Luz en el Alma (Light in the Soul) Award

I have just been awarded the 'Luz en el Alma (Light in the Soul)' Prize by Amanecer en la Habana and I'm chuffed to bits. Many thanks, Zurama.

Blogaccion por Cuba (Blogaction for Cuba)

En una Blogacción por Cuba, los organizadores del evento Blogueando a Cuba queremos apoyar a los cubanos que lo han perdido todo, o casi todo, tras el paso de los huracanes Gustav y Ike.
¡Divulga en tu blog la iniciativa! ¡Házte eco de la misma y AYUDA en lo posible!
Reproduzco a continuación el texto completo de la campaña, ya publicado en Bloggers por un sueño:

El pueblo cubano necesita ayuda.

Tras la situación desastrosa que han dejado a su paso los huracanes Gustav e Ike, después de las inútiles posturas sostenidas por los gobiernos de Cuba y EE.UU, que no se ponen de acuerdo en cómo socorrer a un pueblo que ha perdido sus hogares y esperanzas, creemos que es el momento de no esperar más por quienes anteponen la política a las razones humanas y hemos iniciado una campaña solidaria.
¿En qué consiste nuestra Blogacción por Cuba?
Desde Blogueando a Cuba vamos a divulgar todas las iniciativas de solidaridad con el pueblo cubano de que tengamos conocimiento, siempre que cumplan dos requisitos: que sean a través de organizaciones no gubernamentales (ONG) y que tengan credibilidad. De este modo, facilitaremos a los internautas -blogueros y no blogueros- de todo el mundo, tener a mano las diferentes opciones para hacer llegar su ayuda..
El poder aglutinador de los blogs y sus redes afines es cada vez mayor. Los blogueros cubanos hemos visto demostrado recientemente cómo, con nuestra acción conjunta, hemos sido capaces de lograr cambios en Cuba. Pensando en esto, desde Blogueando a Cuba convocamos a todos los blogueros cubanos y de otras latitudes para que se hagan eco de esta "Blogacción por Cuba" que consiste en reunir en este blog todas las iniciativas solidarias posibles, para que todos aquellos internautas interesados en colaborar puedan informarse de las vías más efectivas para canalizar su ayuda al pueblo cubano.
Si no te has decidido aún a echar una mano, ésta es una buena oportunidad para hacerlo. Ponemos a tu disposición un listado de instituciones que trabajan en la isla, lo que te facilitará la tarea de aportar tu granito de arena para la reconstrucción del país.
Puedes colaborar de diversas maneras: enviando dinero a través de una de las cuentas que las ONG ponen a tu disposición, enviando ayuda material y hasta con tu propia presencia en los lugares donde se necesite.
Todos podemos ayudar un poco más. No sólo a nuestras familias sino a todas esas familias cubanas que han perdido sus hogares.
Blogueando a Cuba agradece cualquier colaboración en materia de difusión que puedas brindarle a esta iniciativa, ya sea enlazándonos, enviando este texto por correo a tus contactos, o colocando en tu blog o web el texto de nuestra campaña.
Pedimos ayuda a los bloggers e internautas de TODO EL MUNDO, para que divulguen en sus páginas esta "Blogacción por Cuba".

Lunes 15 de septiembre de 2008.

ESTE DOCUMENTO HA SIDO ELABORADO CON LA COLABORACIÓN DE LOS BLOGGERS PARTICIPANTES EN LA ORGANIZACION DEL EVENTO "BLOGUEANDO A CUBA", ENTRE ELLOS:

Ivis Acosta, blog Memorias de una Cubanita

Aguaya Berlín, blog Desarraigos Provocados

GaviotaZalas, blog Cubadice

Beatriz Matías, de El blog de Betty

Al Godar, blog Algodar

Abraham Laria, blog Papas x Malangas

A Cabrera Rey, blog Papelbit

Jacques de Sores, blog Tierradentro

LISTADO DE ONGs E INICIATIVAS SOLIDARIAS CON CUBA:
1) Cáritas:

