Happy Birthday Claudia!

(Film by Lia)

Happy birthday to Claudia Cadelo! A brilliant Cuban blogger I had the chance to follow since the inception of her blog Octavo Cerco and a person I got a chance to know through two interviews I did for Ashin-Mettacara.com (see links to interviews as posted on this blog here and here)

Bonne fête!!!

Muchacho Enfermo

Buried in the Sand

I am totally ripping this off from Claudia Cadelo's blog because it broke my heart to read this and since misery likes company... I figured I'd share this with you all.

Muchacho Enfermo









Buried in the Sand
By Claudia Cadelo
(translated from the original Spanish)

I can’t, at times, shake the idea of being immobilized in the middle of time. A feeling similar to what I felt as a girl when my Papa played at burying me in the sand, I couldn’t stand it for more than a few seconds. The concept of absolute freedom is an illusion, but our ability to measure and to understand it is not an illusion; to understand that being buried in the sand unable to move is not the same as standing in front of the sea, looking at the far horizon, so distant that it almost makes no sense to call it a limit.

In my country, while the thoughts are nice and warm below the sand, one can feel safe not to be literally locked behind bars; but when we decide to put our ideas into an empty bottle and throw them into the sea, headed for the distant horizon, our body runs the risk of relinquishing, for an indefinite time, swimming along the shore.

Friends speak to me of changes, I get emails that say little, and a botero comments to me, stupidly optimistic, that they are fixing the streets (later, faced with my apathy and pessimism, he confessed to me that he was in the program for “political refugees” and, in passing, advised me for some strange reason that I should sign up too). I look all around me and I see an expectation that I not feel the slightest friction; the truth is I have no Faith, I don’t believe in these changes, I can’t help it.

More than 200 people are in prison for thinking differently, and have been for six years; the news is a vomit of lies; the newspaper Granma is a joke in bad taste; we still have the same problems, the same lack of freedom as always, with the same party, the same mass organizations, the same politics and ideology. I’m sorry but the truth is that I don’t see anything new with some ministers more and some less, and a younger brother up and an older brother down.

I would like to be able to say that the only one responsible for this situation is Fidel Castro, but I can’t. I remember when he gave up his power, in the interim before Raúl took charge, that Randy Alonso was always saying on The Round Table television show, “The Leadership of the Revolution” had ordered this, “The Leadership of the Revolution” had decided that, and I wondered, half jokingly half serious, under what new abstract concept were we being governed.

I don’t care whether the model is Chinese, Russian or Martian; at this point I can only think, and really hope, to be wrong, that until the whole “The Leadership of the Revolution” is no longer in power, nothing will change very much for those of us down here.

Interview with Claudia Cadelo (part 2)

After my first interview with Cuban blogger Claudia Cadelo was published on Ashin-Mettacara.com she was gracious enough to grant me a follow up interview.

I like this one even better than the first one, with much help from two very good friends, I feel that we have captured her exact words even better than the first one. I also feel that this interview, while containing only 7 questions, really hits home and really shows us what these bloggers go through on a daily basis.

***envíeme por correo electrónico si usted quiere la versión española original: muchachoenfermo (at) gmail (dot) com***

Click Here for the full interview.

Here's the first question in the interview.... just to give you all a little taste and hopefully encourage you to read the rest of it:

Muchacho Enfermo: Your first post was written on Yoani Sanchez’s blog (Generacion Y) it was called From Paranoia to a Scream), can you describe what you felt that day, when you made your decision to publish your name, your picture and your opinions?

Claudia Cadelo: The night before Gorki’s trial we decided to go to ask for support at the Tribuna Antimperialista where Pablo Milanés and a few guest musicians were holding a concert. We had a banner that simply read GORKI, so that the paranoids wouldn’t alert security. But they are paranoid by nature so they simply started to hit us and abducted Ciro (Guitar player of Porno Para Ricardo and La Babosa Azul) and a friend of mine.

The following day Gorki’s trial was to take place and we were all very tired and surrounded by security agents at the entrance of the court house; we had barely slept, Ciro was exhausted. At six o'clock in the afternoon they began the trial; it was supposed to be at 9 on the dot that morning but instead we spent the whole day there, outside the court house.

But the support that I felt around us was bigger than our exhaustion, after four days of sending emails and running around Havana there were, along with us, a few lads from the university, many friends, a lot of foreign press and even diplomats, so we were excited.

When they set Gorki free, I felt something so big that I could no longer stay quiet, I wanted to share my happiness and I asked Yoani Sánchez to publish a text of mine on her blog. She accepted; and this is the way it all happened.

Muchacho Enfermo

Interview with Claudia Cadelo

As some of you know, I try to contribute regularly to Ashin-Mettacara.com, a news website operated by Ashin Mettacara, a burmese monk whose blog I am a big fan of. Ashin is an advocate for freedom of thought, belief and expression so I thought it appropriate to post a couple of interviews with another person who fights for her freedom of thought and expression and whose blog I greatly enjoy, Claudia Cadelo.

This interview is the first in a series I called "The True Democracy of the Voteless" and I think it's a great read for anyone wanting to know a little bit more about Cuban bloggers or for anyone who already reads her and other blogs that originate from behind enemy lines.

I'd like to encourage all of you to read the interview by clicking HERE and since you can't comment on the other site feel free to comment here. For those of you who won't I'll post a very small portion of it here.


