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US Blockade has cost Cuba over 86 Billion Dollars

2006-10-04T07:40:00.001-07:00

Successive US governments’ anti-Cuba policy have failed to destroy the Cuban revolution, but the blockade is not rhetoric, it has cost the island’s economy over 86 billion dollars, bringing about severe economic restrictions, said first vice Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez at the Foreign Ministry in Havana on Monday.

Rodriguez noted that the nearly half century blockade is a blatant violation of human rights and an act of war and genocide against the Cuban people.

Addressing national and foreign media at the Foreign Ministry, Rodriguez presented this year’s edition of Cuba’s report to the United Nations General Assembly on the “Necessity of ending the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States of America against Cuba.” Rodriguez stressed that despite all the hardships it has caused, it has failed, and it will fail because it is being met by the Cuban people’s resilience.

On November 8, the General Assembly will once again take a look at the issue and will hold a vote on a resolution presented by Cuba, which was approved last year by 182 of the 192 UN member countries.

The Cuban diplomat recalled that it is the longest and cruellest blockade in the history of humanity, and includes medicines and food.

He added that just in 2005, it caused 4.186 billion dollars in losses, and because of its restrictions, Cuba was denied the possibility of welcoming US tourists, while it intensified the harassment of those people who visit the island through third countries.

Last year 487 US citizens or residents were fined a total of 530,000 dollars for not complying with restrictions on travel to the island.

According to studies published in Washington D.C., every year an estimated 5 million US tourists do not come to the island that would have, making the local economy miss out some 7 billion dollars in revenues.

Rodriguez also made reference to the toughening of the measures included in the so called Bush Plan for Cuba related to the enforcement of prohibitions of family visits by Cuban Americans, which have dropped by 54%, while visits of US nationals were 45% lower.

Nevertheless, the Cuban official said that US anti-Cuban policies are totally isolated, a fact that will be thoroughly corroborated by the upcoming November 8 vote at the UN General Assembly.

To obtain the full text of Cuba’s Report to the United Nations General Assembly on Resolution 60/12: “Necessity of ending the economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States of America against Cuba” connect to http://www.cubaminrex.cu/English/index.asp

It is also available in Arabic, Portuguese, Russian, Italian, French, English and Spanish.

US Blockade has cost Cuba over 86 Billion Dollars

2006-10-04T07:40:00.000-07:00

Rodriguez noted that the nearly half century blockade is a blatant violation of human rights and an act of war and genocide against the Cuban people.

The Cuban diplomat recalled that it is the longest and cruellest blockade in the history of humanity, and includes medicines and food.

Last year 487 US citizens or residents were fined a total of 530,000 dollars for not complying with restrictions on travel to the island.

Nevertheless, the Cuban official said that US anti-Cuban policies are totally isolated, a fact that will be thoroughly corroborated by the upcoming November 8 vote at the UN General Assembly.

It is also available in Arabic, Portuguese, Russian, Italian, French, English and Spanish.

A Second Call from Fidel

2006-09-18T12:31:00.000-07:00

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

2006-09-18T12:27:00.000-07:00

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

2006-09-04T07:02:00.000-07:00

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.

Statement from Cuba's Parliament on Cuban Five Case

2006-08-17T07:53:00.000-07:00

The Constitutional and Judicial Affairs Commission of the NationalAssembly of the People's Power [Cuban Parliament] voices indignationover the decision of the Atlanta Federal Appeals Court, which, removedfrom judicial procedures, invalidated the unanimous decision of thepanel of three judges that had declared null the trial that took placein Miami against Cuban Five anti-terrorist fighters Gerardo Hernandez,Ramon Labanino, Fernando Gonzalez, Rene Gonzalez and Antonio Guerrero.

The decision makes evident once again the political nature of the trialand the unjust measures adopted, the arbitrary behavior of the UnitedStates government, the violation of the US Constitution and laws, and abreach of the most basic standards of law and specifically of HumanRights.The magistrates of the panel, whose professional experience adds tomore than 80 years, stated in a 93-page decision that "forming an(impartial) jury in this community (Miami) was less than probable dueto the prejudice existing there." "Therefore a new trial was orderedbecause of the perfect storm created when a wave of intense feelingsfrom the community and widespread publicity before and during the trialcombined with inappropriate references made by the prosecutor.

"The decision adopted by the Atlanta court didn't take intoconsideration the violent and intimidating environment existing inMiami, nor the most recent happenings in that city reported by thelocal media. Those included the seizing of weapons caches destined forterrorist attacks against Cuba and public statements by terrorists who,with total impunity, recognized their acts. This confirmed the need forthe monitoring work that the Cuban Five were carrying out to learnabout the violent actions planned against Cuba by groups in Miami thathave resulted in the death of innocent civilians. The revelationsbrought new and dramatic evidence in support of the defense's argumentregarding the universal principal of the right of a state to defenditself.

The decision by the United Nations Human Rights Commission WorkingGroup on Arbitrary Detentions has also been totally ignored.

