Uniformed nights

Text: La Salamandra Blanca

To go to the Film Festival, or simply to walk along 23rd Street lately, is to be surprised by the ever-increasing presence of military personnel. They are not only police, now they are accompanied by young men dressed in guard uniforms, or in olive green. Possibly cadets or boys mobilized in the Military General Service?

I find out about some incidents through the comments of friends and acquaintances: repudiation rallies, the cancellation of cultural events, even those promoted on television such as the Poetry Without End Festival, celebrated for some years in Alamar. To top it off, they tell me about the offensive and humiliating shouts. Citizens have even been hit as a part of the response by authority, uniformed or not, to silence civic demonstrations.

But beyond what they tell me, this weekend I could, in just two nights, verify close-up and with my own eyes incidents that would shock any passerby.

One of them happened at the entrance to La Rampa movie theater and ended with the cancellation of the film Antichrist, eagerly awaited by so many. Every night, in their zeal to control the entry of the crowd, they schedule some few police along with the military mentioned above. This Friday, a shoving match erupted between them and the public, with everyone more worked up than on previous nights: Aggressive face-offs, laughter on seeing how one agent, unable to dominate the crowd, goes red in the face, somebody falls down, even a few flip-flops are lost on the ground. Finding there are not enough of them, they call for reinforcements to try to control the crowd and another nearby patrol car comes with a great number of guards of all types.

For unknown reasons, they take a boy of about 20 over to the patrol car and search his bag. Some friends respectfully demand that they explain why they’re doing it, that they must say where and why they are taking him, and in addition someone nearby asks for the name and number of the officer. They are joined by more people, even younger, demanding to know the cause of the detention. Many of them start shouting at the police that it is an abuse of power, a violation of the constitution, it is abuse they shout. A young man from the Interior Ministry asks who shouts such a thing to show him what abuse is; I’m perplexed at such a stupid swaggering warning.

The official, a man of about 40 or so, seems like he was very bothered by the course of what was taking shape in this part of the street. He changes and I see him say something to the detained young man in an aggressive manner, in his face you can see only anger, the young man answers something and the same policeman attacks him, pushes him forcefully, almost beating him, into the patrol car and takes him away. The friends ask the group gathered around to march together to where they suppose him to have been taken, to demand the young man’s rights. In the end it petered out, and as I said, the film was not shown that night.

The following day, rather late, leaving the theater and walking along 23rd and G to return home, I am amazed to see the wall recently lined with stones to prevent people from sitting and meeting there. But right at the edge of the street is something even more surprising. There are five cops, one of them with a guitar in his hand, which seems very strange, because his face shows no thought of entertaining us with a tune. It turned out that he wanted to confiscate it from one of the boys of a group around him. After being there nearly half an hour hearing the pleas and complaints grow, they called for a patrol car that ended up taking the guitar and its owner to the local police station.

It’s incredible to see how something as innocent as playing a guitar on the corner where part of the youth of Havana gather, is a criminal act, and even more that they assume the right to confiscate the object of amusement for these boys. That something so innocent as sitting on a wall and playing songs in the street could threaten authority is something to worry about. What will they do? Will they confiscate all the guitars of those who while away their nights, and those of others in the city? Will they constantly provoke the impotence of some and the challenge of many and shout in their faces the abuse of power they are constantly committing?

All-Inclusive... Segregation too?

Text: The White Salamander



To see how in history a human being has been capable of so many forms of repression and disdain for his fellow men is a challenge to one’s own sensitivity. To feel in one way or another disdained and deprived of some right, for whatever reason, is quite pitiful. It is also a challenge to one’s equanimity, to not suddenly turn into a violent offender every time they make you part of the segregated human race.

We might think bad thoughts and believe that this is a goal of those who divide in order to provoke something bigger if you rebel and disobey the given order. Because to attack in your own defense could turn you into prey by giving cause to the power entity that segregates you, accusing you of physically or verbally attacking authority. 



