English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Ivan Garcia, 19 December 2016 — According to Luisa, 76, a former prostitute, the first time she collected money for sex, she bathed herself three times trying to remove the smell of an old man who sweated over her body. “I was once young and pretty. The dawn that Batista fled from Cuba, I was in bed … Continue reading “What Fidel Castro Left Us (Part 2) / Iván García”
14ymedio, Zunilda Mata, 17 November 2016 — Discriminated against for decades, Cuba’s Jehovah’s Witnesses just opened an employment agency that focuses on the “honesty and decency” of its people. The database “is an opportunity to advertise the skills that the brothers have in different professions and trades,” says Tamara Sanchez, one of the managers. As a “private … Continue reading ““Serious And Decent Worker Seeking Employment” / 14ymedio, Zunilda Mata”
Commentary by Carmen Zampallo in the forum of the article “Martí and his Myth,” by José Gabriel Barrenechea, published at 14:30m on the 17 May 2015. Thanks, Carmen, wherever you may be! Where are you Martí? What have you become? In your name have been created tyranny, torture camps, and forced labor. Yes, Marti, we … Continue reading “Jose Marti, Tell the Tyrant… / Jeovany Jimenez Vega”
Juan Juan Almeida, La Voz del Morro, August 15, 2006 — Humans eat meat; cattle feed on forage and in their own way find the nutrients in the soil populated by worms, which probably eat other bugs that I don’t know about; but I’m sure they occupy a major place on the food chain that … Continue reading “Fidel Castro: Ignoring Him is the Best Punishment / Juan Juan Almeida”
Ivan Garcia, 30 June 2016 — “Beyoncé” — that’s what she likes to be called — prostitutes herself for less than two dollars on the outskirts of the old bus stop of Víbora, 30 minutes by car from the center of Havana. By day she’s an “emerging teacher” in a secondary school, that is one … Continue reading “Cuban Homosexuals: Excluded From The Army And Taboo In The Dissidence / Iván García”
14ymedio, Miami, 28 March 2016 – This Sunday of the Resurrection hundreds of individuals attended Mass who, the previous Friday, had sung along with their Satanic Majesties in Havana’s Sports City. From Jesus to the Rolling Stones, Cubans want to breathe beyond the narrow limits of the political system and they do it through music, faith, … Continue reading “Easter in Cuba: Death and Resurrection of the Individual / 14ymedio, Mario Penton”
14ymedio, Zunilda Mata, Havana, 19 March 2016 – From the wall of his room hangs an American flag and on his computer screen the wallpaper is the image of Uncle Sam pointing his finger. Maurice is 30 and since he was young he was raised under the strictest anti-imperialism, but today he displays a great … Continue reading “From Yankees to Yumas*, Cuba’s Love-Hate for the United States / 14ymedio, Zunilda Mata”
In the 1960s, close to 30,000 young men were detained in forced-labor camps. The mistreatments that took place in these camps, known as Military Units to Aid Production UMAP, in the name of “social hygiene,” testify to the homophobic component of the Cuban Revolution. Abel Sierra Madero, From Letras Libras, January 2016 — Between 1965 … Continue reading “Academies To Produce Macho-Men In Cuba / Abel Sierra Madero”
Somos +, Frank Rojas, 26 January 2016 — My history is like that of most Cubans born during the Revolutionary period. My generation grew up with our lives administered by others, carrying ration cards and bearing witness to those great moments that marked the lives of millions of us. The Mariel Boatlift, the ridiculous and extreme … Continue reading “My History / Somos+, Frank Rojas”
Cubanet, Luis Cino Álvarez, Havana, 11 January 2016 — I am a resentful person. I have to admit that, at least in this regard, the officials from State Security are correct, they who have condemned me as such during multiple, more or less menacing, interrogations throughout the past almost-20 years. I am full of resentment … Continue reading “Forgive the Castro Regime? Never! / Cubanet, Luis Cino Alvarez”
Wendy Guerra, Havana, 9 January 2016 (from El Nuevo Herald) – It wasn’t hard to know the number of my friends who, during their childhoods, remained with their parents in special situations, parents who needed to hide who they were to survive in a country that, based on accusations, ceased to be one, but turned … Continue reading “Naming the Wounds / Wendy Guerra”
Jeovany Jimenez Vega, 4 November 2015 — The recent termination of Juan Carlos Cremata as a theater director, the previous suspension of “The King is Dying,” his last work on the stage of the Theater Center, and the publication online some days ago of an inflamed letter from the prestigious critic, Enrique Colina, motivated by this … Continue reading “Censorship, the Vital Artery of the Cuban Regime / Jeovany Jimenez Vega”
Cubans will continue to leave for places where they believe God has placed his hand beyond the intervention of his Holiness Cubanet, Miriam Celaya, Havana, 7 July 2015 — It’s been 17 years since a head of Vatican State visited the Island for the first time. John Paul II arrived in Cuba in 1998, preceded … Continue reading “Cuba and the Vatican: the Miracle that Never Arrives / Miriam Celaya”
14ymedio, Fernando Dámaso, Havana, May 17 2015 – The Cuban government, since it seized power on January 1959, has maintained an authoritarian and exclusive approach to politics. Patriots, Cubans and citizens are considerations that have only been extended to those who unconditionally support the establishment. Those who do not or who simply criticize it are … Continue reading “Exclusion as a policy / 14ymedio, Fernando Damaso”
Authored by Angel’s Editor, 4 April 2015 — But you are not one of those worthy men who serve a prison sentence in Cuba for raising his voice against the abuses of the dictator. You are a prisoner of conscience, because your conscience is not free; it is a slave to the designs that Raúl … Continue reading “Cardinal Ortega: You Are a Prisoner of Conscience”