The commission ruled that taking into consideration the events andcircumstances under which the trial took place, the nature of thecharges against the accused, and the severe sentences imposed on them,the trail was not held in a climate of objectivity and impartialitythat is required to comply with the standards of a fair trial asdefined by article 14 of the International Convention of Civil andPolitical Rights.

The commission further declared the detention of theCuban Five as arbitrary, and called upon the government of the UnitedStates to immediately remedy the situation by restoring the rightswhich they have been deprived.

We denounce this infamous and ignominious decision and call uponparliamentarians around the world and on all peace loving people tojoin this noble cause, to demand that the US government immediatelyrelease the Cuban Five, who fought against terrorism to preserve thelife and peace of the Cuban people and the people of the United Statesas well.

By September, they will have spent eight years of unjustimprisonment, with great limitations on visits by their relatives,including two of them who have not been able to see their wives.The International Campaign to Free the Cuban Five, on from September 12to October 6, will serve to continue and increase the struggle fortruth and justice for our brothers and for the development of a widereaching movement among parliaments and in the legal community so thatthe universal principles of law prevail and make possible thesepatriots? return to Cuba.Havana, August 15, 2006.

Taken From Granma NewspaperDeclaración de la Comisión de Asuntos Constitucionales y Juridicos dela Asamblea Nacional del Poder Popular de la República de Cuba

Cuba Presents Draft of Final NAM Summit Declaration

2006-08-17T07:42:00.000-07:00

Cuba has presented the Coordination Bureau of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) with a draft of a final declaration to be discussed at the 14th Summit of this body in Havana from September 11-16.
A Cuban Foreign Ministry source told Prensa Latina Wednesday that the document was delivered to representatives of the member countries at the UN headquarters in New York by Abelardo Moreno, Cuba’s deputy foreign minister.
According to traditional practice, the proposal is first reviewed by the Bureau, in charge of coordinating activities and the positions of the states represented in the 116 member Non-Aligned Movement.
The draft declaration was prepared by Cuba as the host nation for the upcoming NAM meeting of heads of state and government. At the summit the island will assume the presidency of the group for a three-year period for the second time in its history.
The text covers essential issues related to the current international scene at a juncture when positions must be adopted to face a United States foreign policy that attempts to impose its views by force.
The explosive situation in the Middle East with Israel’s actions backed by Washington, the White House threats against Iran and Venezuela and the US plans to further tighten its blockade of Cuba are some of the situations bringing concern to the international community.
Another issue is the role the United Nations should play in the different crisis affecting the world and especially the demand for a restructuring of the UN Security Council, which the Non-Aligned Movement feels is necessary. (PL)

Cuba's Pop Monarchs Release New AlbumHavana

2006-05-05T20:16:00.000-07:00

Popular Cuban duo Buena Fe has programmed a series of concerts at Havana's Karl Marx Theater to celebrate the release oftheir fourth disc Presagios (Premonitions).

The third concert isscheduled for Friday, May 12, at 9:00 p.m. and was announced aftertickets for the 5,000 seats at the Karl Marx for this week's Friday andSaturday shows were quickly sold out, reports Granma newspaper.Presagios is a follow-up to the enormously popular album Coranzonero,which consolidated the band at the top of the pop charts.

With this latest effort, Israel Rojas and Yoel Martinez, both hailing from theeastern province of Guantanamo, have kept the Buena Fe sound but addeda few elements of Samba and Caribbean flavor.Israel Rojas, the band's musical director, spoke about these newtouches. He noted that they come naturally to Buena Fe's music anddon't sound at all contrived, "We are from Guantanamo and the Caribbeanis part of our culture."

A special presentation of Presagios took place Thursday at the smallerAtril hall of the Karl Marx Theatre. During the presentation, the videofor the album's first single, Cayendo -directed by Ian Padron-- wasshown.

Elsida Gonzalez Portal, musical director for EGREM, the recordlabel that released the album, spoke about Buena Fe's internationalsuccess, pointing out that with such a sophisticated pop sound andintelligent lyrics they serve as good ambassadors for Cuba's newgeneration of popular music.

Jose Manuel Garcia, the album's producer, said, "Once again the publicwill enjoy great songs and be moved by the lyricism of such songs asCon hijo incluido and Premoniciones."

Cuba Protects its Children and Enforces Law

2006-04-26T17:18:00.000-07:00

By Istvan Ojeda Bello

Children are the most important members for any family and most states have shown concern for the wellbeing of future generations. Consequently, if parents fail to fulfill their natural obligations, it is the responsibility for the nation’s judicial power to take measures to preserve the integrity of its youngest citizens.

The Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1989 and in effect since 1990, clearly expresses in its ninth article that "state parties shall ensure that a child not be separated from his or her parents against their will, except when competent authorities —subject to judicial review— determine, in accordance with applicable law and procedures, that such separation is necessary for the best interests of the child."