I comment on this because for some days I felt very irritated and upset. I was around Varadero by chance and decided to take a dip at the beach, but I needed to go to a bathroom in order to change clothes comfortably, to take off my traveling clothes, to look in my suitcase for the bathing suit and to put it on, and as I went by a small hotel, the Hotel Club Tropical to be exact, I went in through the lobby looking for the bathroom and I felt the doorman calling me. I tried to evade him, but he was quite insistent and when he inquired I responded about my need, to which he said absolutely no. Surely, if I had been a foreigner he would have let me go past with hardly a glance.

As almost always happens, I concluded not to ruin my friends’ afternoon and not to spoil the few hours that we would be on that beach. I decided not to make a case of it and not to make the scene everyone deserved, from the foreign tourists to the manager, but most of all the orders-following-Yeti (in uniform, whose back you see in the picture) for wanting to throw me out of there with manners, as if I was a mangy dog and not a person, a domestic tourist, as Cuban as he or anyone in his family is. Then I called a truce and decided to get out of there in search of another place which ended up being a disastrous bathroom in the cafeteria where the modest price of a ham and cheese sandwich is 1.75 CUC, which is about 50 pesos in national money.

Above all, I left that Club Tropical with the fixed idea of at least writing about this, as a way to criticize or denounce what the fact of being segregated by our own kind, even at this time, means. It is unbelievable that something as simple and humane as going into a bathroom to change clothes is not allowed and that, only after a long time, citizens may once again rent a hotel room (but at what prices!) though we may not have the right to all services provided to foreigners, such as the use of the Internet, where, for example, comments such as this to the outside could damage even more the image of the regime in this country. This country, where those who possess the power and who control us from within pride themselves so much about caring for the inviolable human rights. A country where nobody can come to inspect from the outside, but I hope that at least they may eagerly inspect for real improvements for its people.

P.S.: xenophobia: (from xeno and phobia) f. hatred, repugnance or hostility towards foreigners.

If that were the case, what would be the name of the same thing directed towards the natives? Some Cubanologist should tell me, because perhaps the term already exists and I still do not know it.

Look at the signs of the Club Amigo (Club Friend – but friend of whom?) and All-inclusive, segregation too?

The dilemma of the cockroach Martina

Photo: Lía Villares
Text: La Salamandra Blanca

These days, I am reminded of the dilemma of Martina, the little cockroach, a story we all grew up with, where she wonders, ‘with the little money I have, what will I buy myself?’ In this country this question is so recurrent but, though the answer is usually evident, one can still become delirious with the idea of buying what are considered ‘luxuries’.

Our connection with this story arose in a conversation with some friends, intelligent people, with hopes and dreams of careers. Sadly however I realize the horrible feeling of disappointment that envelops them. They have come to an age where, after years of studying and preparing for a career, they cannot find work to put into practice what they’ve learned and to get the paltry salary that won’t even cover the barest essentials month by month. This is the challenge of trying to be strong living in this country. This comes from the generation upon generation of need that we inherit from our parents such that almost no one does anything with their wages but seek the scarcities, which in our day and age should be a given, which for many this means a house barely livable.

Once in a while, with a lot of effort, one manages to save some money, thanks to work generally considered as coming from ‘on the side’, because legally you may only have one job. Now they face that eternal debate, what to spend it on. It is the little cockroach Martina’s quandary, what to do with the few coins she has; should she use to make her house a home, or will there come a time when she can rent a bigger place where she has privacy and is able to breathe? There are so many of us that live in a multi-generational household that is falling down around us; a proper space to live is at a premium.

But they do not know if they will ever again be able to save money so they cannot chose whether to spend it on a more expensive rent or to fix up the house they already have so that they can leave it to their children, improving it from the previous generation and bettering it for future ones. And so it continues, the impossible choice of changing the worn-down windows, the old bath or the dilapidated kitchen, or buying a new mattress to finally have a good night’s sleep with your partner, or lying awake at night weighing the decision and desire to become parents.

At least for Martina, the answer seems simple, whereas ours has larger implications; can it be that people still believe that in Cuba this is only an economic issue, that is a small item on a long list of problems where people can take matters into their own hands? But it begs the question; what is the economy of a country but a consequence of the politics of the government?

