The Basis of Everything
HAVANA TIMES – In one of the meetings with his ministers, Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel maintained that “the lemon was the base of everything” and in a longing tone he recalled the times when you could get a lemonade almost anywhere on the island.
In the president’s words, lemons can make almost any drink taste good, but unfortunately they have become difficult to obtain, just like guarapo juice has virtually disappeared despite the fact that Cuba is a producer of sugar cane.
However, along with the president’s laments, it should be noted that it has been precisely the government’s agricultural policies that have diminished production, promoted the importation of food products and discouraged private initiative, leading to the juice stands he misses being a thing of the past.
Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez has only ever experienced communism. He knows naught of political alternatives, being mentally hidebound by the system of which he is a part. It is that which prevents him from lifting his eyes to the horizon and visualizing a better world where lemons are commonplace.
It is only when he and his kind move aside, and individual initiative is permitted to return to Cuba, that the lemonade will reappear.
Meantime the intermittent supply of water, whether bottled and purchased from Pan-Americana, or having been boiled after dribbling from the tap, must suffice.
As one sits in the capitalist world, enjoying an excellent Beefeater London gin and Schweppes’ tonic with the necessary slice of lemon and cube of ice, one reflects upon Diaz-Canel’s opinion regarding lemons, and for the very first time actually agree with him……………think I’ll have another!