Currently 96 percent of the children around the world, including Cuban children, live in countries whose laws are compatible with the UN convention. The right of parents to raise their children, regardless of their religious or political beliefs, has been recognized worldwide.

Spain’s constitution, for instance, states in its 39th article that parents should provide all types of assistance to children they have had within or outside marriage, while they are minors and in other cases that the law may establish.

Likewise, Mexico’s constitution affirms in Article 4 that parents shall ensure the right of minors to satisfy their needs and must take care for their physical and mental health.

Guatemala’s Magna Carta makes it clear, in Article 51, that "the state shall ensure the physical, mental, and moral wellbeing of minors and the elderly. It will ensure their right to food, healthcare, education and security, and welfare."

The obligations established by the different national laws even consider the possibility of withdrawing the legal custody of minors from people who are a threat to the physical or mental integrity of children. It is therefore not at all strange that several countries include in their fundamental legislation the commitment of the state to the welfare of boys and girls.

In that sense Germany’s constitution, in Article 6, states that "the protection and education of children is a natural right entitled to parents and an obligation which primarily involves them (…) children could only be separated from their family by virtue of a law, if those in responsible for their education do not comply with their duties, or if, for others reason, the children run the risk of abandonment." It is an outrageous crime to cause any harm to a child.

That is why judicial institutions are very severe with those who mistreat children. Recently a Catalonian court withdrew the custody of their four children from a couple who lives Barcelona. They were accused of maltreatment and neglect after one of their children had to be operated on for necrosis in one of his hands; this had resulted from a poorly treated burn. The mother was the first to be arrested. Due to the resulting lesions, she was accused of child neglect, which is considered a crime by Article 226 of the Spanish Penal Code.

In Valencia, also in Spain, some 70 parents lost their rights to their children in 2005 after judicial authorities proved that the minors were living in a dangerous family situation. The Constitution of the Republic of Cuba, in its fourth chapter, recognizes that the family is the fundamental unit of society and states that parents have the duties to feed their children, assist them in the defense of their interests, and contribute actively to their education and development.

Cuba has proven on several occasions its attachment to the right of parents to give their children the type of education that they consider most appropriate, even prior to the UN adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Perhaps the period which was most trying for Cuba was in the 1960’s, when many parents —confused by counter-revolutionary propaganda— sent their children alone to the US.

In September 1961, Fidel Castro, who was then prime minister of the revolutionary government, said, "It is painful that those children are being sent there [to the US] to be educated, but above all, we respect the sentiment and right of each family." Those were the days of Operation Peter Pan, a slanderous propaganda campaign directed from the US which spread the rumor that the Cuban government would deprive parents of custody of their children.

More than 14,000 children were taken to the US. The revolutionary government, however, never prevented the departure of any of the minors, as long as they left the country in a safe and legal manner. According to Dr. Olga Miranda Bravo, if the authorities had prevented the departure of the children —whom their parents had given the corresponding authorization through a notarial act and all requirements for travel abroad had been met— then the slanderer would have been proven right.

Miaranda Bravo, who has been a member of The Hague’s Permanent Court of Arbitration since 1973 and an adjunct Professor of Havana’s Higher Institute of International Relations, says that, "child custody, according to Cuban legislation, is a right of all parents, even those who are not disqualified to exercise it.

This was not the case of those parents misled by that propaganda, as they excised their right and transferred it to US authorities or to their representatives in that country. For that, they subsequently paid a high price, as in many cases they lost their children, were later rebuked by their children or by history itself. Laws have acknowledged that parents have the right to raise their children and to take them wherever they decide.

But the laws in most countries around the world have also established that parents cannot violate the laws, nor are they entitled to put the lives of their children at stake

Fidel Castro Leads Bay of Pigs Anniversary Assembly

2006-04-20T16:05:00.000-07:00

Commander in Chief Fidel Castro led the political cultural assembly to commemorate the 45th anniversary of the victory against the Bay of Pigs invasion. He denounced new aggressive plans of the United States government.

Orfilio Pelaez

pelaez@granma.cip.cu

We have high hopes that the new generations will have the same determination as the valuable comrades who died fighting the mercenary aggression, said President Fidel Castro at the political cultural assembly for the 45th anniversary of the victory over the Bay of Pigs invasion, held Wednesday at the Karl Marx Theatre in Havana.

At the beginning of his speech, the leader of the Revolution said he had never seen so much history and glory together. He was referring to the presence of over 3,000 participants in the heroic defense of the island at the Bay of Pigs, which dealt US imperialism its first major defeat in Latin America.

Before Fidel Castro addressed the audience and the nation, three other speakers took to the podium: Bay of Pigs veteran Julio Osvaldo Chaviano, Dr. Antonio Vargas Gonzalez of the Henry Reeve Medical Brigade, and Lisbeth Ruiz Sanchez, student at the Eduardo Garcia Delgado Art Instructors School.

The evening included performances by student Kenia Otano, who recited a poem, musicians Emiliano Sardinas and Hector Gutierrez, actor Jorge Enrique Caballero and troubadour Sara Gonzalez, who sang Giron, The Victory.

