A Second Call from Fidel

By MIGUEL BONASSO, from Havana

There was a phone call at six in the morning that I only found out about three hours later.
And then came a second call.
-Hey, tell me about that article. It received tremendous coverage! ­­­—a hoarse voice says on the other end of the line and then adds ironically— they’ve told me you have become the star of the summit that everyone wants to talk to you.
After a few seconds, he adds with his proverbial gentleness:
-What are you doing today? Would you like to get together for a while? I’d like to personally congratulate you for the article and for your words at the Group of 15 Summit.
He was referring to the exclusive article that this newspaper [Pagina 12] published last Thursday and the speech I made that same day in representation of President Nestor Kirchner. Although I know him well, it’s hard to believe what the Commander is telling me. See him twice in two days; hearing him happy as if he wasn’t Fidel Castro but instead a beginner being interviewed for the first time.
Besides, he was right about the coverage. I’ve spent the last two days giving interviews about the interview and receiving greetings and inquiries from hundreds of delegates at the summit of the Non Aligned Movement. Princes with turbans, presidents from three continents, ministers, ambassadors of the Third and First World have all asked me about Fidel’s health.
Also many humble and anonymous Cubans —like those who open a door or bring you a mojito— have asked me with watery eyes and emotion: “Did the commander really look well? Does he stand up without help? Does he walk? Has he regained some weight?
At the opening session of the 14th Summit of the Non Aligned Movement they have named him president even though he wasn’t present at the modern and functional main hall of the Convention Center. Maybe he’s in the back, overwhelming the summit with his absence-presence; receiving Kofi Annan, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Evo Morales, Hugo Chavez or this author, in his convalescent room.
Everybody remembers the exclusive photos and article published last Thursday by Pagina 12 that was picked up by hundreds of media outlets around the world.
But the world can also see that things continue to function here like clockwork. The summit is very well organized (it’s not easy to lodge dozens of heads-of-state with their entourages and guards) and the opening ceremony has been moderate and eloquent. Raul Castro, the acting president of both Cuba and the summit, has delivered a speech that effectively combined the current situation with history. Hours later, his older brother told me: “Raul’s speech was very good. It was very precise.”
The second visit occurs: the hallway, the camera, the men in white, the kind woman that leads me to the sancta santorum where the Cuban leader is recovering.
“Today we are going to walk,” says Fidel Castro by way of a greeting.
And we walked around the room under the camera of Richard, one of his young assistants. The commander explains: “It is important to stretch.”
We then sit down and he tells me with his bright eyes full of joy: “These days I have a tremendous appetite. I am eating everything.”
I realize that, unconsciously, I have become a sort of spokesperson on the progress of his recovery. As always, we talk about everything divine and human and he asks me to deliver a special greeting to the readers of Pagina 12.
I tell him that Chapter 24 of the book 100 Hours with Fidel appears today as a supplement of the newspaper and he is very pleased with the news. Two days before, as the readers will remember, he had told me that the revision and enhancement of the memoir, compiled in 100 hours of interviews with journalist Ignacio Ramonet, had been his main concern during the difficult and dangerous hours that followed his operation.
Now that those dark hours are left behind, 100 Hours with Fidel remains an impressive book that the heads of state of the Non-Aligned Movement received yesterday as a gift in a special hardcover edition.
Over the last few days, many people have asked me if the commander, after recovering completely, will return to be the same as before (the tireless) or if he will concentrate exclusively on strategic matters, so as to conserve his health which millions of people treat as their own. It’s a difficult question to answer. And for that reason I didn’t even try.
I can only tell what I saw during that second call. He is interested in what is going on in Venezuela, in Bolivia, in Mexico, in Argentina, at the summit and its hallways. He attentively listens to the news articles read to him by his secretary Carlitos Valenciaga and asks to be put in touch with this or that person.
And he says goodbye, standing, with a hug, because Evo is about to arrive.
To tell you the truth, it’s hard for me to imagine him resting.

