Reinaldo took the side of yes and he insisted and insisted. I, however, am of the generation that thinks ahead of time that nearly everything is prohibited, that they are going to scold me at every step and prevent me from doing anything that occurs to me. So this time the matrimonial discussion was intense. He claimed that we could board that boat to see Cienfuegos Bay from the swells of its waves, while the little voice inside me shouted that so much enjoyment could not be available to nationals. For a couple of hours I believed in my husband's optimism and like a tropical Candide he got away with it. We went to the marina office near the Jagua Hotel and an official there sold us two tickets for the coveted boat trip. We never hid our breakneck Havana accents, nor tried to pass ourselves off as foreigners, but no one asked for identification. We felt there were already a pair of seats on board the yacht "Flipper" with our names on them and the murmur of skepticism faded in my head.
We arrived at the dock half an hour early. The sun-burnt tourists began to board the boat. Rei and I reached the spectacular corner from where we took photos of that bay as big as an ocean. The dream lasted barely five minutes. When the captain heard us talking he asked if we were Cubans. He shortly informed us that we had to go ashore, "boat rides are prohibited for nationals at every marina in the country." Rage, anger, the shame of carrying a blue passport makes us guilty -- in advance -- in the eyes of the law of our own nation. A feeling of deception on comparing the official discourse of a supposed opening with the reality of exclusion and stigma. We wanted to cause a scene and cling to the railing, to compel them to remove us by force, but what would it have served? My husband dusted off his French and told the group of Europeans what was happening. They looked surprised, whispered among themselves. None of them disembarked -- in solidarity with the excluded -- from that coastal tour of our island; none of them found it intolerable to enjoy something that is forbidden to us, its natives.
The Flipper sailed, the wake of apartheid was visible for a few seconds and then was lost among the dark waters of the bay. The face of the musician Benny Moré on a nearby poster seemed to have exchanged its smile for a sneer. On one side of his chin was the famous refrain from one of his songs: "Cienfuegos is the city I like best..." We left that place. Reinaldo defeated in his illusion and I sad that my suspicions had triumphed. We waked along the road to Punta Gorda while an idea took shape in our minds: "If Benny had lived in these times, he too would have been thrown off -- like a mangy dog -- from that yacht."
Yoani's blog, Generation Y, can be read here in English translation.
Translating Cuba is a new compilation blog with Yoani and other Cuban bloggers in English.
Yoani's new book in English, Havana Real, can be ordered here.
Follow Yoani Sanchez on Twitter: www.twitter.com/yoanifromcuba
Freedom of speech
Freedom of association
Freedom to live in any geographic point inside the country
Freedom to leave and get back to the country
Political freedom
Economical freedom
The right to drive business like the foreigner does
Equal opportunities in health, education, jobs, housing,
The right to produce richness
The right to decide how the produced richness will be distributed
The right to change a gov. when it is incapable to solve the people problems
Respect for the human rights
Freedom for political prisoners
The right to stay in the country in spite of your political activity or ideological leaning
The right to keep the freedom in spite of your political activity or ideological leaning
The right to keep the live in spite of your political activity or ideological leaning
Respect for the human life
A real and non repressive penal code that not criminalize political and economical activities
Democracy
Justice
Powers independence
Free press
Love, fraternity, unity, tolerance
We are missing too a very important thing.... the solidarity of people like all you that spend the time defending a bloody tyranny that has destroyed the country for 52 years.
We don't need people traveling to Cuba or doing business with castrofascism but people helping us to make the criminal military junta to leave Cubans alone.
Another fact, not publicly findable because the tyranny hides this information, is that the only measurement the tyranny has taken about this situation is to dictate laws forbidding the free reallocation of people from provinces to the capital city, in such way they pretend to cut the arrival to Havana of infantile prostitutes from other cities. Another “measurement” the tyranny implemented was to dictate that all landlords renting rooms or apartments or houses to tourist are in the obligation of watching closely and carefully the movements of the tourist and to inform all activities to the police…… but……. In reality, when a landlord goes and denounce theirs inquilines for performing pedophile activities the only answer they receive from police is: Go there and tell the tourist he/she cannot introduce people minor than 16 year old in your property…… that’s it!!!!!!!
The tyranny has also dictated an order to the police: Live alone our “tourist”!!!!!
