English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Just a few hours ago a shocking even took place in my semi-wintry Bayamo: at approximately seven at night this Wednesday, December 22, a young man of 34, Alexander Otero Rodriguez, appeared at a central corner of the city, accompanied by his wife, Aliuska Noguer Tornés, 18, along with their baby, born 48 days ago. … Continue reading “One Family, One Tragedy / Ernesto Morales Licea”
People on the street in Cuba look sideways at the recent reforms designed for the impoverished national economy. Few are counting on these changes put forward by president Raúl Castro. They don’t believe they will make the country function more efficiently. They know what a group of Cubans think. In a survey of 48 persons … Continue reading “Economic Reforms: More Questions than Answers / Iván García”
On the overcast morning of September 28, the historic leader was in his favourite environment. Public events. The adulation of the masses. His natural state. It is in big gatherings where Castro has given speeches of up to 14 hours, true Guinness records, and where he whipped them up into a state of delirium. The … Continue reading “Fidel Castro in his Element after Half a Century / Iván García”
In 2003, 75 Cubans were arrested in four days. Their crime? Being pro-democracy political activists, fighters for human rights, or simply journalists independent of the hegemonic line of the only Cuban political party, the Communists. Pedro Argüelles Morán was one of them. Seven years later — in the same arbitrary way as the imprisonments — … Continue reading “Journalism as a Living Faith: Telephone Interview with Pedro Argüelles Morán #liberanlosya / Claudia Cadelo”
A couple of days ago I was walking with a friend to my daughter’s house and a cop car stopped us and asked for our IDs. Dog-faced like the usual Cuban police. They frisked us on the public street like common thieves. They wanted me to open an envelope with some magazines a Brazilian friend … Continue reading “I Don’t Even Have a Television and for the Police I am A Subject With A High Standard of Living / Iván García”
The festivities of September 28 are almost here, the fiesta for the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution. The carnival begins. My block, the only one who cleans is Joseito, an employee of Aurora (the State agency for street cleaning), and some other neighbors clean their gardens and in front of their houses from … Continue reading “Carnivals in September? / Rebeca Monzo”
Two signs about 30 inches wide by six feet long were displayed by state officials in many offices and shopping centers in Havana and in other cities in Cuba. They both have the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) logo. One says: “Caring for the neighborhood, vigilant and united”; and the other says, … Continue reading “The Idiots’ Dinner / Miguel Iturria Savón”
PULL YOUR GROUND WIRE Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo Once again, like every few months, they were in the neighborhood collecting cables. Lawton dawned shifting into reverse. Vans from the telephone company, ETECSA, or the Ministry of the Interior (MINIT) or both. Cooperation from the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR) along with the … Continue reading “EATING THE CABLE / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan I’ve been left a little traumatized after the celebrations of the CDR. Between the discussion on the bus, my neighbors’ Sunday volunteer work, and the reggaeton on the 28th until 1:00 in the morning; right now I feel a sense of “been there, done that… and never again would be too … Continue reading “Spontaneous / Claudia Cadelo”
An image that threatens to multiply. Photograph by Orlando Luis Despite the apparent ease with which life goes on, the magma is rising from the bottom and nobody can predict how events that will put an end to the Cuban dictatorship will unleash. Just in the last few days, events have accrued which, directly or … Continue reading “Possible Utopia (II) / Miriam Celaya”
Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan The line for the bus at Coppelia is a special place, one of the corners so eloquent that if it disappeared one day Havana wouldn’t be the same. Yesterday at ten at night I was waiting for my P4 bus when a woman standing next to me with her daughter commented … Continue reading “Subtleties of the Jaw / Claudia Cadelo”
Photography by Orlando Luis In the last few weeks, one topic has become the focus of comments and expectations: the announced increase in self-employed persons, mainly from the massive layoffs that will literally leave half a million state employees out on the street in just one quarter. Speculation grows, while the case is being cooked … Continue reading “Possible Utopia (I) / Miriam Celaya”
At age nine, a fall from a considerable height would give a resounding twist to his life. It would prevent him from ever walking again. He had to endure endless surgeries, which turned his adolescence into a cruel and painful time. Despite all this, perhaps the God whom he invokes so frequently rewarded him with … Continue reading “Practical Instructions for Creating an Enemy / Ernesto Morales Licea”
On Monday, September 13th, in an unusual statement issued by the Cuban Workers Organization (the CTC), it was announced that half a million Cubans will lose their jobs in the coming months. The amazing thing is not the wave of layoffs in itself, (for a while, it has been rumored that about one million in … Continue reading “Anti-Unionism: Another Revolutionary Feat / Miriam Celaya”
There are certain Cuban laws that, from the looks if it, have a quality as native as it is original. A peculiarity so ours, it even takes us back to the rebel periods, when it was necessary to send subversive messages in absolute confidentiality. It is all about the laws that seem to have been … Continue reading “Laws in Lemon Juice”