An Account of Fidel's New Great Battle

By MIGUEL BONASSO, reporting from Havana*

I had prepared myself to see him, but the reality was much more striking. I was even bringing a travel bag for him. That is, an Argentine leather case that has predetermined spaces for papers, cards, plane tickets, passport, for notes, all that a traveler needs. I know very well that Fidel Castro does not carry credit cards nor money with when he travels abroad, but the modest present had an implicit subliminal message: "I hope that you will soon be well, so that you can travel again."
But one thing is what one imagines, fears, or wishes and another is very different, the facts themselves. Suddenly there was a telephone call. "You should be at a given time in a given place." And nothing more. It could be possible that I met him personally or I could be meeting with some of his right-hand people in a preparatory meeting.
I could not believe that I was so lucky. I was the first guest to the summit of the Non-Aligned Movement that would have the privilege of seeing the commander during his recovery, as Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales had done before the summit.
I was so stunned that I even forgot to take a notebook with me, just in case I had the additional luck that he made a statement.
But when I arrived on the spot, I immediately knew I would see him. Along with his closest collaborators, I walked down an aisle just as if I was watching a travel sequence in which the visitor sees reality intensify as he moves forward. At first I saw his bodyguards dressed in olive green uniforms, then his personal doctor who is always very good-natured, and at the end of the corridor there were two women and a tall man, the three of them wearing white robes. Were they doctors or nurses? At last, a very kind woman led me into a room. An austere white bedroom without a single decoration: Fidel, who was sitting on a bed, before a movable white table, stood up to give me a hug.
He was wearing a purple robe and matching pajamas, and fortunately, was the usual Fidel. It was true that he was thinner, but not as much as in pictures that had recently been shown."I lost forty-one pounds," said he, "but I am putting on weight. I have almost gained half of the weight I lost."
Those were many kilograms for someone who already looked like a Spanish gentleman extracted from a novel by Cervantes and now shows a Quixote-like profile.
We sat to talk. It was half past eleven in yesterday's blazing hot Havana morning.
The lump I had in my throat softened up suddenly; it might seem incredible but Fidel was as lucid and ingenious as ever. He had the same confidential tone of a conspirator that his listener must unravel, the same mysterious winks or gestures for any verbal finding, some very loud orders to his collaborators to prove that he can give a speech again any time.
"You see," he stressed. "I can speak very loud if I want."
Some time passed by before he made the confession that fills this note with an existential nature. He started out as usual, speaking passionately about collective and political issues, pushing personal matters into the background. He was very enthusiastic about Venezuela's bid for a seat at the UN Security Council. "He is the same man," I thought. His transit through the illness and the certain presence of death have not diminished at all the intensity of his dreams and obsessions.
"They won't be able to prevent it [Venezuela]from joining in," he assured, underscoring that his great friend Hugo Chavez has become a world leader. "Chavez has been creating an indestructible model. He is not the defender of an extreme socialism, but a realist one. Indisputably, he will be successful in creating a big party that gathers and represents all Venezuelan revolutionaries.
"The diverse parties that supported him have responded favorably to his call of unity. Besides-Fidel added-he has promised to carry out the changes in a democratic manner, by consulting the people. He is not an extremist.
"He has promised to cooperate with the middle class and respect and collaborate with the private companies that comply with the principles of the revolution.
"He has also undertaken social programs that have no precedent worldwide. That has made him an invincible leader.
"I think that a people so plundered like the Venezuelan people deserve this change.
"I joyously see the impetus for Latin American integration, in which Venezuela will be an example of what can be done when a country puts its resources in the service of its people. Chavez does not only use those resources properly, but he multiplies them as well with fiscal measures that were not taken before."