Pedophiles from every country in the world are moving to Cuba and arranged all needed so theirs retirement checks will be send there
Tourism and the Negrificación of Cuban Identity
http://profmama.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/negrificacion.pdf
L. Kaifa Roland
Walking into a hotel nightclub, the security guards would let the others pass without incident but step directly in my path, asking me where I was going. I quickly learned to look confused and to respond in my best American-accented English that I did not understand because I did not speak Spanish. Only in very few occasion, in encounters with police, did I have to prove my foreign status by showing the photocopy of my passport that I learned to keep with me at all times.
To ensure the isolation of international tourism from Cuban society, it was to be promoted in enclave resorts where, as much as possible, tourists would be segregated from Cuban society. This was not lost on the average Cuban citizen, and the government tourism policy soon began to be referred to as "enclave tourism" and "tourism apartheid".[4]
According to Castro, the government was "pondering formulas" that would allow Cubans to use some of the tourist facilities as a reward for outstanding work, but believed that giving Cubans access to amenities at the expense of paying foreign tourists would ultimately be a counterproductive move for the economy; "For every five Cubans staying two or three days in one of those hotels, the country would have one less ton of meat to distribute to the people,".[24]
Until 1997 contacts between tourists and Cubans were de facto outlawed, and Cubans seen in contact with tourists were regarded as potential thieves by police.[2][3] Global human rights groups complaints, and the upcoming visit of Pope, helped cause an about-face, although such contacts are still frowned upon, with standard harassment such as police identification checks for any Cuban seen in contact with a tourist common.[2] Tourist identification is usually not checked unless the tourist has dark skin and is mistaken for Cuban.[2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism_in_Cuba
Nothing shows the effect that your recounting of the experiences you live through are exposing the totalitarian methods used by the regime better than when it brings out the pleating of the Castroite apologists along the likes of John McAuliff and the blogger Walter Lippman who goes by walterlx here.
The only changes occurring in Cuba are those desperate attempts at placating the forces that are building for personal freedoms and an end to the heavy handed economic control whereby the leaders of the PCC bleed the people of their productivity and have in their fifty plus years of power devastated the nation to a point where it cannot feed itself in spite of it having some of the most fertile land on earth and their receiving billions of dollars in support from the former soviet union and now Venezuela and China as well as the monies from nearly two million foreign tourists every year.
Yoani favors an end to the US embargo on Cuba.
These are fact which cannot be denied. For all of
her criticisms and complaints, she holds these
points of view.
Yoani against travel ban:
http://www.lexingtoninstitute.org/Library/resources/documents/Cuba/cuban-triangle/hearingyoani.pdf
Yoani against the embargo:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/yoani-sanchez/cuba-embargo_b_1029826.html
It seems like the exile Cubans have an issue with Yoani.
No I don't have any issue with what Yoani supports as it is her right to choose any stand that she believes in as that is what personal rights and freedom allow and what I support whether of not I agree or disagree with that point of view unlike you and your Fidelista ilk who demand obedience to the regime or you send out the Rapid Response rabble to attack those that dissent.
They were also around for numerous hijackings and the US government's declaration that another Cuban mass migration to the US like the one that occurred in 1980 would be declared an act of war and the US would respond in kind, forcing the Cuban government to make sure that people did not jump into the sea en masse hoping to get to the Land of Milk and Honey where they believed the streets were paved with gold. They know perfectly well why they can't just hop on a boat.
But they also know that most of you, poor readers, don't know any of this. So they keep raking in the money via their European PayPal accounts and ""prizes" in the tens of thousands of dollars for her blog -- and then complain when they can't spend a little of it in a place they knew perfectly well they couldn't.
end for now
"People who hide behind anonymity to make personal attacks should be barred from responsible sites." (see comment here)
GRASPING AT STRAWS :Fig. 1. To depend on something that is useless; to make a futile attempt at something. 2. Trying to find some way to succeed when nothing you choose is likely to work 3. Trying to find reasons to feel hopeful about a bad situation
--Yoani and her husband certainly knew before they played this little game that while Cubans with the money to pay for it can go into hotels, restaurants and other places that were originally set up and formerly reserved for foreign tourists to bring money into the country to help pay for all the services that all Cubans --including Yoani and her husband --get, like subsidized (free or nearly free) housing, health care, education, food, and so many other services it would make you drool to think of having them here -- there have always been laws regulating who can get on a boat (or airplane) without a passport and traveling papers. Why? Precisely because it has been in the US government's interest to lure Cubans to leave the island ILLEGALLY (while making it very difficult to do so legally) so the revolutionary government would look bad. That's what the Cuban Adjust Act that lets Cubans enter and stay in the US without any visa or documentation --but with lots of benefits -- is all about. Yoani and her husband were around in the summer of 94 when that same Cuban Adjustment Act plus a tightened US blockade and the demise of socialist trading partners caused tens of thousands of her countrymen and women to lose their lives at sea.