Besides the thousands of Bay of Pigs veterans and family members of those who died in battle, also attending the gathering were members of the Political Bureau of the Communist Party and Councils of State and Ministers, relatives of the Cuban Five, Juan Miguel Gonzalez and his family including his son Elian, representatives of political parties including Kgalema Motlanthe, secretary general of South Africa’s African National Congress party, and the diplomatic corps.

The U.S. ban on travel to Cuba devastates local families

2006-04-19T17:05:00.000-07:00

By Kathy Johnston

A rare visit to SLO next week by a musician from Cuba brings into the spotlight the U.S. ban on travel to and from our Caribbean neighbor. It's a prohibition that hits especially close to home for two prominent local Cuban-Americans who aren't allowed to go back to see their families. Delvis Fernandez, the founder and president of the national Cuban American Alliance Education Fund, would like to take his blind 88-year-old mother Sara to Cuba to visit with her diabetic 86-year-old sister, whose leg was recently amputated. But their proposed trip is illegal under the U.S.

Administration's tightening regulations.

George "Jorge" Milanés of Los Osos wants to travel to Havana to see his dying 94-year-old aunt, Tia Carmen, who-in a typical Cuban extended family custom-helped raise him. However, U.S. rules forbid him to go. "What are we as a society if we violate the basic rights of the most fundamental part of civilization, the family?" asks Fernandez, who moved from his Washington, D.C. office to See Canyon to be closer to his sons and grandchildren.

"There is such pain among Cuban-Americans because of family separation. I want American people to be aware that the policy of the Bush Administration has exacerbated a tremendous problem," he adds.

Although other Americans are not allowed to travel to Cuba at all, Cuban-Americans are now allowed one trip every three years to visit family members. But under the new rules, "family" has been redefined only as mother, father, sister or brother. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, and nephews don't qualify-which is the reason Fernandez is not allowed to accompany his aging mother on a visit to her sister.

"We could be detained, we could be arrested, if we go to see our family, if we unite two elderly people, two loving sisters, in the twilight of their lives," Fernandez says with a deep sigh.

Administration officials say the travel ban is aimed at supporting the U.S. embargo and restricting the flow of funds to Fidel Castro's government, thereby hastening a regime change. That's also the reason Cubans are not permitted to travel into the U.S., where they might earn money.

Cuban guitarist and composer Pablo Menéndez, who comes to Cuesta College April 17, is virtually the only musician currently allowed to travel back and forth. But he's a special case. Born in Oakland, California, Pablo Menéndez went to Cuba in 1966, at age 14, to visit his father and study music. He's been living and playing music there ever since, an active part of the Cuban music scene.

Members of Menéndez' Grammy-nominated band Mezcla (Spanish for "mixture") are not allowed to accompany him, so instead of a concert, he'll give a multimedia tribute to Cuban music. The event is cosponsored by the Central Coast Cuban American Alliance, a local group founded by Milanés after he revisited his birthplace in Cuba in 2000.

Milanés first met Pablo Menéndez 12 years ago, while attending a Northern California concert of Mezcla promoted by Carlos Santana. "Mezcla is the cleanest, freshest water I have ever tasted," gushes Santana.

Impressed by the band leader's blend of traditional African rhythms, Cuban songs, jazz, blues, and rock, Milanés made a point of seeing Pablo Menéndez' concert at Havana's premier jazz club, La Zorra y El Cuervo (The Fox and the Skunk). [Fox and Crow--L.A.] He's stayed in contact, and invited the Cuban musician to the Central Coast for next week's Cuesta College presentation.

With the Bush Administration's new definition of "family" for Cuban-Americans, Milanés cannot legally travel to Havana again, since he has only aunts, cousins, nieces and nephews there. His California-born children are not allowed a first-hand experience of their Cuban roots. "How gross is that, to hinge foreign policy on the separation of families, especially for a 'family values' kind of guy," Milanés fumes.

When Milanés was three, during Cuba's revolutionary struggle, a government-issued military bullet pierced the wall above his crib, so his uncle put him on a plane in Havana to join his parents in Miami. For Milanés, going back to Cuba after living 40 years in the U.S. was "life-altering."

"Stepping on Cuban soil in 2000, I almost got weak in the knees with the flush of feelings. I felt like I was home," Milanés says. Now, he says, to be legally allowed to visit, he would have to marry a Cuban-and would be allowed to see her only once every three years, even if they had children there.

Fernandez' story has a similar ring. He arrived in the U.S. from Cuba in 1957 at the age of 17 to attend college in Salt Lake City. With limited English skills, he enrolled in mathematics classes, eventually obtaining his Ph.D. and becoming a college math professor in the Bay Area.

Returning to Cuba to see his younger sister 22 years later was a dramatic experience for him. He had last seen her when she was just four years old.

"You have the hunger for connection, for commonality of day-to-day experiences, all those little things of life we're missing-that's what creates love," Fernandez says.

