English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Fernando Damaso, 2 December 2015 — Once again we residents of Nuevo Vedado have had to suffer the incompetence and irresponsibility of the “Tree Destruction Brigade” from the Electric Company. Without the least knowledge of what it means, they “prune” them, leaving just a trunk with two or three branches that look more like arms … Continue reading “A Deplorable Example / Fernando Damaso”
Today we publish the first part of the testimony of a Cuban who has made the dangerous trip from Guatemala to the United States 14ymedio, Mario J. Penton Martinez, Guatamalan/Mexican Border, 13 November 2015 – I live proud of being Cuban. I always have been. Cuba evokes the warmth of a mother’s lap, the tenderness of … Continue reading “Chronicle of a ‘Rafter’ on Foot (Part 1 of 3) / 14ymedio, Mario Penton Martinez”
14ymedio, 22 May 2015 — I am a Cuban of Spanish descent. I was born in Havana exactly fourteen years after Franco’s death, ten years after the Spanish Constitution of 1978 was ratified, and one year before the fall of the Berlin Wall. My grandparents, most of them from the Spain’s Galicia region, could be … Continue reading “Letter from a Cuban-Spaniard to Pablo Iglesias / 14ymedio”
Ivan Garcia, 29 April 2015 — The urology ward at Calixto Garcia Hospital is a bleak scene. Patients in soiled pajamas wander through the halls like zombies with serum on their hands, in search of a urologist, who hasn’t come through the intake room all morning. Ubaldo, sitting on a granite bench outside the room, … Continue reading “Cuba Needs More Doctors and Better Hospitals / Ivan Garcia”
Now that the beginning of the VII Summit of the Americas in Panama is upon us I think I understand why there are so many expectations. I studied in the former USSR and I know that many optimists are living in a sort of suspense similar to that of Moscow in 1985, when Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan … Continue reading “Cuba: Dreams and realities before and after the Summit of the Americas / Juan Juan Almeida”
They are referred to as old folks, half-timers and the pure. They are shipwreck victims of a capsized island. They cling to debris, trying to stay afloat. Cubanet, Camilo Ernesto Olivera Peidro, Havana, February 27, 2015 — Men and women in Cuba who have reached the age of forty are referred to as tembas (old folks), medios tiempos (half-timers) and los puros … Continue reading “Being Forty Years Old in Cuba / Cubanet, Camilo Ernesto Olivera”
Cubanet, Tania Díaz Castro, Havana, February 19, 2015 — Homosexuality has been around longer than humans have been walking upright. But Fidel Casto — working through State Security, an organization he founded and of which he has always been in charge — has done everything possible to banish it from Cuban soil. He once looked … Continue reading “Mariela Castro’s Eloquent Silence / Cubanet, Tania Diaz Castro”
1994 was an amazing year. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the disappearance of the USSR had been the trigger for the beginning in Cuba of the “Special Period in Times of Peace,” an economic crisis which lasted for 25 years. We returned to a subsistence economy. The factories shut down as they had … Continue reading “The Day the People of Havana Protested in the Streets / Ivan Garcia”
Nuria retired last year and this month she traveled to Miami, where her sisters live. On returning to the Island she showed 14ymedio what she brought home in her suitcase. Let’s take a look at what she threw in her bags with brief comments from her about why she chose each product. Two bottle of … Continue reading “What Does a Cuban Bring Home in Her Suitcase? / 14ymedio”
1994 was an amazing year. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the disappearance of the USSR had been the trigger for the beginning in Cuba of the “Special Period in Times of Peace,” an economic crisis which lasted for 25 years. We returned to a subsistence economy. The factories shut down as they had … Continue reading “The Day the People of Havana Protested in the Streets / Ivan Garcia”
Artwork by Rebeca An article by a young Cuban journalist was just published in the so-called youth newspaper under the arresting title “The Happiest Children in the World.” In it she recalls her childhood of aged, half-bald dolls previously belonging to her older sisters, toys given to her by a neighbor after he was too old to … Continue reading “A Hilarious Conclusion / Fernando Damaso”
“If the media stops talking, let the streets talk” In one way or another, Cuba is taking note of the street protests occurring these days in Venezuela. The most nervous are the olive-green autocrats. According to a low-level party official, since the death of Hugo Chávez on 5 March 2013, the regime has had various … Continue reading “What Is Happening in Venezuela Worries Cuba / Ivan Garcia”
One way or another, the street protests taking place recently in Venezuela are being noticed in Cuba. The most nervous are the olive green autocrats. According to a low-ranking party official, since the death of Hugo Chavez, the regime has had several contingency plans in its drawer, in case the situation in Venezuela were not … Continue reading “Opposition Protests in Venezuela Worry Not A Few Ordinary Cubans / Ivan Garcia”
SANTA CLARA, Cuba – The demonstrations by students and opponents of President Nicolas Maduro in Venezuela are the news of the moment. Countless media worldwide are focused on the events. The web is full of videos, images, writing. We Cubans are not unexposed to this; although we only see and hear what the censored media … Continue reading “Concerned in Villa Clara About What Is Happening in Venezuela / Alex Reinaldo Perez”
Overwhelmed by the flood of information about Venezuela, we Cubans are hanging on everything that’s happening. We tune in to shortwave radio stations, try to find something moderately objective on the Internet, listen to what someone who has a relative on a “mission” there says, and try to catch on the fly some detail that … Continue reading “Caracas, Damn! / Reinaldo Escobar”
