all’s set to change.

Many people have been asking me about my ideas on what will happen in Cuba after Castro, now that there is an apparent crack in the façade. That was one of the main questions that I had in my mind when I hitchhiked across the island last March. Some things are becoming clearer, many are becoming yet more obscured by the forces at play.

Fidel on Cuban television

I highly recommend this article in the New Yorker by Jon Lee Anderson, a writer whose view on Cuba strikes me as unusually well-rounded and informed. It's certainly well-timed, being published just a few weeks before the announcement of Castro's illness. I had firsthand experience with many of the things he describes in the article, and can vouch for it. Anderson's biography of Che Guevara is also worth mentioning, it's the best I've seen, if you're interested.

At the moment, a couple things seem important to remember. First, Fidel is possibly already dead. This is at least as likely as any of the other possibilities, remember that Franco had been dead for weeks before his Spanish government announced the news.

Second, there is a lot on the line. To understate it, our recent experience in Iraq doesn't speak highly for our country's expertise in the area of "nation-building" and "regime change." Be wary when you hear Bush-appointed bureaucrats speak of the "transition to a market economy" in Cuba. Sure, a lot can be approved upon in Cuba, but it would be a huge global loss if the island were to go the way of Haiti or even Puerto Rico. It deserves freedom from Fidel and freedom from US dominance. A second colonial era would benefit no one, not even Americans in the long run.

There's an unpublished article of mine that I wrote in March on this subject, I just may post it here soon. In the meantime, check this out: it is a video I recorded of Fidel speaking on State television in Cuba in February. He is speaking at a transportation summit with the Chinese (who are currently underwriting a supposed major upgrade in the Cuban system), so there is a Chinese interpreter speaking as well. At this point, he had been speaking for several hours and just happened to serve onto the subject of the US just as I hit record. Let me know what you think.

The old man rides an old bicycle

The old man rides an old bicycle in slow rhythm along the bay, on his way home to his wife after watching the technicolor sunset on the old dock. "¿De qué año es su bicicleta?" I ask him as he peddles by me. "Tiene 50 años," he says, smiling as he stops the bike next to me.

"¿Es un tipo Schwinn?" I ask, being into this type of thing.

"No, se llama Super Rex," he tells me, and pulls out of the breast pocket of his half-open cotton shirt the ancient registration card, which is paperclipped to his carné de identidad. "El gobierno me dio este papel pero como no saben escribir bien pusieron 'suder res.'" We laugh.

He asks me where I'm from. "Oh!," his eyes flush with emotion as he folds up his thick glasses. "I lived for five years there! In New York! Nineteen Fifty Five until Nineteen Sixty. But I think, not because I'm Cuban, that here, Cienfuegos, has the most beautiful sunsets in the world."

"Looked pretty good to me," I tell him.

"How do you like Cuba?"

"Me facina," I say, smiling.

"The same for me in New York," he smiles too. "I love my country," he says the words slowly, as if describing an ache, "but this situation here... it's not good. I stay against my will because I love my country. But this system doesn't work."

"I agree with you," I tell him. I realize he only has the courage to say these things because we are speaking in broken English. By this time we've stopped walking and we're leaning close to each other. He starts laughing.

"I must go," he says, "my wife is waiting for me. It was a pleasure to talk to you and practice my broken English."

"For me too. Tell your wife I say hello and take care."

"Ok, goodbye."

•

radio habana

Recorded in early marzo in la Ciudad de la Habana, Cuba as part of the Ambient Mixtape Project, I give you the Cuban airwaves.

Most of these sounds can't be found anywhere off the island. What you'll find here may or may not interest you. If you're into linguistics you'll dig the accents, if you like music there's a good variety here, if you're into politics you'll get a chance to hear some first-rate propaganda, if you're curious I hope you won't be disappointed.

I'm still working on importing all of the audio I recorded, though I'm finished with the radio sections now and thought they deserved to be heard. If you're curious but not patient, wait for the mixtape, as most of the good stuff will also appear on there. Enjoy and let me know what you like.

These files are large. All are available as 96kbs mp3 files.