Slight but sincere comments

Photo: Blogger Meeting
Text: La Salamandra Blanca

To write and post this is not easy for me, it takes time, concentration, strength, and other things, and even more if writing is not your line of work. Especially when you want to say something, but there are so many things to do in your daily life, like work, or do the things you need to do to meet your needs and even your wants, things that don’t come with a salary. Because even though there are some who believe that if you openly criticize the government the money “falls from the Empire,” that’s not the case.

However, it’s very flattering to read something you wrote, published on the web, and to see, each time, the increase in the number of comments from those who cheer you on. And the others, well the fact that they took the trouble, that’s good, isn’t it? Many make me laugh. Even when they’re confused and think it’s Claudia and not La Salamandra who wrote, it doesn’t bother me. It’s good that they congratulate her, after all, she’s the owner of the blog, right?

But best of all is to be near to something that makes you feel alive in this half dead space, at times immobile and pulverized, to be able to help or support people full of bravery and courage, to say and do what they think, even when you think you aren’t as bold as they are and are only anonymous and invisible, you feel a little bit further from the stupidity.

There are also moments of thrilling joy to know you’ve advanced another step on the road to pushing back, a little more, the line that censors and segregates those who are tired of shutting up and waiting. After having lived, seen, read or heard something that you know exceeds the limits of the suppression of civil liberties, that they try to crush through threats and intimidation, you can no longer be complacent when people manage to join together, whether close friends or not, to show the injustice. They demonstrate this when someone is indicted, imprisoned, labeled a dissident lackey or simply can’t publish a book, because of the way they dress, sing, write, feel, or think with all their human rights.

I regret that I can’t be closer, physically, to the many people who provide support with their comments, although they are greatly appreciated. You could, from supposed anonymity or not, better feel this vibration, and each time would be stronger, when we must move that boundary, as it becomes more asphyxiating, but also pushed back further.

The Grand Maestro of ethics

Photo: Erazm Ciolek
Text: La Salamandra Blanca

It turns out he’s taken up his Reflections again. But this time with a force that tries to keeps up a chatter with the United States. In one form or another he always draws on topics that question the approach of the government of a country that it seems he once vowed, in secret or not, to make “war” on until the end of his days.

He complains that they’ve imposed an economic blockade on us for more than 50 years and it really seems that everything he does is designed to provoke them more and more to want to keep it. We know it would be convenient for him because the Blockade has come to bear the blame for creating hunger and scarcity, and served to justify the general blockade that we have inside the country that has produced many of our disasters.

The Reflections of Thursday, February 5th, “The contradictions between the politics of Obama and his ethics,” is formulaic, with approximately 14 questions to consider about the president. Once again he tries to remind him and, also clearly, us, about every bad thing the government of this country historically has done to Cuba and the rest of the world. Almost a full page asks if Obama is right or fair, this and that, and all that he, the Grand Maestro of ethics, wants to debate and call into question in the eyes of others.

And what is fair and right here, when will he engage in self-examination and see himself as we, the ones below, the ones on foot, see him? Or is it that his ego even now doesn’t allow it?

Doesn’t he realize that we’re no longer interested in knowing any more about what the president of the United States does or doesn’t say or do, but in what they have done here, in this country, he and his government, and what they are doing or will do to resolve what really concerns us? He writes of protecting Humanity from the deterioration of the climate, but doesn’t talk about the part of Humanity that lives in this country and the pure deterioration, through no fault of the climate precisely.

Why isn’t it the role of the great sacred figure, internationally important, questioning the dignity of others, and always referring to his interest in Humanity, to publicly reflect every day, asking those questions that he says have “no easy answers.” Above all about what we want to know, have, change and see here.

What did he do for us in 50 years of absolute power? And I ask you, please talk about more than the usual, agrarian reform, literacy campaign, “free” medicine and education, that is all water under the bridge. We live now in other times, other needs, another way of thinking and of life, we are OTHERS, I mean new, different, distinct. Enough of only living in the memory of disasters overcome and resolved by the Revolution, which soon ceased to be revolutionary.