Then he went on to speak about "Operation Miracle", one of the healthcare programs that he is most passionate about. And he did it with the same zeal as usual. As if he had never been in a serious health condition that kept millions of people in suspense. He recalled that in barely two years, some 400,000 Latin Americans had been operated on for cataracts, pterigium, and other eye diseases with the application of new ophthalmologic techniques developed by Cuban specialists.
He also remarked that all those operations, many of which had been performed in Cuba, had been free of charge for the benefit of the poorest Latin Americans.
Later, Fidel offered me more coffee, while a lot of photos were taken. With his perennial enthusiasm, he admirably commented: "These digital cameras are incredible."
At this point, we were coming closer to the confession. There was a thick book on the table. It had an unpretentious but well-designed cover, which read "One Hundred Hours with Fidel. Conversations with Ignacio Ramonet. Second edition. Revised and enriched with further information."
A few months before, I had seen—with visible envy—the first edition of that mega-interview in which the Cuban leader reviews his life and the world history in which he stands out as one of the main protagonists.
In June, the Commander-in-Chief had shown me the handwritten corrections to his answers in the first edition. Ramonet's questions had, obviously, been kept unaltered by the interviewee. By the end of July, when I met him again in Cordoba, he was carrying the proofs; he was in the middle of the process of revision and enlargement. But I would have never imagined what happened after his July 27 operation.
"I kept doing the corrections even in the worst moments," he whispered, "I did not stop correcting it. Don't believe that I did it when I got better. I did it since the first days. And I did not only do it because of its content but rather because I had promised the people that I would revise it before having it published. So I spent many hours dictating to Carlitos [Carlos Valenciaga, his secretary]. Long hours."
He looked at me, with his eyes wide open and that expression of amazement that normally surrounds his mouth when he shoots a decisive dart, and then said with a serious but unemphatic tone:
"I wanted to finish it, because I didn’t know how much time I was going to have.”
The shadow of an immense limit, the impossibility of all possibilities, was floating in the bottom of his eyes. Then I said: "Another great battle."
He nodded and added, “I am telling those things as a friend and a writer."Then he apologized for not being able to give me a book for protocol reasons, as a copy had to be handed first to each head of state attending the Non-Aligned Movement meeting.
Next to us, pondering over some of the new contributions to the revised edition was the tireless Carlitos Valenciaga—the young collaborator that read the historical proclamation in which Fidel relinquished his responsibilities.
"It includes unpublished letters [by Fidel Castro] to Saddam Hussein recommending he withdraw from Kuwait. The contextualized letters to Nikita Khrushchev," said Valenciaga.
On the white table there was also a booklet reproducing the cover of the book and the following title. "Chapter 24: The events of April, 2002 and other Latin American issues."
"It has been translated into nine languages," Valenciaga explained. I asked for a copy to have it reproduced as an advance in Pagina/12 [Argentine newspaper] after it was distributed among the heads of state.
Particularly two loyal friends whom the commander awaited impatiently: Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales. In addition to the failed coup d'état against Chavez, in chapter 24 the reader will find interesting reflections about nationalist and progressive militaries in Latin America, such as Omar Torrijos, Juan Velasco Alvarado or even Juan Domingo Peron.
And he makes sharp comments on the defeat of Carlos Menem and the triumph of Nestor Kirchner in 2003.
The moment to say goodbye was nearing. The conversation had lasted an hour and a half. Fidel pointed at a modest TV set that was in front of his bed (it didn’t have a plasma screen nor stereophonic sound) and said: "Television is more and more violent. Everything is extreme violence. Everything is advertising and violence, from fiction to international newscasts."
I said, with all honesty, that I was leaving very happy to see him so well."Everything in its due time," he noted as he gave me a handshake. "You must not forget that the machine that is being repaired is already 80 years old.”
*Published in the September 14 edition of the Argentine daily newspaper Pagina/12