«CÁRITAS CON EL CARIBE»
Teléfono de información y donaciones: 902.33.99.99
Entidad
Número de cuenta
SANTANDER
0049-1892-64-2110527931
BBVA
0182-2000-89-0201509050
LA CAIXA
2100-2208-39-0200227099
CAJA MADRID
2038-1028-15-6000969697
Y EN LAS CUENTAS ABIERTAS
POR TODAS LAS CÁRITAS DIOCESANAS

2) La ONG Solidaridad Española con Cuba difunde en Internet una Guía para ayudar a los afectados por el huracán Gustav en Cuba..
La Guía ofrece información acerca de las zonas afectadas y la ayuda que se necesita. Puede descargarse gratuitamente en: http://www.solidaridadconcuba.com/documentos/GUIAayudahumanitariaGustav.pdf

3) Cruz Roja
Llamamiento urgente para la temporada de huracanes 2008

4) Centro Memorial Martin Luther King. En su revista Caminos donde explica que:
"La ayuda puede expresarse financieramente realizando ingresos en la cuenta del Banco Financiero Internacional bfi030000003347323 huracanes- restauración de daños o recopilando y trayendo hasta Cuba (pues el país no puede pagar fletes) donaciones en especie sobre todo de materiales de construcción (materiales eléctricos, muebles sanitarios, entre otros) y avituallamientos diversos sobre todo calchones, lencería, ropas y calzado (hay muchas familias que han quedado sin nada sólo con la ropa que traían puesta) y alimentos no perecederos."
Más datos de la cuenta bancaria:
Banco Financiero Internacional
Código Swift: bficcuhh
cuenta: bfi030000003347323 huracanes- restauración de daños

Si conoces de otras iniciativas solidarias, envíanos la información, de ser posible un link, para colgarlo en esta Blogacción por Cuba.

OTRAS INICIATIVAS SUGERIDAS EN LOS COMENTARIOS....
[Continuar leyendo en el post original]

Radio Freekinternational

Nostalgia (n): From Greek nostos, 'a return home'. A wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life, to one's home or homeland, or to one's family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time.

Hello, everybody and welcome to the first Radio Freekinternational, live from London.

What is Radio Freekinternational? For non-Cubans, who might be puzzled by this hybrid of a word, half bastardised English and half Cuban, the explanation is simple. RFI is the brainchild of one of the better blogs on the Cuban blogoshephere nowadays, generacionasere. It is a valuable and laudable attempt to unite those of us (and those before us) who grew up in the 60s, 70s and 80s when music in the Anglo-Saxon lexicon was frowned upon by the Cuban government, if not outright banned.

The word ‘freeki’, ‘friqui’, or ‘freaki’ denoted a person who was keen on rock music. Another version that I saw on people’s school bags when I was younger was ‘Free Kiss’. What cannot be denied is that originally the word had a pejorative meaning, aiming to offend the person being addressed. This changed with the passing of time and ‘freeki’ was reclaimed quite justly by the rock community in the Caribbean island.

There’s a lovely if also sad story behind Radio Freekinternational and what it stands for and at the risk of coming across as a boring, old fuddy-duddy I will try to sum it up in a few paragraphs.
After the Mariel boatlift in 1980 when thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of Cubans left the country, the government clamped down on anything English. Not even Huckleberry Hound and Yogi the Bear were saved from the cull. They were replaced by Zé Carnero and 'El Rancho del Pájaro Amarillo'. I was 9 at the time and felt the change straight away. It would be two more years before the situation went back to ‘normal’. By then my generation was coming strong as a group of people who started to question their surroundings and did not take no for an answer. By the time I started secondary school in ’83, the country was gripped in an Oscarmania frenzy. This was as a result of the popular Venezuelan salsa musician Oscar D’ León’s visit to Cuba after which even the local music scene had to pull their socks up and catch up with the times. Visually, Oscar D’ León represented to many Cubans a carefree and blithe way of performing, not tied to dogmas or prejudgments. At that time the musical spectrum in Cuba was still dictated by whatever orders came from above and radio stations had very limited resources, ergo, music in English was poorly promoted. If you can imagine a plug blocking a water tap and water accumulating inside the tap (or faucet, whichever way you want to call it), that’s what the situation was like. And as it usually happens in real life, nature won. The tap burst out.

