English Translations of Cubans Writing From the Island
Useful advice for tourists who visit the last Communist barricade of the Cold War in the Caribbean If you speak Spanish, it’s advisable to get to know Havana by taking private taxis. In a rented car, air-conditioned and with a map of the capital, it’s more pleasurable, but also more expensive, and you wouldn’t be … Continue reading “Havana: A Guide for Tourists / Ivan Garcia”
HAVANA, Cuba- Some years ago the American sociologist George Ritzer adopted the perspective of the “McDonaldization of society.” Within this, and thinking of the Disney parks, he coined the term, “McDonaldization of tourism.” It would be interesting to know Ritzer’s opinion about the great theme park that Cuban has been turned into. Or the several … Continue reading “Havana: Castro-McDisney Theme Park / Luis Cino Alvarez”
HAVANA, Cuba, Dec. 6, 2013, Michel Iroy Rodríguez Ruiz / www.cubanet.org.- In recent weeks, several independent journalists and opposition have been victims of kidnappings, assaults and theft. Many blame this on State Security. On 7 November, between eight and eight-thirty in the evening, Mario José Delgado González, correspondent of the Social Agency of Independent Journalists … Continue reading “Strange Coincidence of Attacks Against Regime Opponents and Independent Journalists / Michel Iroy Rodriguez Ruiz”
Laura is a Cuban woman who has lived in Spain for more than twenty years. She speaks like a Spaniard. She looks like a Spaniard. Her husband, children and grandchildren are Spaniards. But in spite of the passage of time and the distance separating us, she still considers me her best friend. Or so she … Continue reading “Through Havana with Laura / Tania Diaz Castro”
In any country, the acquisition of a car, whether new or used, usually represents a reason for the new owner’s satisfaction. In Cuba, if acquiring a vehicle demands overcoming numerous obstacles, keeping it functioning requires overcoming many more. In the first place, new cars can only be gotten if the State grants the right, generally … Continue reading “To Have or Not To Have a Car / Fernando Damaso”
Faced with the debacle of urban transport, the Government will implement an emergency plan that includes the use of bicycles as an alternative for personal mobility, a measure that dusts off the bloody years of the “Special Period.” In the Council of Ministers meeting held on Saturday June 29 in the MINFAR (Ministry of the … Continue reading “The Era Is Giving Birth to a Bicycle / Pablo Pascual Mendez Pina”
Comments on the recent speech by General-President Raul Castro can be heard in a pharmacy line as well as in an almendrón.* People in general are pleased that the country’s top leadership is finally acknowledging the presence of the invasive social weed that until now seems to have been growing unnoticed. Cubans, with our ability to adapt … Continue reading “Why Not Just Dissolve the CDR? / Regina Coyula”
Diez de Octubre Street This past Tuesday June 12th was for me a personal errands day in the hot Havana sun, the thick smog of the avenues and the usual dirty streets. It was one of those days that are doubly exhausting because of the slow pace at which life moves on the Island, the … Continue reading “¡No, Not That! / Miriam Celaya”
My husband is not just any writer. He belongs to the generation known as “The Generation of the ’50s,” a rather arbitrary poetic grouping that started with Carilda Oliver (1922) and ran through David Chericián (1940). His generation’s peers — if they haven’t died or emigrated — have received the National Literature Prize and enjoyed … Continue reading “Rafael Alcides, Who is a Very Important Person / Regina Coyula”
http://www.marketingdirecto.com/ The phrase is attributed to the old Bolero; I’ve only heard part of the chorus and it says that everything will be the same when one of the members of a loving couple returns to the marital nest. It’s also used in colloquial speech in Cuba to emphasize that something remains, monotonous or not, … Continue reading “The Little Room is Just the Same / Rosa Maria Rodriguez”
American cars continue to be a fifth column nailed into communist heart of the Revolution. They come from the republican prehistory and yet belong to the democratic future of the nation. They lasted, despite the asphyxiation and the repressive workshops without replacement parts, where they “adapted” them to change their original bodies. But the American … Continue reading “Lens With Lyrics: Battlefront / Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo”
Many people who don’t know Cuban could have read this article* by a Frenchman who presents himself as an expert on Cuban issues, which encouraged me to offer some clarifications about what can be done with money in my country, information that I have first hand for being a Cuban who lives in Cuba, where … Continue reading “The Cost of Food in Cuba, or Clarifications Regardless of the Intent of an Article / Regina Coyula #Cuba”
Free enterprise is not a term that is mentioned in the new process of “updating the model,” but you just have to give a little nodto “the factors” in constructing your own socialism now that the Frankenstein of socialism, which according to them is being built in Cuba, seems to be delayed. There are some … Continue reading “The War of the Worlds / Regina Coyula #Cuba”
I felt wiped out when I got there after having waited for more than three quarters of an hour for the Route 27 bus. I finally gave up and opted instead for an almendrón—one of those cars from the 1940s or 1950s that are virtually the only available form of transportation these days and that … Continue reading “Breathing Can Shut Down the System / Rebeca Monzo”
I found out from national press and radio reports that the government of Namibia will send to “my planet” nothing more and nothing less than one hundred fifty animals for the national zoo, which is located on the outskirts of our capital city. These include elephants, lions, tigers, panthers, great apes and many other species … Continue reading “Animals – For What? / Rebeca Monzo”