Later, his sister suffered an aneurysm, and her family in the U.S. couldn't go see her before she passed away. The experience was a catalyst for Fernandez to form the Cuban American Alliance Education Fund, which advocates for expanded trade, especially of food and medical supplies, and more liberal visitation policies. He's lobbied Congressional lawmakers, and last year testified before the U.S. Commission on Human Rights in Geneva.

But the U.S. rules on travel and trade keep tightening up, in spite of his efforts. Even educational and arts exchanges, like the one that took the SLO's Academy of Dance to Cuba in 2000, are no longer allowed.

Some Americans are refusing to follow the Administration's directives on Cuban travel, lured by the forbidden fruit that's closer to the U.S. than Santa Barbara is to SLO. In spite of the risk of fines up to $65,000, according to the Los Angeles Times, "many" Americans fly to Havana through the back door, from Canada, Jamaica, the Bahamas, or Mexico. At least 500 Americans were fined last year for traveling to Cuba, according to the Times
.
From Fernandez' point of view, most Americans are not aware of the U.S. Administration's travel restrictions. "You'll find every American you talk to rejects the U.S. policy. We have to expose this cruelty so people will rise up and say, 'This is not right.' There comes a time when you have to say, 'Basta,' that's enough."

Surrounded in his See Canyon office by Cuban books, photos, and a bust of José Martí, Fernandez quotes the Cuban national hero: "To see a crime and do nothing is to commit that crime."
Award-winning journalist Kathy Johnston may be reached at kjohnston@newtimesslo.com.

Frustrated Airwaves of a Macabre War

2006-04-18T17:32:00.000-07:00

By RANDY ALONSO FALCON

Along with the thunder of its arsenal, Washington flexes its muscles through its propaganda, using the latest technology.

The US media has been used to unleash wars (Remember the Maine! Remember Iraq!) and to manipulate public opinion in “enemy” countries.

Cuba has been a target of this media manipulation and aggression for four decades. Two of the most infamous manifestations of this anti-Cuban intervention are Radio Marti and TV Marti, created during the Reagan-Bush era in 1985 and 1990 respectively.

Right from their sordid beginnings as tools for manipulation, both have been ostracized. Twenty years and close to $500 million dollars later, the anti-Cuban radio and television stations are still without any audience in Cuba.

A recent study from the Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA) fully reveals the framework of US interference, professional ineptitude, manipulation, political corruption and the colossal waste associated with these two US government companies.

INDUCED BIRTH

The hypocritical media creations, cynically named after Cuba’s National Hero, were the fruit of Washington’s obstinacy and the Cuban American National Foundation’s ability to buy political leverage in Washington.

As revealed in the COHA report, one of the main driving forces behind the Broadcasting to Cuba Act of 1983 —which enabled the creation of Radio Marti— was the Republican senator from Florida, Paula Hawkins, who received more than $126,000 dollars from Cuban-American organizations for his political campaigns.

Following this law was the Television Broadcasting to Cuba Act, sponsored by the Democratic senator from South Carolina, Ernest Hollins, and Republican Representatives William Broomfield (Michigan) and Dante Fascell (Florida). The research report “The Cuban Connection: Cuban-American Money in US Elections, 1979-2000” reveals how Senator Hollins received more than $94,000 dollars, and Fascell more than $97,000, from Cuban-American organizations for their political campaigns.

FROM BAD TO WORSE

From the very onset of these two anti-Cuban stations, the ultra-rightwing Cuban-American community in Miami took hold of them, turning what were already offensive and interventionist broadcasts into the voice of their dark and sinister interests.

The head honcho of the Cuban-American National Foundation, Jorge Mas Canosa, was also the first chairperson of the President’s Advisory Board for Cuba Broadcasting, from where he had complete control of both stations.

The COHA report also details how in 1996, both the US General Accounting Office and the State Department’s Office of the Inspector General investigated Radio and TV Marti in response to allegations from station insiders who were fired for their political beliefs and criticisms of the stations.

The relocation of both broadcasters from Washington to Miami in 1998 caused a backlash. Even the station’s former news director, Jay Mallin, acknowledges, "The station has gone steadily downhill… under a series of… totally incompetent directors.”

This was during the time when Herminio San Roman was director of the Office of Cuban Broadcasting (OCB) and manager of Radio Marti and TV Marti. He was accused of “significant deterioration of programming.”

An evaluation carried out in 1998 by five journalists associated with the Florida International University looked at Radio Marti programming and concluded that there were problems of credibility, inadequate sourcing, and a profound lack of professionalism.

Following, the anti-Cuban consortium was directed by the unsavory individual Salvador Lew. According to the COHA report: “Lew’s tumultuous tenure had created utter chaos and internal strife within the Marti operations, as he filled its ranks with close personal associates, including some of Miami’s most ultra radical right-wing figures, among them such tawdry characters as Amardo Perez Roura, a follower of Batista and a member of the Alpha 66 and the Cuban Unity faction, as well as Rolando Espinosa, former partner of brigand businessman Demetrio Perez Jr.”