First it was Madonna. Then, Cindy. Or maybe both at the same time. Michael had already been popular for a long time as well as Kool and the Gang and Earth, Wind and Fire. There were other artists the generation before mine used to listen to clandestinely, like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. My peers, though, caught the Zeitgeist of rock and pop from the 80s. And the result put paid to the government’s efforts to control a youth that used to pump up condoms as if they were balloons and tossed them in the air every Friday evening in front of the Havana University Alma Mater whilst listening to Moncada (a local pop band).

Then in 1987 (or ’88, my memory fails me) a second huge cultural phenomenon occurred. This one would turn the Cuban youth upside down and blaze the trail for a lot of Cuban musicians who were trying to find their voice, far from the normal conventions. A 24-, or 25-year-old Argentinian musician from Rosario arrived in Cuba armed only with a powerful repertoire of songs and a pair of trainers, of different colour each. By the time Fito Páez left, he was a legend and Havana was never the same. Wherever you went you were sure to find people offering their heart out, singing about a girl with a horn under her heart or chastising rushed decisions, especially the ones that cost lives. Through Fito Páez, I learnt about León Gieco, Charly García, Espinetta, Baglietto and many more Argentinian artists. I did not stop there and came face to face with Los Prisioneros for the first time. My younger self remembers a time when despite the fact that we were still getting the music out of date, at least we were getting it.

The media caught on the act and certain radio and television programmes appeared on the horizon with a bolder musical agenda. ‘El Programa de Ramón’, ‘En Confianza’, ‘A Capella’, Juanito’s Camacho’s daily outings on Radio Ciudad de la Habana and on Sundays evenings on the same station. Carlos Figueroa and Alfredo Balmaseda both promoted home-grown talent on their daily cultural timetable ‘Hoy (Today)’. It was an intoxicating time that shaped the generation I belonged to then and still belong to.

Because this generation, whether they were born before 1959 or after is united by a unique desire to express themselves in a coherent way. We are Jackson Pollock’s paintbrushes, dripping different hues onto our empty canvas, Cuba, ignoring the master’s instructions. We’ve foregone the hand guiding us through the blank space and have chosen to design that space ourselves. And that’s what the Cuban Blogosphere has become, a formidable force of debate, discussion, acceptance and respect.

Some of you, my dear non-Cuban readers will watch the clips below and will probably think that this is guilty-pleasure music. Well, no, this is just pleasure, there’s no guilt involved. The music below represents a stage of our lives that, thanks to this marvellous medium, the internet, can be relived and experienced again through the collective memory of a nation in exile.

I also know for a fact that many of you will watch the clips and will reminisce upon your own halcyon days of yesteryear. For that’s what nostalgia is about, reminiscing about the past with both feet planted in the present and looking determinedly to the future. And yes, you’ll probably shed a tear; I know I have these last few days whilst collating the list.

So, once again, this is just pleasure, no pain.

And the playlist, I hear you ask? Ha, ha. No, no playlist, my lovely little puppies. I am playing Cruella de Vil tonight and will delight in keeping you guessing as you sift through the almost one hundred clips included in this collection.

I would like to thank two blogs without whose help I would not have been able to host Radio Freekinternational tonight, nor would I have met the fantastic people who make up the Cuban Blogosphere. And they are Algodar for his blog ‘Blogs Sobre Cuba (Blogs about Cuba’ and generacionasere for coming up with the idea of Radio Freekinternational.