Cubans in the United States

BY ANDRES GOMEZ—Editor of Areítodigital

WASHINGTON D.C—Some1, 448,684 of us Cubans live in the United States according to a 2004 study by the U.S. Census Bureau titled “American Community Survey”. The Census Bureau considered as Cubans those born in Cuba and their descendents born in the United States. Of these, an estimated 912,686 (63%) were born in Cuba and 535,998 (37%) are their U.S. born decedents.

Thus we are nearly 4% of the total 40.5 million Latin Americans living here. The results of this census were published in a recent study by the Pew Hispanic Center, a reputable research center that studies the Latin American community in the United States, and titled: “Cubans in the United States.”

Of the close to 913,000 Cubans who were born in Cuba, 431, 429 (30%) arrived in this country before 1980; 171 798 (12%) came between 1980 and 1990; and 309,459 (21.4%) from 1990 to 2004, the year of the census. To this last figure at least another 40,000 must be added corresponding to the 20,000 minimum that annually emigrate to the United States legally, as stipulated in the Migratory Agreements in force between the two governments. The remaining 37% are U.S. descendents.

The average age of the U.S. Cuban population is 41, much older than the average age of the rest of the U.S. Hispanic population (Latin Americans and their descendents) which is 27, and the average of the general U.S. population, which is 36.The average age of U.S-born descendents is estimated at 18.5 years; of Cubans arriving before 1980, 63; of those arriving between 1980 and 1990, 50; and of those arriving between 1990 and 2004, 38.

More than two-thirds (around 990,000) of Cubans in the United States live in Florida. Other states with large Cuban populations are New Jersey (81,000), New York (78,000), California (74,000) and Texas (34,000). Surprisingly, according to this study, 1,356 live in distant and freezing Alaska and another 1,886 in the remote but sunny islands of Hawaii.

Cubans also live in other isolated areas of the country; for example, there are 246 in Montana; no less than 13,000 in the Nevada desert; and 200 and 62, respectively, in the remote states of North Dakota and Wyoming,.Officially, according to this study, there are only two states where no Cubans live. These are South Dakota and Arkansas, although I’ll bet that if you looked real hard, you would find a Cuban living there¼ and perhaps more than one.

According to the study, 25% of U.S. Cubans over the age of 25 are university graduates. That is double the percentage of other Hispanics (12%), although lower than that of non-Hispanic whites (30%). Among the Cuban population, 39% of those born in the United States are university graduates, compared to 22% of those born in Cuba.

Of those born in Cuba, the group with the highest number of university graduates (26%) are those who arrived between 1990 and 2004, followed by those who immigrated before 1980 (24%), and out of those who left the island between 1980 and 1990, only 13% are university graduates.

The average annual wage of the Cuban population is $38,000, higher than that of other Hispanics ($36,000), but less than that of non-Hispanics ($48 mil). Among those born in Cuba, this average wage is $38,000 for Cubans arriving before 1980; $33,000 for those immigrating between 1990 and 2004; and $30,000 for those arriving between 1980 and 1990.

Nevertheless, 13% of Cubans under 18 years of age are living in poverty; as well as 11% of those between the ages of 18 and 64, although this is lower than the figure for other Hispanics living in poverty in these age categories: 27% and17%, respectively.But the situation becomes worse for Cubans over 64. Of this age group 24% are living in poverty as opposed to only 18% of other Hispanics and 7% of non-Hispanic whites.

The figure is even worse for elderly Cubans who were born in Cuba: for those aged over 64 who arrived before 1980, 20% are living in poverty; between 1990 and 2004, 36%; and shamefully, four out of every 10 Cubans (39%) over 64 who migrated between 1980 and 1990 are living in poverty.The study by the Pew Hispanic Center maintains, as we all know, that the high incidence of Cuban obtaining U.S. citizenship reflects their special migratory status.

Nearly 60% of the Cuban population has acquired U.S. citizenship, double that of other Hispanics (26%). Ninety percent of Cubans who emigrated before 1980 are U.S. citizens, compared to 60% of those coming between 1980 and 1990, and only 18% of those who arrived between 1990 and el 2004.Cubans and their descendents make up 6% of all Hispanic registered voters. The study indicates that 28% of those consider themselves Republicans, 20% Democrats and 27% politically independent.

Finally and significantly, the Census Bureau study demonstrates that in 2004, 56% of Cubans were in support of dialogue between the United States and the Cuban government to resolve existing conflicts between the countries. A clear rejection of the intransigent and inhumane posture of the Cuban American ultra-right.