Eduardo’s Barbershop
Today Eduardo has spent almost 20 years cutting people’s hair. The money he earns, around 100 CUCs per month (about $110 USD), is enough to take care of himself and to maintain his sick parents.
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Diaries
Where One Learns Not to Say ‘I Love You’
Maritza is a woman who has lived her life with great intensity. At sixteen she was already dating a man who was over thirty, and no one asked why a man so much older.
Read MoreOld Letters
“There’s nothing more delightful than rummaging through drawers, you can find anything,” said my aunt. And it was true.
Read MoreA Cuban Philosopher on ‘Obsolete & Futile’ Communism
I met Alexis Jardines on a university campus. He was a philosophy professor and later I enrolled to try to become one too. His theories seemed to me back then to be so brilliant on one side and so opaque on the other. I mentioned that to him one time but he disagreed.
Read MoreA Visit to the Dulce Maria Loynaz Cultural Center
In the former home of the Cuban poet Dulce Maria Loynaz, now an institution which bears her name, I was amazed during my visit there a few days ago.
Read MoreA New Community-based Newsletter
In Havana’s Santos Suarez neighborhood, a monthly publication has been founded that seeks to make the daily lives of its inhabitants visible in print. The first issue has already been distributed to local residents.
Read MoreView from Cuba on the Killing of Gadhafi
Gadhafi was killed in his native town by rebel troops. After several months of bloody struggle, devastation, and material and human losses, the former Libyan leader was finished off. He who for more than four decades governed that African country died at the hands of his own people.
Read MoreDisadvantages of Letting Go of Power
When the use of political power granted to a person becomes indiscriminate, there always comes a day of reckoning. Like life itself, that power is not perpetual.
Read MoreConversations over Ice Cream
A few days ago I went by the Coppelia ice cream parlour, and surprisingly there was no one waiting to go in. I couldn’t resist the temptation to enter that palace of deserts without lining up.
Read MoreEverything Was Supposedly Ready
TV announcers seem more like life-size carnival puppets, perhaps because of the two-dimensional characters that they present on camera with their affected makeup and especially the poses of satisfaction or sorrow that they feign according to the news story.
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