English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
This post is from Raul Garcia Jr.’s blog, Pedazos de la Isla. Translating Cuba’s Dissident Voices Mary Jo Porter is an American who lives in Seattle. When she wakes up each day, she works as a transportation consultant. In the moments she is not working, she focuses her energies and talents on providing an enormous … Continue reading “Translating Cuba and HemosOido.com: How Did it Happen?”
Chapter 3: Dissident Muralist* The procedure was simple. Very simple. You looked for a piece of cardboard and painted it with a phrase against the Government. You hung it around your neck and went out into the street. Like in the reality shows where a naked man comes out into the light of day starkers, … Continue reading “Instructions for an Escape / Ernesto Morales Licea”
[I have decided to publish, before this blog is closed down, some texts that I didn’t publish at the time because it was practically impossible to do it because of obvious difficulties or because as time passed I doubted that it would be the best idea. Due to recent events, I think it is best … Continue reading “Closed by Demolition / Francis Sánchez”
Photo: Luis Felipe Rojas The automobile pretentiously came to a stop and interposed itself in front of the four individuals dressed in civilian clothing. Suddenly, two more vehicles arrived and took away one woman and a man. Nobody protested, everyone was astonished by the arrest. Those being detained screamed slogans against the government, but no … Continue reading “One Day They Will Not Return / Luis Felipe Rojas”
The government extended authorizations to contract workers, a decision which violates the Constitution and which no tribunal can question. Laritza Diversent The Council of Ministers agreed to extend the authorization to hire workers in the 178 authorized activities of self employment. The measure was announced by the Granma Newspaper, the official voice of the Communist … Continue reading “Cuban State Remains Silent About Unconstitutional Measures / Laritza Diversent”
Photo: Luis Felipe Rojas The automobile pretentiously came to a stop and interposed itself in front of the four individuals dressed in civilian clothing. Suddenly, two more vehicles arrived and took away one woman and a man. Nobody protested, everyone was astonished by the arrest. Those being detained screamed slogans against the government, but no … Continue reading “One Day, They Will Not Return / Luis Felipe Rojas”
Voces 8 28 May 2011
The habaneros were screaming for it. After 9 months of a fierce drought, where water-laden clouds kept moving around the city, and the dams and reservoirs had gone to code red, the rain appeared. Now, when the month of May leaves us, the longed-for spring showers made themselves present. Children and teens in shorts, barefoot … Continue reading “Rain Has Arrived in Havana / Iván García”
From their literary Mount Olympus, where they had already given the world their tremendous fiction, Borges, Monterrose, Quiroga, Bukowski, wrote Decalogues for young writers. Decalogues and, perhaps, subtle warnings. Others, not content with brevity, took it more seriously; Rainer Maria Rilke published his “Letters of a Young Poet,” and Mario Vargas Llosa, balancing genders, his … Continue reading “Decalogue for a Cuban Blogger / Ernesto Morales Licea”
I saw him before me, for the first time, in a television studio in Miami. He had been invited to debate an incident in which he had been a protagonist: A billboard, in an anti-Castro city par excellence, that for twenty-four hours spoke out on behalf of the five Cuban members of the “Wasp Network” … Continue reading “Among Dissidents: My Interview with Max Lesnik (I) / Ernesto Morales Licea”
Written by: Wilfredo Vallín Almeida The case opened one afternoon, when two women, one, the wife and the other who turned out to be the sister, of the Cuban living in Florida detained for many months for the crime of trafficking in persons, came to see me in my house. The crime is one of … Continue reading “Let Justice Be Done / Yamil Domínguez”
Miguel, married and with three children, used to work as a cook in a State enterprise. He would get up at three in the morning and undertake a trip of more than 12 kilometers and arrive early to work. He paid union dues and on two occasions was chosen ‘vanguard worker’. But his salary didn’t … Continue reading “Many Cubans Steal to Survive / Laritza Diversent”
“He who does not know is the same as he who does not see,” affirms Teofilo Roberto Lopez Licor, victim of an arbitrary government scam. Today, after he and his family were stripped of all their goods, he learned that he should not ever trust in the benevolence of the law, much less if it … Continue reading “The Law and the Trap / Laritza Diversent”
With seventy-five years on his back Leslie Chan never imagined he would take his bones to a police station. Barely a week ago he was sitting on a public bench waiting for some friends to have a little chat as he does every morning since he’s been retired, but a police officer interrupted the day. … Continue reading “A Civic Gesture / Luis Felipe Rojas”
Enemy Campaigns and The Politics of Confrontation with Counterrevolutionary Groups Download a PDF of this transcript here. La ciber policia en Cuba from Coral Negro on Vimeo. Presenter: Eduardo Fontes Suárez Introduction The title more or less says it all, we can adjust [the talk to meet] your interests, comrades, when it’s time for discussion. … Continue reading “MININT Cyber Lecture Video – English Transcript”