So, let’s enjoy this ride together, we all deserve it.

Disclaimer: Some clips contain some swearing, so readers/fellow bloggers, you have been warned.

Thanks.

This post is dedicated to ‘El Plátano’, exceptional Cuban photographer who died earlier this year. R.I.P.

Brillante Weblog Award

I have just been awarded the 'Brillante Weblog' prize by Eufrates del Valle from the always informative and interesting El Imparcial blog. And as it is the custom I must nominate at least seven other blogs (it can be more) in order to receive the award.

Here are my nominations:

Algodar

Betty

Entendiendo el Caos (el Garri)

Hija del Exilio

Ivan Darias (fellow Cuban in London)

sinEvasion

Luces y Sombras

The reasons why I selected these blogs are the same reasons why my space was chosen: On them the reader will find creativity, originality and respect galore. I could have easily picked up seven or ten more and that says a lot about the strength of the Cuban Blogosphere nowadays.

Thanks to Eufrates del Valle for the award and I look forward to welcoming you all here in my humble, little 'lair' next Friday when Radio Freekinternational will be broadcast live from London for the first (and hopefully not the last!) time ever.

Thanks.

He Did It His Way (Grave)

And now, the end is near

And so I face the final curtain

My friend, I’ll say it clear

I’ll state my case, of which I’m certain

I’ve lived a life that’s full

I’ve traveled each and every highway

And more, much more than this,

I did it my way.

As I was making my way back from the Tate Modern today with my wife and our two young children I could not stop thinking about the news that greeted me first thing this morning courtesy of the BBC. Fidel Castro, the leader of the Cuban Communist Party, the man who has been in power for almost five decades, has stepped down. And immediately Paul Anka’s re-worked classic, popularised by Frank Sinatra, came into my head.

It’s hard for a British citizen to understand the stature of the outgoing leader. After all, the Cuban president outlived nine British Prime Ministers and ten American dignitaries. And he did it his way. In the case of the US presidents, some of them tried to give him an early retirement on more than 600 occasions allegedly. Whereas in the UK a politician occupying the top post is usually in power between five to six years during which he amends old laws and develops cogent domestic and foreign policies (except for both Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair who were in power for ten years each), in Cuba we always had ‘El Caballo’ (The Horse) to look after our own affairs, a little bit like a paterfamilias making sure that his offspring was well-fed and well-taught. Although the well-fed is a moot point. A British prime minister will normally spend the first couple of years of their premiership implementing the programmes that made up their election drum-roll, whilst using up the remaining time to ensure that they got re-elected. In Cuba’s case, the man who has just stepped down had to contend with an illiterate nation in 1959, an illegal embargo a couple of years after and a crumbling economy to top. And whether people loved him or hated him, what we must bear in mind is that he led probably the most profound social, political and ideological revolution ever to have visited upon Latin American shores. That is not to say that the maximum leader was always faultless. Through a cult of his own personality, albeit with no statues in sight à la Stalin, an efficient neighbourhood surveillance system and a stranglehold on the media, Fidel’s grip on the everyday lives of Cubans has been at times absolutist and autocratic. Opinions have always differed as to whether this was brought about by the US blockade, or if by a self-imposed embargo. The former idea has been voiced mainly by armchair socialist intellectuals from Europe and North America, the latter has been the reality-based experience of many Cubans both in Cuba and overseas.

Fidel’s role as a cunning statesman should not be downplayed either. When the OEA (American States Organisation) evicted Cuba in 1962 due to its Marxist inclinations and its incompatibility with the Inter-American system, the Caribbean island’s market narrowed down to almost zero. This was one of the main reasons behind the decisions that led to Cuba becoming an ally of the former Soviet Union in the mid to late 60s. The surprising outcome of this arrangement was that on turning into Washington’s bete-noire, the late Cuban leader garnered a reputation as a fearless ‘caudillo’, capable of upholding the principles of socialism. A system that, even our National Hero, José Martí, was wary of endorsing.