WADING THROUGH THE SWAMP

With many more millions in their coffers, the anti-Cuban broadcasters carry on down the same muddy path: plagued by internal turmoil, they do not see or hear criticisms. The current head of the propaganda machine is Pedro Roig, another former Bay of Pigs mercenary and an individual closely linked to the CANF and the reactionary Floridian congresspersons.

Despite the fact that the poorly named Radio Marti has increased its broadcast frequencies and transmissions from Florida, California and North Carolina, while flagrantly violating international broadcasting laws, its impact on Cuba is laughable. An even bigger failure has been the television broadcasts, practically invisible, whose latest mishap was the disappearance, during a hurricane, of the blimp from which they were broadcasting their transmissions.

The COHA report clearly demonstrates the failures: "Radio and TV Marti is almost entirely characterized by propagandistic low-quality programming, mismanagement, and a striking inability to reach the intended Cuban island audience.”

Sen. Ron Wyden, (D- Ore), recently lashed out saying: “What we have been feeding the Cuban people is static and snow… and this is just about the most expensive snow we have seen on the planet.”

Despite the incompetence, waste, corruption, discredit and interventionist nature of the anti-Cuban broadcasters, they continue to receive lucrative US public funding as part of Washington’s obsessive policies towards Cuba and the support of congresspersons who receive campaign funding from Miami-based rightwing Cuban-American organizations.

As cited in the COHA report, “…the whole venture is in fact little better than a ill-reputed rape of the treasury and a propaganda machine for the radical right-wing of the Miami Cuban community, as well as a job-bank for unemployed anti-Havana ideologues.”

Despite all the criticism, the US Congress earmarked $37 million dollars this year for funding of the two broadcasters. Included in this sum is $10 million for the purchase of an EC-130 military aircraft that will replace the one currently being rented from the US Air Force for the media aggression against Cuba.

The COHA report states: "In his 2005 State of the Union Address, President Bush proclaimed ‘tax payers dollars must be spent wisely or not at all.’ Given that the U.S. is currently facing a serious budgetary and debt crisis, one must question why this administration and congress is willing to spend an additional $10 million dollars above and beyond the hundreds of millions already spent on anti-Havana initiatives including Radio and TV Marti.”

The anti-Cuban propaganda machine may receive even more funding in the coming days after a Commission, chaired by Condoleezza Rice, finishes its review of the Bush Plan for Cuba.

Sincerely, the best piece of advice for Ms. Rice may be that from Senator Byron Dorgan who, during a debate in Congress over the anti-Cuban creations, told Rice to “have the courage to shut down a program that is a total waste of the American taxpayers' money.”

The Varadero Xanadu

2005-12-13T08:49:00.000-08:00

• Golf course and small hotel • Former mansion of Irenee Du Pont
BY MIREYA CASTAÑEDA —Granma International staff writer—
• PERHAPS it would be a contradiction to say that there is a mansion called Xanadu in the resort of Varadero. However, if we follow — precisely— the myth of the summer capital of Kubla Khan, the splendor of which Marco Polo spoke, Varadero really is a Xanadu given the wealth of its nature, its beaches, its sky and its gardens.
The word Xanadu does not bring to mind Olivia Newton John or U.S. millionaire Irenee Du Pont, but the British poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834) and his Kubla Khan (1797), who gave eternal life to Xanadu. The first stanza of the poem has been cited many times: In Xanadu did Kubla Khan /A stately pleasure-dome decree: /Where Alph, the sacred river, ran /Through caverns measureless to man /Down to a sunless sea.
Although “to the sunless sea” doesn’t fit with Varadero, other verses, other metaphors, other expressions in the poem totally describe the blue waters of Varadero and especially the area acquired by Du Pont at a ridiculous price. For example when it speaks of Enfolding sunny spots of greenery, or The shadow of the dome of pleasure, or Where was heard the mingled measure/ From the fountain and the caves, It was a miracle of rare device.
THE ARRIVAL OF DU PONT
The Xanadu Mansion, as the magnate named it, although it was later known as Du Pont, is located in the rocky outcrops of San Bernardino and was designed by architects Covarrocas and Govantes in 1927, the year the U.S. millionaire reached 49 years old and decided to retire from the presidency of the family empire (in the book Trading with the Enemy: 1933-1949, historian Charles Higham, after describing him as being the most amazing and powerful member of the clan, added that he was obsessed with Hitler.)
It is said that he began to search for a retirement haven, and, like many U.S. citizens, he found it in Cuba. He then bought 180 hectares on the Hicacos peninsula for 90,000 pesos (an absurd price of 4 cents per square meter.) The property included eight kilometers of virgin beach, but he chose the rocky hills of San Bernardino to build the house (at a cost of $1,300,000), a veritable mansion on four floors, with 11 bathrooms, three large terraces, seven balconies, and a private boat dock.
Precious woods were used for the ceilings, stairs and columns while the floors and bathrooms were of marble from Cuba, Italy and Spain.
Du Pont resided in Xanadu for a few months every year starting January (Varadero oral history says only a few days and not every year). In 1931 he ordered the construction of an 18-hole golf course (redesigned to only nine in 1933 after the first course was destroyed by a hurricane.)
It was in March 1957 when Du Pont visited Xanadu for the last time, corroborating that he did not come to Cuba every year given that he stopped his trips two years before the triumph of the Revolution. He died December 12, 1963, the same day on which Xanadu opened as the restaurant Las Americas, with the first women cosmonaut in the world, the Soviet Valentina Tereshkova, as guest of honor.
VARADERO GOLF CLUB
Over the last few years Xanadu and its surroundings have undergone many transformations finally becoming, in 1999, the Varadero Golf Club.