LIKE ! REALLY! CAN YOU PROVIDE A LINK TO THE ORDINARY CUBAN'S PERKS? I CAN!
WIKILEAK DOCUMENT: Cuban healthcare: Aquí Nada es Facil
A Cuban woman in her thirties confides, “It’s all about who you know. I’m okay because I am healthy and I have ‘friends’ in the medical field. If I didn’t have my connections, and most Cubans do not, it would be horrible.” She relates that Cubans are increasingly dissatisfied with their medical care. In addition to the general lack of supplies and medicines, and because so many doctors have been sent abroad, the neighborhood family physicians now care for 300-400 families and are overwhelmed by the workload.
http://www.wikileaks.ch/cable/2008/01/08HAVANA103.html
YOUTUBE : Cuba Hospital Calixto Garcia Hospital Emergency Room - Poor state of the main Emergency Room in central Havana, right in front of the University of Havana, Cuba. Notice the bloody head of the man in the hallway. Even worse, the nurses/doctors in the last room showing lack of hygiene, no gloves, the family member holding back the old man but the hospital staff won't touch the patient.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK3AnxSgdxA&feature=share
Cuba Urged To Let Church Leader, Family Leave Island-Monday, November 7, 2011 Monday, November 7, 2011
HAVANA, CUBA (BosNewsLife)-- The leader of a major Cuban network of independent churches and his family have urged Cuba's government to let them leave the Communist-run island following years of harassment, including imprisonment, Christian rights activists told BosNewsLife Monday, November 7.
Pastor Omar Gude Perez of the growing 'Apostolic Movement', his wife and two children were granted asylum in the United States in July but were refused permission to exit Cuba, said advocacy group Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW).
"We are deeply concerned at the news that Cuban officials have once again declined to issue the Gude family an exit visa," added CSW’s Special Ambassador Stuart Windsor in a statement to BosNewsLife.
Pastor Gude, served almost three years of a six and a half year prison sentence on what his supported called "trumped up charges". He was released on "conditional liberty" earlier this year but is reportedly prohibited from preaching or from traveling outside his home city of Camaguey.
"After receiving asylum in the US in July, the couple was informed by government officials that they would not be issued exit visas, or “white cards”, as they are called in Cuba," CSW said.
CLICK LINK FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE!
http://www.bosnewslife.com/18935-cuba-urged-to-let-church-leader-family-leave-island
Cuba is the only country on the entire planet where people from the United States are forbidden to visit without a permission slip from the federal government. Only Cuban-Americans and a few others in small exceptional categories of the law are permitted to go to see Cuba for themselves.
Why is that? What is Washington afraid we will see if anyone from the US can go there?
Racism? Of course there's racism in Cuba. It's inexcusable, but there's no racism in the United States? If people couldn't go to places where there's racism, no one would be able to come to the United States. By every single social measure, from health to low property ownership to presence in prisons and on death row, Blacks in the US are represented far out of their proportion in the population.
But should the US be banned as a tourist destination because of that?
People who live in glass stones shouldn't throw houses...
GRASPING AT STRAWS :Fig. 1. To depend on something that is useless; to make a futile attempt at something. 2. Trying to find some way to succeed when nothing you choose is likely to work 3. Trying to find reasons to feel hopeful about a bad situation
‘Obama Effect’ Highlights Racism in Cuba
New America Media, News Analysis, Louis E.V. Nevaer, Posted: Dec 15, 2008
"The European Union recently dispatched anthropologists to study racism in Cuba. Their findings were shocking: Not only was racism alive and well in the workers’ paradise, but it was systemic and institutional. Blacks were systematically excluded from positions that involved coming in contact with foreign tourists (where they could earn tips in hard currencies), they were relegated to poor housing, complained of the longest waits for healthcare, were excluded from managerial positions, received the lowest remittances from relatives abroad, and were five times more likely to be imprisoned. "
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=7b4ef8e52790034e043a37d170243f0f
Some of the commenters here have a sort of reverse-Panglossian approach: Everything they write about is 100% negative. And one gets the distinct impression that these fiercely hostile 100% negatonians have either never been to Cuba, or haven't been since they left as children decades ago.
