English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
She’s 49 with skin tanned by the sun, she’s called Penny Palfrey and this weekend she tried to swim the roughly 103 miles between Cuba and the United States. She left Havana at 7:00 in the morning on Friday and by 9:00 AM on Saturday she had covered close to half the distance, about 50 … Continue reading “Swim Stroke Diplomacy: Penny Palfrey Tried to Swim from Havana to Key West / Yoani Sánchez”
The Interests Section of Cuba in Washington D.C. has called the first National Meeting of Cuban Residents in the United States of America for April 28, which will involve a representation of Cubans who are “linked to their country in a respectful manner, aware of the urgency to defend its sovereignty and national identity.” This … Continue reading “Opening to the Diaspora / Dimas Castellanos”
The contractions of the womb “favored” María del Carmen Peña with her birth on January 1, 1959, the same day the guerrillas led by Fidel Castro came to power. I met her in seventh grade and we studied together through the tenth. Her classmates and teachers knew that every year all those born on that … Continue reading “From My Archive / Rosa María Rodríguez Torrado”
The contractions of the womb “favored” María del Carmen Peña with her birth on January 1, 1959, the same day the guerrillas led by Fidel Castro came to power. I met her in seventh grade and we studied together through the tenth. Her classmates and teachers knew that every year all those born on that … Continue reading “From My Archive”
For fifty years the Cuban government, scripted by Fidel Castro, has decided to convert Cubans into heroes or traitors, according to its own convenience. All those who left during the Mariel Boatlift were “scum and worms,” notwithstanding that they had committed no crimes or were doctors or engineers. When General Del Pino took a small … Continue reading “In Cuba You’re an Agent or a Criminal / Angel Santiesteban”
What Jimmy Carter can’t change in Cuba Thirty years after he left the White House and nine years since his only previous visit to Cuba, Jimmy Carter arrived in Havana last week, wearing the white guayabera that would serve as his uniform during a three-day visit to our island. Watching on television, I recalled how … Continue reading “Yoani’s Op-Ed in the Washington Post / Yoani Sánchez”
JJ – Zenaida Gonzalez Cuétara is a Cuban worker, proud of her origin. She was of those people who, on a not too hot day in 1980, decided to take refuge in guarded premises of the Embassy of Peru. ZG – I lived at O’Reilly and Aguiar, Centro Habana, until April 5, 1980 when I … Continue reading “The Peruvian Embassy 1980 / Juan Juan Almeida”
Recently, a friend and regular reader of our blog made a comment about a very controversial post in which he argued that the Mariel migration was triggered by the fact that “two Cubans launched a bus against an embassy in Havana.” In effect, that action was the public and visible event, but in any case, … Continue reading “Short Trip Down Memory Lane / Miriam Celaya”
1 – Yesenia Álvarez, young intelligent, successful….strange combination. Tell me about yourself, this organization over which you preside, your professional and family education, and when and why you had this passion for Cuba. If in our countries we let our talents flourish in freedom we would not talk about a strange combination. I am sure … Continue reading “A Story from Peru / Juan Juan Almeida”
Text: Boris González Arenas Photo: Leandro Feal See, see how from the ground rising magnificent in flight searching the air of Cuba. “One Palm” Luis R. Nogueras We don’t play with freedom. We spend our whole lives thinking about the danger of losing it, that once it is lost it is impossible to rescue it. … Continue reading “Searching the Air of Cuba / Claudia Cadelo”
On December 10, Human Rights Day, my 15-year-old son came home from school and said he had been summoned to go to park centrally located in Havana, exactly the same place where, each year, a group of dissidents and non-conformists demonstrate for improvements for Cuba’s citizens and political prisoners. The students of all the high … Continue reading “Cuban Regime Calls on its Children for Shock Troops / Yoani Sánchez”
He received me on Monday in a quiet apartment in Mantilla from where he has written almost all his work. On a polished table he put cold water and strong coffee for both of us. He lit a cigarette whose smoke, luckily, chose as its victim the bust of Cervantes resting on a nearby sideboard. … Continue reading “The Novel of So Many Lives”
It was Fidel Castro who, in one of his his typical vitriolic outbursts, during a speech on January 2, 1961 (in what was then the Civic Plaza, today Revolution Plaza), applied the epithet “worms” to those Cubans who dared to criticize his olive green revolution or who decided to leave their homeland. That day he … Continue reading “Good Worms and Bad Worms”
“I wanted this story to be told because in places like Spain and other countries in Europe they think that Cuba is an ideal country” EFE (via 14ymedio), Hugo Barcia, Miami, 8 August 2025 — Illustrator Edel Rodríguez, known for his covers of Time, The New York Times and Der Spiegel magazines, is used to … Continue reading “‘La Libertad Es Un Verbo’ (Freedom Is a Verb), an Intimate Look at the Art of Cuban Artist Edel Rodríguez, Now Launching”
The Catholic hierarchy has lost the moral authority it had before the Revolution and in the years that followed. 14ymedio, Juan Izquierdo, Havana, 21 December 2024 — The Christmas message published this Thursday by the Cuban Episcopal Conference gives an indication of how much the tone has been lowered when it comes to questioning the … Continue reading “Faced With the Terrible Crisis That the Country Is Suffering, Cuban Bishops Choose Silence”
