English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Jesus still believes that he should not have to pay off a debt for enjoying foreign television. The restless Jesus Martinez approaches and asks them if they can help him. He was staring all over the place with his thick glasses while he whispered something about his grandmother being at the verge of a depression … Continue reading “Watching Foreign TV: A Decade of Debt / Laritza Diversent”
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”
I met Jose A. Triguero Mulet during a heated political debate. The nearly 70-year-old Mulet is a freedom-loving man. I’m writing this after he gave me an article he wrote about the humiliations he has lived through just for daring to scream the truth at the militants which rule my country. It was from those … Continue reading “Friends That Remain / Luis Felipe Rojas”
At dawn on March 18 I was kidnapped along with Aimé Cabrales Aguilar at the corner of Calzada de Infanta and San Tomas a few meters from my house and on a public street, from a bus with a veneer of tourism in which women in the uniform of the National Revolutionary Police (PNR) came, … Continue reading “History of a Kidnapping / Katia Sonia”
It’s beautiful to sit in front of the TV and contemplate the end of the Revolution. “Cuba’s Reasons,” they call it on Monday nights, this material clearly anonymous. My blog, which appeared for the first time on the small screen, is also called Monday. Post-Revolution Mondays. A slightly obsolete title. The Revolution is no longer … Continue reading “WEBDITORIAL / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
Punta Brava, La Habana After several weeks of communication and interaction with the different segments of Cuban Civil Society, the Neighborhood Spokespeople decided to call a working meeting Saturday morning, with the aim of analyzing and evaluating the results of the first stage of the proposed modification of the current Electoral Law. Through admirable effort, … Continue reading “Neighborhood Voices Discuss Strategies / Silvio Benítez Márquez”
Josefa, 67, retired, never imagined that sugar, always one of the cheapest products there was in Cuba, could reach such high prices. When she went to the market, she saw at the counter the notice of unrationed sale: 8 pesos for a pound of white — or refined — sugar ($0.40 U.S.) and 6 pesos … Continue reading “Bitter Sugar / Iván García”
The massive layoffs so frequently announced by the Cuban nomenclature have not yet been implemented, but we can already see some of the first effects. Despite the initial impulse of those who have seen an incentive, escape, or “breath of oxygen” in this, others have decided to “take justice into their own hands”. The absence … Continue reading “The Inflamed Nation / Luis Felipe Rojas”
Each day in Havana a new fast food joint appears, or a pirate CD stall, or a place that sells religious objects. These are three businesses that proliferate in the city during this spring-like month of February. But they are not the only ones. Signs both rustic and well-designed advertise appliance mechanics, shoe repairers, seamstresses, … Continue reading ““Paladares” in Havana Pose a Threat to State Restaurants / Iván García”
Photos: Francis Sánchez My watch was still running slow, probably because I needed to change the battery, so I went looking for a watchmakers when, about to turn a corner, I noticed that I was passing in front of a sort of bunkhouse, tenement block or similar poor dwelling. I remembered that there, years ago, … Continue reading “Lead Us Not Into Temptation / Francis Sánchez”
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”
A hustle and bustle filled the air as the ringing of the “wake up” bells resonated throughout the prison. The scene was similar to that of a rooster fight, right at the most exciting moment of the battle. For a second, I could have sworn I was in a dream and that all of these … Continue reading “First Days in Prison / Pablo Pacheco”
TO BE MYOPIC IS TO MAKE MOVIES Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo The eyes, curved, the orbits exorbitant. The image of the world becomes amorphous and much more brimming over. A film should be shot entirely like this, from the vision of the illuminated. For instance, from the perspective of a child that suffers from overlight. … Continue reading “CUBAN MYOPICMATOGRAPHY / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
The snack bar on 13th between F and G — that afternoon on December — is full of security agents and admirers. The first are the ones who follow this restless blogger, like a tragicomic troupe that dances around my body, my house; the second pursued the radiant face of the actress Julia Stiles, with … Continue reading “Julia and Me, An Embrace is Possible / Yoani Sánchez”
HOWLABANA (Allen Ginsberg howls back in La Habana) Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo [Performed in La Madriguera (Finca de Los Molinos), at 9 PM in Friday 18 September 2009, as a part of the poetry reading of Mundo Beatnik/Hippie.] I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through … Continue reading “UNLIMITED READINGS / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”