English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
WHY ISN’T LAGE LAUGHING? Carlos Lage isn’t laughing because it would be cruel to ask a man condemned to death (when the picture was taken he only had months left in his high position). Although he was at the beginning, of course, in those decades when he traveled in camouflage on a military plane. … Continue reading “Communism of Laughter and Forgetting / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
Open letter from the General Surgery Department of the “Calixto Garcia” Hospital to the First Secretary of the Cuban Communist Party and President of the Councils of State and Ministers, Army General Raul Castro Ruz To be good is the only way to be happy. To be cultured is the only way to be free. … Continue reading “Cuba Surgeons Write to Raul Castro About Disastrous Health Care System”
In Cuba there is the habit of arranging or accommodating things so as to keep up appearances, while the reality and the truth remains behind the curtain. So it usually happens in businesses, offices, agencies and ministries. Lying is so natural and inventing figures and adulterating statistics so common, that we can now say that … Continue reading “Pope Benedict Didn’t Look Behind the Scenes / Yoaxis Marcheco Suárez”
Will a change bring us democracy? Change is a process, although some people don’t even see a leaf move. But where that change will take us is unknown, and when I see our General-President visiting Vietnam, China and Russia, I feel an involuntary shudder. The only thing left of socialist Asians is the name. There’s … Continue reading “Post-Castro Democracy? / Regina Coyula”
The caravans for Cuba, which are organized annually by the so-called Pastors for Peace, force one to think. In the one held this year (the 22nd), which already crossed the border between Canada and the United States, they orchestrated the usual media show with allegorical posters to the blockade (in reality an embargo) and the … Continue reading “Pastors For What? / Fernando Dámaso”
by Ernesto Santana Zaldívar HAVANA, Cuba, June, www.cubanet.org – In the ’90s, the generation of the Novísimos (the Newest) brought to Cuban literature themes and narrative forms that marked a certain rupture with the previous generations. Angel Santiesteban, born in 1966, became one of the most emblematic creators of this time, not only for the … Continue reading “Now I feel more free in my conscience: Interview with the writer Ángel Santiesteban / Ángel Santiesteban”
When Leandro was born, back in 1930, there was no television. Of course, there was no Internet, computers or mobile phones either. The radio and the movies were no longer silent, and newspapers used to have many pages. Leandro still remembers when at age 13 in San Antonio de los Baños, he saw two planes … Continue reading “Portrait of a Revolutionary Old Man / Iván García”
Photos by Rebeca It is right and necessary to fight against urban planning and other crimes, and to try to create a bit of order in society after so many years of barbarities. It seems as if the attention is focused on citizens who built precarious garages in the common areas of multifamily buildings, closed … Continue reading “Urban Planning Crimes: Who Started Them? / Fernando Dámaso”
Citizens who have opted for self-employment in both rural and urban areas, in addition to the problems of a start-up, have had to face the plague of State inspectors (Comprehensive Monitoring, it is called) which, like a sword of Damocles, is constantly hanging over their heads, threatening to take away the land given in usufruct … Continue reading “Inspectors: The New Plague / Fernando Dámaso”
It is possible that the maximum leader of the Catholic Church doesn’t know that when he officiates at the public mass in Civic Plaza* in Havana on March 28, he will not only be offering his blessing to the people of Cuba, but also sealing the first act of Revolutionary Reaffirmation called by the Cuban … Continue reading “Mass of Revolutionary Reaffirmation / Miriam Celaya”
From her basilica in El Cobre, she watches us so we can be bathed in the love that she radiates. Three boats carried the Spanish conquistadors to the New World. One of them – the flagship named Santa Maria – never returned to the Old World, it was destroyed on the island La Española. So … Continue reading “The Cubans’ Virgin / Wendy Iriepa and Ignacio Estrada”
Once again, State Security uses the old tactic of trying to discredit, given its inability to come to a public debate of arguments and ideas. A debate that would have a long-awaited end, because absolutely nobody can hide the ruin they have brought to the Cuban nation. They razed it and follow by trying to … Continue reading “Who Are the Real Anti-Cubans? / Estado de Sats, Antonio G. Rodiles”
History is a succession of events, first experienced, and then interpreted by men, a peculiarity that impregnates them with a certain subjective component. The difference between those two moments — the experience and the interpretation — is one in which objective events happening at a concrete moment can suffer various explications over time, depending on … Continue reading “The Pact of Zanjon’ A Political Event / Dimas Castellano”
Military ranks, stars, distinctions of greater and lesser importance: decorations that recall past glories. Along with the books sold in the Plaza Vieja — and the tourist postcards of Che’s face — we have the largest market in medals in the whole country. If in East Germany the wall fell and, afterwards, the commerce in … Continue reading “Medals for Sale / Yoani Sánchez”
Text of Article: Dario Delgado Cura Attorney General of the Republic Reflecting on the phenomenon of corruption in Cuba is not just an academic exercise, but also an important and unavoidable responsibility, given the proved consequences on the moral, economic and social order it generates, and considering that it is a phenomenon produced in any … Continue reading “Broken Windows / Regina Coyula”
