Yesterday was my father’s Birthday and of course I called him, to my surprise he was a little bit clearer for whatever reason. He keeps repeating that he wants to see me and I am dying to go and see him but I have a family of my own now, work and lots of responsibility. The economy is not that good and every family in America have to make decision on daily basis whether spend the money on a cruise this summer or pay for the new AC unit broke in your house. I rather get whatever money I can and send it to them so he can have a better quality of life. It’s ridiculous how many people Fidel put in jail for carrying American dollars in their wallets and now he open the channels for us to send money to our families and save help to cover somehow the mistakes he made for the last 50 years.
It was not until 2008 that I was able to travel to Cuba to see my family after almost 15 years of Exile, it was a thrill but fear was covering me from head to toes. If leaving the land when you grew up for 24 years is shocking imagine how bad was coming back after 15 years and see everything like if time never passed. Einstein would have used Cuba perfectly to explain the theory of relativity, time never passed, it was like everything froze in time and only people aged. I couldn’t contain the tear when I left and much less when I returned and saw the first conglomeration of Royal Palms near by the coastline of Havana. The green in my island is greener than in Florida, the smell of the country is different, the soil that when grabbed with your hands tends to fill release this amazing reddish coloration.
It was a romantic feeling with a lot of excitement, but my day dreaming experience quickly turned into reality. I suddenly remember why I left Cuba and decided to risk everything. My brother was there picking me up, we are talking about my brother the Doctor that makes more money driving his friend’s old 1946 Chevy than working 40 hours a week or more for only the equivalent of 10 dollars a month practicing medicine. Since never changed, every buddy is looking for the opportunity to steal from the government, who else you are going to steal from if everything belongs to Fidel and the revolution. What kind of future you will have in a country like that; the Cuban nationals can’t save money and plan a vacation with his family to Mexico or Barcelona. They know that even thou the aforementioned countries will grant tourist visas, the Cuban government reserves the right to deny that vacation, just based in nothing but control over the people and subjugation. That why many Cubans are willing to face death in the darkness of the Florida Strait with the idea of freedom as sail in their rafts, boats and trucks. I remember all my life under the communist regime that Fidel talked all the time about the achievements of the revolution, the abolition of prostitution, the illiteracy and turning Cuba into a powerful Medical Global Potency. Let’s just visit some of those, prostitution was eliminated at the beginning but if you go to Cuba now it became one of the most interesting attractions for tourism; you can find now pages on the internet when you can make appointment to have escort services and cheap sex with amazing women in Cuba. The prostitution is illegal we all know that but I am sure that the big PIMP Fidel is receiving the benefits of all the money those desperate girls are bringing into the country, the second one it is in my opinion the only good thing the revolution did for Cubans, but there is always a catch. They wanted to educate you for free so can read and at the same time take away your freedom to read what you want and control your reading habits with books approved by the governments, history books written by revolutionaries with a communist agenda. Free education, which is what Fidel, always mentioned on his 8 hours speeches at the base of the Plaza de la Revolution or revolution square. Yes, I received free education, I can even go to the university for free and become a Doctor or an Engineer but instead I have to work 45 days per year on the country fields of cigars, potatoes, oranges, Egg Plants, tomatoes, etc. I started working for free but mandatory country hard labor for 45 days a year for 6 years, that is a total of 270 days, almost a full year of hard labor in my opinion to pay for the education I was receiving and at the end I will be having a title and work my ass off for nothing. I will have no professional future; my family will not have a decent living with what the government will pay me, so at the end. You receive free education but only to dig your own grave into the control that the revolution has over you, because if you by any chance, refused to work those 45 days a year. They will take your privileges away and will outcast you from society. So at the end, in Cuba you have to be a faker and never show your real emotions otherwise you’ll pay with up to 25 years in prison and become a martyr of the opposition.
Let’s talk about the issue that Fidel that talks so much against child labor is having thousands of children of 12 years and up working hard labor, getting up at 5:00 am to get almost no breakfast and work under the sun for more than 8 hours a day. Why is that? Why the revolution needs to bring children to work the land? It was in 1961 that Fidel signed the 2nd” Ley de Reforma Agraria” Agrarian Reform Law. The idea of this law was to take the land from the rich landowners that were making lots of money by selling the products of the land to USA, and give it to the people that favored the revolution and were working those fields for the landowners. The reason why the Cuban revolution was successful is because Fidel knew that the majority of Cubans were poor, and as great politician he always was, told the people that he will take from the rich to give it to the poor; kind of a socialist Robin Hood. Well, of course he received the support of a great majority and won, but look at what happened later. Fidel tell the farm workers, let’s take this land from your rich American boss and I will give it to you so you will be your own boss and take care of your family. Their eyes opened so big that you can’t believe, their dream was coming a reality but what they didn’t know is that years later Fidel noticed that those lucky ones that had their land were enriching themselves and becoming powerful social class, the very same thing he was trying to prevent. Then he came with the idea of taking the lands back and sending all those wajiros or farmers to live in a town for farmers called the “Cooperativas Agropecuarias”, Agricultural Cooperatives with cement buildings with electricity, refrigerators, fan, televisions and all the commodities they didn’t have in their country huts. Of course once more, was the heroic revolution that was doing this because was the only way to help the revolution to grow stronger against the Enemy at 90 miles from Cuba. Always manipulating with propaganda the poor farmers that recently learned to read and write thanks to the revolution.
After living for years in a town now with all commodities, Fidel decides to offer the son and daughters of this group of farmers the opportunity to educate and get the chance of an education in the capital, of course none of them returned to the interior, the capital was the best. That is who Fidel destroyed the land of Cuba and that is how the land stooped producing abundance of fruits. In all type of civilization the descendant of the farmer most likely becomes the future farmer when the former dies, breaking that chain forces the revolution to recruit their children to work the land.
To be continued…..
