Author: Jorge Milanes

“Jorge,” said the faint voice of a silhouette I see behind the window. It’s Lila, a friend from junior and senior high school who did a Bachelor’s in Economics (while I had studied Naval Engineering). I thought she had left for the United States.

Recently, I was finally able to meet with my Internet pen-pal Lo Lai Hing in person. He travelled to Cuba from Hong Kong with his mother, Yue Wing. They were very happy. It was their first time in Cuba.

Plaff, o demasiado miedo para vivir (“Plaff, or Too Afraid to Live”) is a Cuban film from the late 80s starring Daisy Granados, Luis Alberto Garcia and Thais Valdes, premiered at the close of Cuba’s decade of material abundance.

When I got on the bus, I saw that the driver had his hand over the fare-box. Everyone who got on was paying him a peso. “Driver, I don’t have any change,” said a woman who had just boarded the bus, wrestling past a crowd of people.

Not long ago, a friend of mine went to pick her kid up at his primary school and I tagged along. In the hallway, I saw the collages that are always hung on the hallways or at the back of the classrooms in these schools. Only one of them was more or less acceptable, the rest displayed tasteless information and decorations.

At ten in the morning, I was returning from Vedado on a P-5 bus (which goes all the way down to the ocean drive in Old Havana). I got off and crossed the street, heading towards the Plaza de Armas. Suddenly, I hear two young men call me.

From the moment they arrived to the time they left, the Yubonas controlled absolutely everything that took place at the ceremony. In Cuba, Yubonas are the women responsible for all aspects of the ritual whereby a practitioner of Santeria is initiated into the religion.

Last Thursday, I went out to help a friend with her shopping. We went to Almacenes Ultra, one of Havana’s largest department stores. We thought we’d be able to find what we were looking for at Ultra, which has a wide variety of products in stock. Sold in Cuban Convertible Pesos, of course.

“My life has been a never-ending struggle, just like everybody else’s,” says the 30-year-old fellow who sells used eyeglasses across the street from my cousin’s. “I moved to Havana when I was 15 and had to sell deodorizer to make a living when things were really tough here.”

Looking up the meaning of the word “claustrophobia” in Google, I came across a web-site (www.claustrofobia.com) created by one of the most promising young writers in Cuba today: poet, storyteller, radio-play writer and current director of Santiago de Cuba’s Caseron publishing house Yunier Riquenes.