He commits no sin, he says, modestly presenting his ideas. But he doesn’t allow anyone else to express theirs, also free and modestly (unless it’s to criticize the United States), much less if it’s to question anything in this county and very much less if it’s to make it public, because he imposes censorship, or here comes the tattletale without any ethical issues and almost ubiquitous powers and a cell phone designed to make an urgent call to the police, and having freedom of expression (even if you’re wearing in a suit) is only a dream turned into a nightmare where you wake up in jail, or at least with a warning and a fine.

I could pen some reflections with the title: The contradictions between Fidel’s politics and his ethics. Where I would also ask the Maestro his own question: “Is it right to promise a reconciliation of such contradictory and antagonistic interests without transgressing ethics?”

Reflections

Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan
Text: La Salamandra Blanca

I read Granma last Friday the 23rd, motivated to know what he might think to write about as he returned to his reflections after a long period of silence that led to the well-known doubts and speculations about his health and even his physical existence.

He seems personally vainglorious, but subtlety so (omitting his own name), saying that the Cuban Revolution in its 50 years has outlasted eleven US presidents. After referring to Obama almost affably, he explained to everyone who might be interested, and gullible, why he has reduced the number of Reflections. He has no interest in obstructing the work of his colleagues, which given his habit of poking into everything must be very difficult for him, and difficult for us to believe. As was expected, he left up in the air a final question about the eleventh president with a typical cutting remark: “What will he do when soon the immense power he’s taken in his hands is absolutely useless to overcome the insoluble antagonistic contradictions of the system?”

He calls it a rare privilege indeed to have witnessed events for such a long time. When this hasn’t been pure coincidence, nor remotely the product of a divine gift given exclusively to him, but rather something very well planned, fought for and maintained with all the forces of arms and minds, hearty and mighty, by and for himself. Is the fact that he’s still enjoying that power today what makes it unusual? Or it is because it’s difficult to believe that we’ve endured for so long?

The thing I like most of what I’ve heard, is his mention that his colleagues shouldn’t worry about his condition or death. Just the fact that he alluded to the possibility that by the end of Obama’s term he won’t enjoy the privilege, serves as a relief to many, as if he had said he only has less than four years to live.

If we asked him the same question he asked Obama, I would like to know what he would answer. Or doesn’t he realize that he, too, has had immense power in his hands for a much longer time and he has not resolved the insoluble, antagonistic, growing contradictions of this system? Doesn’t that make him think that at this point the power that he still so severely maintains has become useless? …He could reflect on that and give us at least the slight pleasure of publishing it.

The boy in the interview

Photo: Claudio Fuentes Madan
Text by: La Salamandra Blanca

A few days ago Cubaencuentro published an interview with Claudio Fuentes, one of a group of post-Revolution young people. This article is a response to comments on that page and also to the comments of some friends. Some of them, the most decadent and critical opinions, say that he is poisonous, that the language is terribly rude, the terminology is homophobic, that if we expect anything good from this type of people we as a country are lost… in the end. Perhaps he has defects, as we all do, but we find in him more virtues and he awakens more affection than many who think they are better and who are bothered by his manner. He is the most sincere guy I’ve met in my life, not to say he’s not a little sly when he wants to be, but this is only in the interest of his lovely art work. With regards to the homophobic terminology, it’s a shame that it sounds that way, real Cubans know that his references are not precisely homophobic. Because this boy, in many ways, is one of the most open minded in the city, and in variety of ways, not just sexually. His photos speak to this.

He takes very good photos, though he has been able to show them in official places only a few times, but maybe it doesn’t matter, nor does it interest him, he will find where his art has value. Each time will be better, because he always seeks to learn, to understand what makes the difference. It’s a shame that everyone can’t know him personally because he is, as he himself would describe it, a charmer. Yes, I like his poison, because it’s a poisoned charm, but it’s poison only in the form of a vice that gives you the sense of being agreeably stoned. He’s like a vampire who converts others, and once you’ve passed the moment of terror and have tried it, you want more. Even just to be in his company, you always come out having learned something, and almost always laughing. Because to provoke laughter takes great talent; he can do almost anything with a joke. He manages jokes across a wide spectrum because of his intellect, which will always be less than he aspires to, because he is insatiable and never stops reading and looking for information about what interests him.