Fidel’s role in Cuban society and politics was not restricted just to being leader of the Cuban Communist Party. He was also head of the Revolutionary Armed Forces (FAR), State Council and Ministers’ Council. As if this was not enough, he also branched out into other unofficial positions. And it was maybe this ubiquity of his that polarised his supporters. He masterminded the famous Ten Million Sugar Cane Harvest whose main objective was to improve the financial situation in the Caribbean island. To achieve this, the government concentrated all its efforts on producing the targeted amount of sugar by razing entire fields and planting sugar cane. Tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people were mobilised to the countryside to work the fields, including personnel from the armed forces, to make this dream come true. In the end only between six and eight million tonnes (figures vary) were produced, but the effect was calamitous as the land that was used to plant sugar cane could not be utilised for anything else. Some experts point at this moment in time as the beginning of the end for the sugar industry in Cuba.

Another role ‘El Comandante’ took on himself was that of journalist-in-chief. It was under his mandate that the Cuban media became a homogenous, uniform mass devoted to complimenting and eulogising the regime, thus, clipping its wings of any possible negative influence. With endless stories on the evils of capitalism and the benefits of socialism, the Cuban journalistic apparatus became formulaic and predictable. Occasionally it would highlight an issue of particular importance when it was no longer possible to conceal it, as when it addressed the prostitution situation in the mid 80s, a thorny topic that was already being talked about, although sotto voce, behind closed doors.

It was as an educator and health devotee that Fidel found more success and acceptance in a population that up until 1959 had a large deficit in the construction of new hospitals and schools. The special attention that these two sectors attracted from the Cuban president made it the cornerstone of the Caribbean island social reforms and put Cuba on a par with various nations of the developed world in terms of access to health and education. The downside was that as the number of graduates increased, so did, too, the level of politicisation they were subjected to. Nonetheless, it would be catastrophic if now that Fidel has bowed out of the political arena these achievements went to waste due to Cuba following the same privatisation path travelled by the former socialist states of Eastern Europe.

So, what now?

That has always been the question posed to me by some of my friends and acquaintances and it has also been a quandary plaguing my mind for a long time. What now?

Well, I do not know. And that’s the honest answer. We have been used to just the one person holding so much power for so long that we are now in the same situation as those youngsters who, when faced with a long weekend on their own without Dad and Mum, end up wrecking the house and smashing the china.

However, amidst the rubble, a light shines through and this is the beam I would like my nation to follow.

There are four principles, in my understanding, that Cuba should follow: the development of a free media and an independent judiciary are the first two. Economic and financial opening to foreign investors (as long as cherished achievements like education and health are not touched) and accountability should be the other two.

The establishment of these four tenets will not happen overnight. We have depended too much for too long on the ‘he who has a friend has a sugar mill’ mantra and I do not think that we will see it overturned just like that. So patience is paramount and so should be the drive to change our mentality. Small and medium private enterprises should be encouraged. The one-party system should be eliminated. And free elections held where everyone has their say.

I have not mentioned the US embargo and its negative influence over Cuba because that, too, is a hot issue. I do believe that given the chance to attack the Caribbean nation, our northern neighbours would not hesitate to do so. Anyone thinking otherwise should go back to his or her history books and read what happened in the 60s, 70s and 80s. I still remember US planes flying overhead when I was younger. Government propaganda or not, it is the gospel truth that the US wants a piece of Cuba and as we now head into another phase of our country’s social, political and economic development we need to remain alert to what happens around us.

So what now?

I hope there is no bloodshed, I yearn for a democratic opening on the island, even if it takes some time and above all I would like Cubans to remember that in times when many nations in Europe and North America use hyphenated nouns to label the various ethnic minority groups that make up their polities, our main identity marker is still being Cuban. As Ol’ Blue Eyes sang it: when there was doubt/I ate it up and spit it out/I faced it all and I stood tall/ and did it my way.

Copyright 2008