. I felt so much pride for you at that moment, so much that I momentarily forgot the fact that I had just been condemned to 26 years of imprisonment.

I can barely even see here. Like I told you during the visit, they do not allow light bulbs here in the cell. And I started writing this letter rather late, for I could not muster up the valor to do so sooner. And there you go, we men behave like this in situations such as this one. But do not worry too much. I will be fine, and most importantly, I will be thinking of you and of our Cuba. That’s the most important part. Take care of our son and seek God, for only in Him shall we find peace. Very soon, I will once again write to you. The young men who accompany me in this cell have asked me to give you their regards. Remember that I love you.

PS: From time to time, I entertain myself by playing chess in different cells. But for the most part, all I do is think of you and Jimmy. When you write back to me, please tell me about the latest news regarding our country and the world.”

That night, I stayed up late contemplating about human destinies. I concluded that the future was absolutely unpredictable. Suddenly, I felt that tears escaped from my eyes, and that nostalgia grew around my heart. The next morning I handed the re-educator, Ricardo, the letter. Ten days later, it had reached the hands of Oleivys.

Translated by Raul G.

28 February 2011

NOTE: Pablo Pacheco was one of the prisoners of Cuba’s Black Spring, and the initiator of the blog “Behind the Bars.” He now blogs from exile in Spain and his blog – Cuban Voices from Exile – is available in English translation here. To make sure readers find their way to his new blog, we will continue to post some of his articles here, particularly those relating his years in prison in Cuba.

You Lie to Make it Appear That They Lie / Reinaldo Escobar

The latest heroism publicized by State Security starred Agent Emilio who worked under cover as the independent journalist Carlos Serpa. One of the missions assigned to this soldier of the Revolution was to infiltrate the Ladies in White (not disguised as a woman) to try to get some information that would serve to discredit this group of relatives of the political prisoners. In his televised appearance he didn’t manage to show conclusive evidence to that effect.

What Agent Emilio did show was the daring and audacity with which he faced the camera as it filmed him lying to a radio station (Radio Martí). The purpose. To demonstrate to naive viewers that what independent journalist say is a lie, a matter “totally proven” because he was lying.

Operation “Flim-Flam Man” was a complete success.

28 February 2011

Scapegoats / Fernando Dámaso

Generally, on this piece of land and sea where I live, the cause of all problems that oppress us and make our existence a yogurt, is the embargo (officially known as the “blockade” although one word differs from the other) that the government of the United States has subjected us to for over fifty years. This cause, so often repeated, is taken for granted, and most of our foreign friends share it as do many members of the United Nations without question.

There is no doubt that the embargo hinders our trade and obtaining credits from the United States, as well as relationships of all kinds that should exist between neighboring countries. But it is inefficiency, demonstrated in all aspects, that is the principal cause of our long crisis.

Scapegoating and throwing blame around for all the disasters had been the daily practice. Victims of this practice have been hurricanes, rains, drought, cold, heat, epidemics, etc. There is always somebody or something responsible for the ongoing productivity and economic failures.

This dogmatic and erroneous position has prevented the necessary self-criticism as well as the acceptance of criticism and recognition of mistakes–always seeing in them the hidden hand of the enemy–which is necessary to begin to repair the wrongdoing, though it might have been done with the best intentions.

While they don’t assume responsibilities for the outrages committed, while they don’t accept that it’s because of their own will and inability, and then they continue to blame the empire and its employees, they will not advance a single inch toward real solutions to our problems.

27 February 2011

The High Cost of Death in Cuba / Iván García

Photo: Colon Cemetery in Havana

The crematorium located in the town of Guanabacoa is a clean building with an amiable and personalized treatment. Anabel, 49, has no complaints. The last wish of her mother, who died of a terminal cancer, was that they cremate her body.

But the crematorium price made Anabel jump like a spring. “A couple of years ago, when they incinerated my father, we paid 50 pesos (2 dollars). Now the service raised its price to 300 pesos (13 dollars), which seems excessive to me”.

The silent rise in prices of funeral services promises to grow. On an island where the rumors are more credible than the news published by the press, the possible announcement of the readiness of the State to collect for wakes — until now, gratis — are attracting strong comments.

In his zeal to make meticulous reductions in these awkward official subsidies, which according to its auditors are burdening the good function of the Cuban economy, President Raul Castro hopes to eliminate — all of a sudden — the ‘gratuities’, one of the flags flown 52 years ago by Fidel Castro’s revolution.

In that future designed by technocrats in olive green, we’ll say goodbye to the ration book and 1,300,000 workers will be laid off. Also, benefits subsidized by the State, like the movie theaters, sports events, and funeral services will have a price increase.

The clue was given by the independent journalist Moises Leonardo Rodri­guez in a note published in Cubanet. According to Rodri­guez, there would be a charge between 1,500 and 1,800 pesos (65 to 75 dollars) for funeral assistance.

That quantity of money is equivalent to seven times the minimum monthly salary of 225 pesos. Sources consulted in the Rivero Funeral Parlor, situated in the Vedado section of Havana, confirmed the news.

“Besides the caskets, they’ll charge for veils, lights, and they will rent out the chairs and armchairs. The hearse will also be more expensive”, the funeral home employees assured.

During the 60s, the Castro government, who by then had a populist argument in favor of the poor, intervened in funeral parlors and their services were presented for free.

Those were other times. The urgent needs to slow the fall of the fragile Cuban economy have provoked heavy-handed and Draconian measures, similar to shock therapies applied in capitalist societies.

The news from the independent journalist spread fast among Cubans with internet access. Elena, employed by a food manufacturer, commented that the State tourniquet to contain the hemorrhage of this crisis is too tight.

“In one year, it’s difficult to change the mentalities of people accustomed to living with their mouths open, waiting for the State to give you your pablum. The sudden elimination of numerous subsidies, besides bringing discontent, might transform itself into a spark that could set off open, massive protests. The cases of Egypt and Tunisia are an example”, Elena underlines.

Another big problem that’s been noticed is that the government makes no mention of a rise in salaries, which would compensate in part for the suppression of subsidies and dangerously shooting prices.

In a country where two currencies circulate, replete with material shortages and where the workers’ salaries are a joke, it is not only difficult now to confront the cost of living. Now death also has a high cost.

February 26 2011