  • A.M. 1 15.1mb 21:59 By nature of it being AM radio, some of this is a little sketchy as far as quality. But remember, perfection ain't the goal. I run more or less through the dial on this one. A couple full songs, some better than others depending on what you like. A long and somewhat strange discussion about the importance of the horse in the history of people. A very misplaced American country rock song.
  • A.M. 2 12.2mb 17:41 Information on people willing to swap casas (as selling or buying them is illegal in Cuba). Some cuts from a few different songs. Radio Rebelde. Los titulares, news of the day. An errant ESPN signal. About five minutes of novela. A weak Radio Reloj signal broadcasting news of the Iraq war. Ending with some good propaganda.
  • Canciones 19.5mb 28:22 We begin with some more novela. Sometimes iffy quality. Trova, salsa, free jazz, disco. Radio Progreso. "La Onda de la Alegria, Cadena Nacional." The last few minutes are the best, if you ask me. Yes, including the shitty disco.
  • La Voz de Fidel 1.1mb 1:33 What can only be Fidel speaking over the airwaves. Listen to this man's voice and then decide for yourself how much longer you think he'll be around...
  • Radio Reloj 1 9.3mb 13:34 My favorite station, Radio Reloj, Clock Radio, with news and info thrown in as the seconds tick by in the background. Discussion of linguistics. International day of the Woman. Sports. The illegal base of Guantanamo.
  • Radio Reloj 2 5.4mb 7:51 Venezuela. Música Cubana. And a lot more. Enjoy.

Cuba 2006

[nggallery id=5] La Voz de Fidel by dirtyverbs

The second castle of the "New World," second statue of Columbus, the chalices of kings, gilded thrown that's never seen a holy ass, marble rooms where governments change with the swipe of pens, gold embossed caverns, build of marble shaped into a scale replica of the ambition of man.

A drowning Paris. A humid human maze. A history book written of towering words. The broken windows on the backsides of the monuments. Semitrucks hauling hundreds of humans, a sun actually built of fire, bodies built of naked flesh and sweat. Ay, compadre.

All fotos by logan phillips, 2006.

The Cuban Writers' Union

I.Some writers working for the state have clandestine dreams of smuggling out a manuscript to the presses of the capitalist world.

Others just rearrange the same adjectives around the words revolución and Fidel because Customs has long forbidden the importation of new words into Cuba,

so the remaining writers are like everyone else in this country, making do, shuffling the same broken puzzle pieces, searching for new endings.

The writers here are just like the men who sit on the sidewalks behind dirty wooden stands, injecting new aerosol breath into old disposable lighters and the womens’ fine hands in the relojería, fixing old watches with skill, then searching for the hour to set the watches by, the hour that this country lost long ago.

II. On the edges of this living city there are piles upon piles of all the abandoned thoughts, dirty and wet, buzzing with flies, putrid in the tropical sun.

And there are coasts where the government allows no one to swim because there too they have dumped all the aborted ideas of the island, coasts where the waves mumble unintelligible promise and people stop on the seawalk to gaze at the hollow horizon. Sometimes the weight of their unintended sighs is enough to push the cool breeze back out to sea.

Here for every kilo of true creativity the streets are polluted with a hundred liters of tears. Maybe it’s no wonder that the bookshops read like the dictator’s personal library and all the true writers sit in buildings about to collapse, trying to inject new breath onto thin sheets of cheap paper, while others have stopped writing altogether, and spend their days folding their quota of paper into airplanes which they bring down to the shore and toss into the sea, hoping they’ll catch the warm propulsion of an entire nation sighing.

The world has gotten so small that now there’s no more room in the oceans for so many bottles containing the words of so many trapped peoples. The few boats that do manage to leave set sail to the deafening sound of shattering glass and sinking letters. No more messages, no bottles. Here in Cuba all the writers know better than to trust the sea, they study the sky, trying to guess the hour and the best flight plans for paper airplanes.

•

Hasta el Horizonte Siempre

Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo, México Querido Mundo,

I'm headed off into the unknown and won't be posting anything or replying to any emails for the next three weeks. Todo me espera. Don't worry, it will be worth it, I promise good cuentos.

Todo es possible, nada es seguro. Now go and don't stop going.

logan