In reality, he’s a guy who’s very satisfied with life in general, although he has introspective days that hint at a possible sadness. Others could not live as he does, with very few or almost no material possessions. He could become a bitter person, or a miser, but without a doubt he never is, he’s easily generous with his friends and if he has money he shares it with no problem and always wants to help those who have none. So I don’t believe we need to let loose with the sanctimony and irritation when we read the words in the strong language he uses when he speaks with passion about something that might seem jaded. These really are attitudes typical of him, always the irreverence and the provocation, and if it’s about politics… please!

The Spanish girl, who wants to see his shirtless photos, and trouserless photos, (don’t fixate too much on the legs but that’s not important) and take him to Spain, now you can have a look and you’ll see.

He’s an exceptional boy and a it’s a real pleasure to know him; to be counted among his friend can be, though it might sound terribly corny, one of the most important and beautiful things that could happen in your life. Thank you for letting me get to know you is something I’ve always wanted to tell him, and I still haven’t said it.

The same thing 50 times

Text: La Salamandra Blanca

It would seem that in Cuba, instead of a reason for happiness and celebration and hope, all that the New Year could bring with the coming of every January is simply the arrival of the alleged celebration of the now extremely old Triumph of the Revolution. Because of this, the press is always full of “the same.” Recently a 50th Anniversary Bohemia Special Edition magazine was published with articles published in 1959. In general, like always, even today, they tell of the horrors of the dictatorship overthrown that year and everything “we cannot forget.” (But how could we, if every year, one after another, they remind us again how hideous it is?)

In the magazine there are two pages with “Phrases for History,” of course from the “Star of that moment,” with many photos of him. I would like to repeat some of the phrases here, to see how they strike one today with the passage of time:

…”This war was won by the people. And I say that for anyone who believes that he has won it. What interests the Revolution is the people…”
Who would be the one who, at that moment, believed that he had won and was interested in maintaining, for such a long time, all of the people under his absolute command and authority?

…”I believe that this people has the same rights as other people to govern itself and to chart its own destiny.”
…And since then…? Sometime it’s time to let the people chart a new destiny, and it would be good to stop living through what someone else charted for himself and extended to everyone.

…”Where there is justice there is no crime, and where there is crime there is no freedom of the press; where there is crime they hide what they do.”
…Freedom of the press? Where is that… is it here?

“This people is not a barbaric people, nor is it a criminal people. This the most noble and sensitive people of all."
…Asshole, then why are you so determined to fuck them over?

Question of monarchy

Text and photo: The White Salamander

I recall the stories told by acquaintances about the efforts, expense and the lies some parents had to tell to give their children a present for “Three Kings Day.” Siblings were even born to satisfy the requests of some toddlers.

Revolutionary history always emphasizes how, before, poor people didn’t have any money and could not, even on this day, give anything to their children who still “believed” in the “Three Kings and Father Christmas,” and the social problem of the marked class differences between those who received much and those who received nothing. Hence, the absurdity of celebrating these dates was like something taken as a given by the people… to the great dissatisfaction of some.

But, in reality, the differences were never completely eliminated. They tried to eliminate the frowned upon celebration of Christmas and the Three Kings Day which, according Revolutionary history, became a part of the bourgeois life that we had to let go, when in reality, for some, they were almost more cultural and family traditions than celebrations based on religious beliefs. Then the children had to put aside their silly innocence and must learn that the bearded kings were others and brought other kinds of gifts.

This last January 5th, watching people expend tremendous effort running to the shops to buy their children “toy cell phones” at 25 Cuban pesos (national money), and others in line at stores selling toys in “Cuban pesos” but also in “convertibles” or CUCs (1 CUC = 24 national money or Cuban pesos), I remembered that the “terrible” social differences that the government so greatly “fears,” have more or less always existed.