José Tovar, its general director, assured that its “course of 18 holes par 72 is in line with universal regulations.”
Golf —he said— is a magnificent tourism option, given that this sport is growing by around 15 % annually and more than 80 million people are members of golf associations.”
Tourist arrivals in Varadero are particularly significant between November and April, as the Club’s main clients are from Canada, Spain, France, and the UK.
“The Xanadu Mansion has been remodeled into a clubhouse with six hotel rooms. The first floor restaurant offers a menu and banquet service, and has a wine cellar in the basement (formerly a bar).”
The current Varadero Golf Club —explained Tovar—, with its 39.7 ha., (not including surrounding greens, lagoons, and parks totaling 61.0 ha.), was the first 18-hole course on the island designed by architect Les Furber, president of the Canadian Golf Design Services Company Ltd. It extends along a narrow strip in the vicinity of a number of hotels such as Breezes SuperClubs, Tuxpan, Bella Costa, Meliá Las Américas, and Meliá Varadero.
According to Tovar, the shape of the golf course separates two areas each with their defined characteristics. The first section up to the ninth hole is considered a bit easier; holes 10-18 stand out for their individual complexities. “Both allow golfers to combine the technical elements of the game with the beauty and tranquility of the environment.”
For its qualities, the Club has been twice selected as the venue of the European Challenge Tour Grand Final (1999 and 2000.)
The Varadero Golf Club or Xanadu Mansion is, without any doubt, a magical place in the finest tradition of the myth of Kubla Khan.

The Bayamesa. The first Cuban Song and its fate

2005-12-13T08:46:00.000-08:00

The Bayamesa. The first Cuban Song and its fate
By José Galiño When Luz Vázquez (20 years old, a tall black-eyed brunette, very cultured and with a resolute character) learned the probable gallivanting of her husband Francisco del Castillo, she took the decision to break the marriage bonds, and then...

Pub.: 12/3/05, 09:00:18 PM
Serenata for Luz

In the city of Bayamo in mid 19th century it was a tradition to serenade the ladies, and that was what Francisco decided to do for mending relations with his adored wife. But an original song, clearly from Bayamo, was needed for that special occasion, so he went looking for help to his nephew and partner in his law office, Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, who would write the lyrics together with the outstanding poet José Fornaris. Céspedes, who was also a good pianist, would compose the music together with the grieving husband.

Late into the night of March 27, 1851, Luz was drawn to her window on hearing an unknown melody that carried words that she felt were meant for her. With Luz and the authors of the song as audience, tenor Carlos Pérez Tamayo sang and played his guitar.

Thus, because of an apparently trivial event, a song was born. Even if musicologists do not consider it part of the genre of Cuban song, the one that troubadours would give to the music of the island twenty years later, La bayamesa opens up that path, for its melody frees itself of European patterns that influenced the music of the island at the time.

But its greatest significance is not of being a forerunner –although in fact it should be considered the first Cuban song–, but for the fate of the song itself and of its protagonists.

A Women in the War

When the Cuban independent army took the city of Bayamo on October 18, 1868, Luz Vázquez, who had been a widow for a year welcomed in her house the band that played what later would become the National Anthem, written by Perucho Figueredo, who was married to Luz’s twin sister.

Three months later, when the citizens of Bayamo decided to set fire to their town, she herself burned down her home. With six of her children she fled to the Sierra Maestra mountains, until she was forced to return to Bayamo in 1870 when one of her daughters was found to have tuberculosis. It is told that when one of her daughters passed away, and believing the other one was dead, Luz died embracing the former.

After initiating the war for independence on October 10, 1868, Céspedes was abandoned by the Government in Arms and died at the hands of Spanish troops in 1874.

But after the war the song became popular, sung with lyrics referring to the struggle, until it became a symbol that identified patriots.

Whether fate put it on the road to fame because of the story of its protagonists or because the people have found in the sad narrative and in the sorrow of its beautiful melody the lamentations of a country, The bayamesa has become a symbol of patriotic feelings. And Luz Vázquez, who inspired the transcendental composition more than 150 years ago, keeps conquering feelings to become a legend.

