Opinion Archives - Page 447 of 495

So…Where’s the Coffee?

I’m one of the many Cubans who when getting out of bed in the morning, the first thing I look for is a cup of coffee. However, for months, the coffee that’s bought with our ration cards hasn’t tasted like coffee.

Cuba’s Housing Market Realignment

Against all predictions, this law has neither unleashed rage nor triggered a booming housing market. People are taking it calmly; it’s completely new territory and they need to study carefully what they’ll do – because like a mother, we only have one home.

Nor Can I Judge

With great ease, many people inside and outside the island criticize Cubans who they see forced to jinetear (hustle), prostitute, lie and even commit crimes to meet their basic needs.

This House Is Mine, Fidel!

The decree authorizing the sale and purchase of homes in Cuba ends or at least gives a good breather to the discussion around private and public regulation of an issue as sensitive as real property.

To Imperialism, Nothing; To the People, Everything

The party/government spends plenty of resources and devotes ample space in their media to constantly remind the Cuban people of the endless string of attacks perpetrated against them by imperialism and the terrorist forces of the extreme right.

The ‘Young Cuba’ blog

Harold Cardenas and Roberto Gonzalez are two young university professors from Matanzas Province. Together they created La Joven Cuba (Young Cuba), one of the most interesting blogs in Cuba based on the number of visits, the youth who read it and its independent perspective.

Cuba Party Conference Document Questioned

The conference could be an opportunity for the PCC to build the national unity needed and claimed by calling for dialogue—as part of the meeting—with the participation of socialist and democratic forces that hold positions and proposals other than those approved in last April’s Sixth Congress.

The Cavalcade of Cuba’s Alfredo Guevara

Taking advantage of the government’s new permissiveness, the Catholic Church convened a conference entitled “Current Challenges of the Cuban Nation” led by Alfredo Guevara. According to some reports, those in attendance included some dissidents as well as important Cuban academics.

Cuba’s Horizontal Gravity (I)

Although people in the First World enter airports almost as naturally as going into a store, for the average Cuban a trip abroad by airplane means breaking a silent and sinister curse.

Cuba’s Elusive Building Materials

A few days ago I read a story about how when home repair materials are put up for sale, all traces of those products disappear within 40 minutes, a fact that speaks to the real needs of citizens here in Cuba.