Author: Dariela Aquique

Yesterday, in the midst of the tumult of trying to get on the bus, a friend who was with me was hemmed in by two pickpockets set on stealing her camera. She managed to fend off the assault by clutching the small apparatus and staring squarely into the eyes of one of them with a menacing stare.

We’re starting the year and the Cuban theater world is in mourning. Only day’s apart, we lost two of its finest exponents: Ramiro Herrero Beaton and Vicente Revuelta Planas.

According to predictions in Cuba’s media, “This new year we’ve just entered will be a prosperous one, raising the quality of life of the Cuban people. It will only be necessary that everyone put their nose to the grindstone and work.”

When I’m out on the street, in the corner store, at the bus stop, standing in the line at the ice cream parlor, at the farmers markets, relaxing in any park, visiting f friends, sitting at a table sipping coffee at a cafe, in any of these places people speak in one voice using one recurrent phase: “This isn’t working anymore.”

What is catching my attention during this Christmas period is a series of good news and proposals for change in the lives of Cubans. The government is becoming “Papa Noel” (I think they would consider calling it “Santa Claus” to be “ideological diversionism”) and it is bringing gifts to the people.

How ironic it is for them to go around proclaiming here in Cuba: “Striving to achieve excellence in food service and customer attention!” This is one of the inventions you have to listen to daily in the iniquitous marketing attempts by our media to feign the friendly treatment and quality that people deserve.

Fanatics insist that the end of the world will occur on December 21, 2012, the exact date when the Mayan calendar ends. They contend that this is not conjecture based on interpretation but a reality that the wise ones of that civilization were able to predict from times in the distant past.

It’s alarming the number of protests, occupations and marches of the “outraged” that are occurring in different parts of the world. Obviously, the discontent of the masses has acquired unsuspected dimensions.

Currently many people here in Santiago de Cuba are calling for the application of the “Law of Retaliation.” What has caused the highest degree outrage among people of all ages and both sexes was a heartbreaking and horrendous act.

Such feelings have always been held by Cubans, but this isn’t a phenomenon unique to us. Rivalries between regions, states, cities and towns occur all over the world.