The Bayamesa. The first Cuban Song and its fate
por José Galiño Pictures Eduardo Cabrera

The Song

Don’t you remember, maid from Bayamo,
That you were a shining sun,
And that on your languid forehead
I smilingly stamped a kiss?

Don’t you remember that in happy times
I was ecstatic with your pure beauty,
And on your bosom I reclined my head
Dying from joy and love?

Come, show yourself at your window;
Come, and listen to my singing;
Come, do not sleep, and answer my weeping;
Soothe my dark pain.

Remembering past glories
Let us, my love, dissipate sadness;
And lowering our heads
Let us die of joy and love.

The world fits into a Bonsai

2005-12-05T13:10:00.000-08:00

Can you imagine giant trees reduced to a few centimeters for humans to "raise?"

Kyuzo Murata, one of the fathers of the modern Bonsai, would enjoy visiting the Gallery of Art in the city of Ciego de Avila, 420 kilometers from Havana, where the most eminent Cuban Bonsai sculptors participated in the 3rd 2005 CubaBonsai Convention.

Thirty representatives from nearly all the country’s provinces discussed this living art that penetrates to the depths of one’s soul and captivates those who cultivate it.

LIFE IN MINIATURE

It could be said that the world fits into a Bonsai; and those who agree are not without reason. These diminutive lives, by definition, are semi-perennial living plants, placed in a pot, atop a rock or slab."

"Each plant not only represents the beauty of nature, but its aspect brings to mind something more: a forest scene, a majestic solitary tree, a marine landscape, a lake, river, a pond..."

The Bonsai simulates the abundance of nature and expresses its eternity of slow changes. It is the result of centuries of development and continual evolution.

It is a convergence point for diverse disciplines such as art, botany, and philosophy, which all share a drive toward perfection.

I say that the world fits into a Bonsai and I think of the Maquette of the City of Havana, a large metropolis reduced to only 22 meters in length and 10 in width; or the Monólogo del Bonsái (Bonsai Monologue), interpreted by Carlos Luis de la Tejera, who with subtle political humor compares Latin America to a small garden in which the International Monetary Fund is the gardener.

The tale of the origin of these miniature trees comes from a Chinese legend claiming that during the Han dynasty (206 b.c.-220 A.D.) an emperor ordered the construction on his patio of a landscape representing the mountains, rivers, valleys and lakes of the empire. Afterwards, he stood ecstatically gazing through the windows of the palace, as if he had the world at his feet.

More recently, in 1971, the oldest testimonies of the plant were discovered in the tomb of Zhang Huai, of the Tang dynasty.

These writings describe that in the year 552 A.D. Buddhism arrived in Japan and with it, the tiny trees. Thus, Japan Islands assimilated the culture of China, including its architecture, literature, calligraphy, ceremonies, etc.

Even the theatrical piece Hachi-no-ki (The Model Trees), one of the world’s most relevant works treating this theme, appeared on stage. The piece is based on a much loved Chinese folk story.

BADLY-RAISED CHILDREN IN CU BA

Hijos malcriados (badly-raised children) is a very Cuban saying and an apt one in the case of these little living beings. "We have to provide all their needs if we want them to grow and develop, from food to adequate education", commented several cultivators questioned by Granma International during the Convention.

Raciel Méndez Gómez, with 16 years experience in this art, explains that as far as she knows, the first trees appeared in the house of a couple who lived in the town of La Fe, on Cuba’s Isle of Youth.

She claimed that in the early 70’s her friend Enrique Cuenca had seen the plants, which disappeared a short while after the couple died. "It’s not known what happened to them."

Raciel also said that in Santiago de las Vegas, Havana province, many books on the subject appeared in an abandoned house. The books were passed on though many people, some of whom may have begun cultivating the tree.

The history of the Bonsai, like life itself, is full of mystery and conjecture. So much so that there are 300 known cultivators in Cuba, a figure that is growing as others, still anonymous, are incorporated.

For Dimitri Gómez González, president of the Convention organizing committee and who has given life to the project in recent years, the cultivation of this living art could be another pathway to integration among nations in the year of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas. He notes: "The president of the Latin American Bonsai Federation is in Venezuela."

THEIR OWN HISTORY

Alejandro Moya Valdés, a beginner, acquired his first specimen after spending four hours with a chisel and hammer extracting it from the coast. Perhaps this is the reason for his belief that the fundamental element of cultivating and educating the plant is discipline.

The participants of the conference each summed up their definition of the art in one word: "spirit," said Lorenzo González Casuso; "addiction," Leonel Monzón García; "harmony," Asley Hernández Sánchez; "peace," Jovany Borrego Mejías; "emotion," Raciel Méndez Gómez; "tranquility," Nancy Gutiérrez Gárciga; "spirituality," Jorge Guerra; "thought or passion," Leonardo Rodríguez Triana.

Without thinking about monks, empires, civilizations, nomads and dynasties, the Cuban cultivators have their own history, which with the passage of time will be told by others keeping this 1,000-year-old art alive.