We still don't have an answer to the simple question of why the people of the United States should not be completely free to visit Cuba, just as they can visit Saudi Arabie, Iran, North Korea, China, Vietnam, all of whom have political systems completely remote from the one which exists here in the United States, and which Washington wants to impose on Cuba, too.
Why are people from the United States denied the freedom to visit Cuba?
African-American Professor of Anthropology at the University of South Florida, Gayle McGarrity, wrote this article published in the Miami Herald:
Yes, Cuba has a race problem
Go to this link: http://miamiherald.typepa
d.com/cuban_colada/2010/03/yes-cuba-has-a-race-problem.html. When you are there click on Download McGarrity on Cuba, and it will take you to the article
BY GAYLE McGARRITY
As an anthropologist and a woman of mixed racial descent, who is fluent in Spanish, I was in a unique position to capture the ideas and beliefs of Cubans of all different racial classifications.
Although I was treated much better than darker skinned Cubans, I did feel discrimination. When I would attempt to enter places reserved for tourists, I would be questioned and had to make sure that I always had my foreign passport handy.
YOUTUBE : CUBAN Documentary - "Wishes on a Falling Star"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Afnx7j1m6eA&annotation_id=annotation_725071&feature=iv
The Castro brothers face their certain end, an uncertain future hangs over the island. Some people are afraid, many cannot wait, but all shudder and hope that the changes will be positive.This documentary leads the audience through the discovery of this hope, through a tourist's camera which looks to be turned off and oblivious to the conversation at hand, yet is focused on candidly capturing each person's wishes..
Clandestine underground shops, businessmen experienced in all things illegal, dodgy pimps, mothers who force their daughters into selling their bodies -- the hidden face of the State which welcomes tourists into its luxury resorts is openly displayed beyond censorship's control.
One special guide is Yoani Sanchez, the independent blogger, a leader of the new, peaceful revolution -- the revolution of ideas. The internet is its main instrument, while the government attempts to limit computer use with any means possible in a pushing and pulling of ideals. In the interview, recorded in a secret location, the young writer speaks about her country's ruin, and where Raul's reforms have no effect on everyday life.
Castro's supporters and dissidents, young and old -- none deceive themselves that the star of the revolution will shine on for much longer. And this is what this project focuses on: the wishes on a falling star.
FREEDOM is KNOWLEDGE
KNOWLEDGE is FREE
Perhaps if the US did away with the motivating factor of automatic admission under the wet foot/dry foot policy and the Cuban Adjustment Act, Cuba would respond by ending restrictions on boarding boats, whether or not foreigners are on them.
Yoani tends to confirm the prejudices of a hostile foreign audience. She is articulate and sometimes insightful but not considered the most accurate or respected critic of Cuba's problems by other Cubans. Even harsher views can be found on thehavanatimes blog but the authors are not oriented to outsiders.
Mr. Mc Auliff is not a casual and naive American lured by castrofascism propaganda and believing the criminal military junta in power in Cuba created a paradise in this tiny island for the workers, no dear one, he is the head of an organization of American producers that fights to be part of the feasting organized by castrofascism for international capitalists...... Mr. McAuliff and the members in his organization are very upset because one of the bans conforming the so called embargo is a credit ban..... this credit ban does not allow these gentlemen in Mr. Mc organization to commerce with castrofascism because castrofascism does not pays, so, they need USA to give credits to castrofascism in order to make US gov. the payer for what castrofascism buys......... One condition castrofascism impose to those that wants to be part of the monopolistic economy they created is to be part of castrofascism propaganda efforts to wash the bloody face of this regime....... there you have the explanation about why Mr. McAuliff finds "logical" causes for all castrofascist crimes.
Regards
The only credit ban I am aware of affects agricultural sales. I have never heard farm organizations seeking credit, but they would prefer for the Cubans to be able to use US banks rather than be forced by OFAC to go through third country banks, to the disadvantage of both countries.
People who hide behind anonymity to make personal attacks should be barred from responsible sites.