As a child I had friends who had everything--toys and other things--that marked the differences, solely because of the fact that they were Papa’s nieces or nephews, relations or shirt-tail relations, or his kids. Me, with my “poor communist” family, I had to be satisfied with playthings from the coupons in the ration book in their three variants or categories: basic, non basic, and additional. Making it even more complicated were the numbers they gave out and the terrible lines, adding uncertainty about whether you’d get something you saw in the window, and the disappointment when the most desirable items were running out, the times when you’d be “bawling” because you didn’t reach the front of the line in time and had to leave the store with “something” so as not to go home with tears running down your face and empty hands.

To me, Three Kings Day and Father Christmas don’t mean a thing, nor do I know the history very well (because of my background, I suppose), but I wonder if the absurdity, like so many other things, wasn’t an attempt to impose the disappearance of these dates on so many people for whom they continued to matter and to try to eliminate something, established or not, in the mass culture of the people. Because even now some grandparents and parents find themselves “between a rock and a hard place” with the problem of low wages and the high prices of toys, etc. etc… on top of the terrible and noticeable differences compared to their children’s playmates.

Maybe the kids of today will just have to invent a new story about the New Kings (...at this point, way too old) to see if we believe them.

¿DiSidimos todos ser disidentes? / Did we all "Disside" to be dissidents?

(A friend brought me this text, it seems my work is bearing fruit and my friends are beginning to get excited and give me posts. Even though they are anonymous, I know that bit by bit they’ll stop being so, we’ve already come a long way even with a pseudonym, which gives me hope they’ll continue writing.)

Photo: OLPL
Text by: The White Salamander

There are journalists, almost always foreigners because the national ones are too “careful,” who pose “uncomfortable questions” to “our leaders,” more or less causing heart attacks in public. Just a few days ago they asked Raúl about dissent in Cuba and he almost had a heart attack, meanwhile answering “forcefully.”
Sometimes you assume you know the meaning of certain words for many reasons, through reading, conversations and hearing them so often from the mouths of others. And so you don’t look them up in the dictionary because their meanings are “obvious.” But I wonder if sometimes they aren’t used badly, leaving us with a slightly erroneous idea of them. I have to share, even if no one has asked me to:

Dissidence: (ad. L dissidentia) n. 1. Action and effect of dissenting. II. Serious difference of opinion. Synonyms.: Disagreement, division, Anton.: Harmony.

Dissident: (ad. L Dissidens,-entis.) n. One who disagrees. adj. Disagreeing.

Dissent: (ad. L Dissidere.) v. To deviate from the common doctrine, belief or conduct. n. difference of opinion.

This word, dissidence, and all of its “derivatives,” in this country has, for all practical purposes, been banned as nearly every thought that is different from theirs is banned. And as a consequence they want “the masses” to look at a dissident like a social pariah. “EWWWW, stinking dissident!!!!” they seem to shout. Because of this some have already been separated from the their families, friends or acqaintances simply for being, or going with others who are, “disaffected with the Crown.” The fear instilled is great, I honestly admit that for me sometimes it is… (That’s why I write this as “anonymous.)
In this country, the governemnt, on the few occasions they’ve done so, mentions dissidence (or “political deviants”) as a small percentage of people whom they believe they can “control” very well. Furthermore, they accept as a fact the belief that all of them are supposedly “paid by the Empire.” Knowing the full meaning, I wonder if the government is really so naïve as to believe that there are only a minimum number of people who disagree with its “Common Doctrine” (??) or who are “seriously in discord with the opinions” of the government.
Because if that’s the case, I believe they’re seriously deluded or, one might say, total clowns, to not know that there is a great percentage of dissidents in this country, many, thousands. Too many people don’t think like “Them,” they want to change things, they are tired of everything, of nothing changing for 50 years. It’s only that lamentably we don’t all have the balls to do what some do, some of the wonderful very young people, bold, and though fearful, brave.
And paid by the Empire? What Empire might that be that they’re talking about? Oh right, I’m sure it must be the “Foreign Empires,” because in this country a large share of the people live on what their families and friends send from “outside,” if not…