Muchacho Enfermo: In a recent blog post you spoke of the harassment of the State towards those they perceive as dissidents. Is that something that worries you?
Claudia Cadelo: It worries me, I worry about a lot of things, my family, my friends, myself. I know perfectly well that I upset the government, like all those who are different upset them and everyone who, in one way or another, denounces or simply abstain from participating in the political circus that Cuba has become. But that doesn’t mean that I will stop writing, or that I will stop offering my support to those they try to silence.

Muchacho Enfermo: Why do you think what you do is important?
Claudia Cadelo: The truth is that I don’t know if it is important or not, I don’t like thinking of my blog as important. It is simply something that I do because I want to and because it seems right to me. If it is important for someone, that is very good, but that’s not what compels me to write; the fact that some people like reading it is, for me, already slightly wonderful and unexpected, that is more then I hoped for. I don’t try to change anybody’s mentality, I only want to say what I have a right to say in a world where freedom of expression is an abstract concept, one might say that it’s a luxury that I afford myself: I have decided to be a free being.

Muchacho Enfermo: What would you like to say to those outside Cuba who agree with the system and that criticize your blog and other blogs from VocesCubanas.com?
Claudia Cadelo: I have nothing to say to people that use their freedom of expression, their civil rights, their economic freedoms and their political freedoms to defend this totalitarian system. I don’t believe that any system is perfect, but what I am sure of is that this system is not the right one: a better society cannot be constructed if the basis of it is oppression, fear, militarism, the absence of civil rights and the supreme unlimited power in the hands of only two or three people; and we can add to that that the social ills, the corruption and the poverty which are also a part of the status quo, which remains.

Muchacho Enfermo

Cuban author threatened, they even called his mother!

A book launch planned for Monday February 16th in Havana, hosted by world famous blogger Yoani Sanchez, for the new book of Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo called Boring Home is now threatened by the government.

Early this morning a blog post on Octavo Cerco showed an email that is circulating on the Caubarte.cu intranet. An email that is a not so subtle threat to OLPL and to those planning to attend the meeting. Yoani Sanchez has posted about it on Generation Y a few hours following the post on Octavo Cerco and shows the same email.

OLPL`s mother also received a call to tell her to warn her son not to go. I mean seriously, how sad is that when a government resorts to calling your mom?

I'll post a copy of the email here but please refer to the above mentioned websites for more insight and details:


I’ve heard a there’s a message circulating, by email, promoting the presentation on this coming Monday, the 16th, outside La Cabaña, of a book by Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo, and that it will be presented by the infamous and counterrevolutionary blogger, Yoanni Sánchez, who is well compensated by the empire.

A few months ago a photo of Pardo Lazo also circulated, masturbating over a Cuban flag, an act that outrages all the sons of this country and of other latitudes because this is an insult to a symbol of the country. His literary work is little known, however this fact was disclosed as part of the propaganda against Cuba.

Pardo Lazo has become a puppet at the service of Yoanni and her clique.

I don’t think they would carry out this stupid activity, to do so will give them a fright like that I’ve read in the “summons,” and I’ve also had news of some disagreeable surprises they are going to find there.

I still can't believe they called his mom...

Muchacho Enfermo

Vote for Yoani!

Yesterday I asked you all to support Ashin Mettacara for the Weblog log awards as he was nominated in the "Best Asian Blog" category. Today I am asking you to show your support for Yoani Sanchez as her blog Generation Y has been nominated in the "Best Latino, Caribbean or South American Blog" category.

Yoani is Cuba's most famous blogger, her blog has been blocked from within the island, she has gone head to head with Mariela Castro, she has been interviewed by countless TV stations and was voted by Time magazine as one of the world's most influential people.

Yet, her government still finds ways to harass her and the handful of blogger that blog in Cuba about Cuba. In December both her and her husband, along with another blogger Claudia Cadelo, were summoned by the Ministry of the Interior and were told in no uncertain terms that they should cancel a meeting of Cuban bloggers that was planned for the following weekend. These awards help raise awareness about her cause and help keep her out of jail.

Just as you did yesterday by voting for Ashin Mettacara, please take 30 seconds out of your day and show your support for Yoani and all of the other Cuban bloggers who risk their freedom to fight for freedom speech and freedom of opinion.

Muchacho Enfermo

50 years later...

I could start my blogging year by talking about Gaza or about how Russia is cutting Ukraine's gas again, I could speak about the war in Afghanistan or about Hoder who is still in jail for his blog. But instead I'll I'll start the year by blogging, again, about Cuba.

Everyone from Reuters to Al Jazeera was talking about it... Even local papers here were talking about it. The Globe and Mail had a great little slide show. 50 years of Revolution. 50 years of hard times. 18,263 days of censorship. 438,312 hours of living under the same government without a free election.

I didn't get a chance to finish my year in blogs... but here's a just a few (and please feel free to add to the list) few blogs about Cuba that everyone should check out, blogger from within the island and Cuban expats write about their love and their sadness and the hardships. Zurama the other of one of these blogs suggested that Cuban bloggers should dress in black today to mourn 50 years of having no freedom... that, for all of us, should speak volumes.

http://www.desdecuba.com/generationy/
http://octavocercoen.blogspot.com/
http://desdecuba.com/sin_evasion_en/
http://desdecuba.com/reinaldoescobar_en/
http://el-guama.blogspot.com/
http://habanemia.blogspot.com/
http://penultimosdias.com/
http://zuramascuba.blogspot.com/

Muchacho Enfermo

Now in English

Claudia Cadelo's blog is now being translated into English! For those of you who haven't had the pleasure, or just weren't able to read her Spanish one I'm putting a link to her English version in my blogroll. If you liked Generation Y (which links to her as well) you will also love this blog. Check it out.

Muchacho Enfermo