I just returned from Cuba and the news of your upcoming visit has caused commotion. It will be the first time in 88 years (Calvin Coolidge had gone in 1928) that an acting President of the US visits the neighboring country. They are separated only by the Florida Straits and by a history of hegemonism from your country, that began when the second President in the history of the US, John Adams, declared in 1783 that Cuba ought to be a part of the United States.
Then, in 1898, Washington appropriated the victory of Cuban patriots against Spanish colonialism and seized power over the island, along with Puerto Rico and Philippines. They imposed a neo-colony through the Platt Amendment and supported every crook that raised to power in the island, thus backing some of the most bloody tyrannies of Latin America and the Caribbean, which is a big deal in a continent that knows a lot about tyrannies.
The Cuban Revolution put an end to this endless crime and disgrace, and the reaction of your predecessors in the White House was to condemn the island for its desire of freedom and self-determination, for its loyalty to the historic mandate of José Martí.
They did everything they could to put an end to the revolution, but they couldn’t. They caused thousands of deaths and caused enormous harm and suffering to the Cuban people, with a blockade that amounted to two Marshall Plans, in present values. One of them was enough to rebuild Europe after the Second World War, two weren’t enough to sink Cuba. Isn’t that revealing? You and your secretary of state, John Kerry, have an enormous merit in being the first ones in acknowledging the resounding failure of the US policy against Cuba.
That is why you and Raúl Castro have decided to begin dismantling the blockade and creating, for real this time, a fresh start. That December 17, 2014 was a historic day. Then the embassies opened and now you are going to Cuba, and if your secret services allow it, you will be able to appreciate the Cuban people, their cordiality, their integrity, the freedom with which they express their feelings on any topic without fear, their pride for having resisted so many aggressions without ever bowing down. You may encounter many issues in Cuba, as in your own country, but Cubans were never brought to their knees (never!). And despite the adverse conditions that they have to endure daily, they still take better care than the US of the health and education of their people. You will see.
With that said, and since I know that sometimes your advisers are somewhat inexperienced and not too sharp, I take the liberty to extend to you some practical advice that will make your trip much more pleasant.
First of all, don’t bring US dollars. I know that for the head of the world’s greatest empire, President of the only country that emits the most powerful currency, that advice can sound absurd and even offensive. But before you step on the Air Force I, make sure that your entourage changes dollars to euros. Dollars are not very useful in Cuba, not because the Cubans have anything against it, but because of the stupidity of your predecessor, who, I guess while under the influence of some intoxicant, emitted an executive order that established that all dollars coming from Cuba had their origin in drug trafficking, and therefore were not acceptable for the US Treasury Department. If you take dollars, Cubans won’t be able to accept them, because they can’t do anything with them.
But because they are very sympathetic and hospitable people, they will surely exchange dollars for CUCs (Cuban pesos), but for 10% less of the value. Because, you must know, the Cuban currency is, along with the Euro, the second strongest one in the world after the sterling pound. Stronger than the dollar! That must be a tough nut to crack for a US President, so please save yourself the trouble. Take euros and then convert them to CUCs. Then you will be able to drink some mojitos in the iconic Bodeguita del Medio, or Cuba’s famous rum in the beautiful gallery of the National Hotel, and buy music from the excellent bands that liven up the days and nights of Cubans.
Dollars also won’t serve you to buy the magnificent paintings and sculptures by Cuban artists, nor do what almost all of your fellow countrymen and women do with almost religious devotion: to get on a 1955 convertible Cadillac and see the most beautiful sights of Havana, and, of course, enjoy an unforgettable stroll down the Malecón esplanade, and let the sea breeze fill you with positive energy. Lucky for you, if you arrive a day earlier you may see the Rolling Stones play for free, because in Cuba, unlike the rest of the world, these shows are free. With dollars you won’t be able to do any of this. That is, unless you annul Bush Jr.’s stupid decision before your departure.
Secondly, if your daughters don’t go with you on this trip, make sure you leave them some recent pictures of you, because Skype doesn’t work in Cuba. You may speak on the phone with them, if you’re lucky, but you won’t be able to see each other. As it turns out, as part of the blockade there are many regulations that impede or hinder the supply of Internet to Cuba. Take a look at a map of the cables that go across the Caribbean sea and you will see that Cuba has only one, and it barely works. This was the one that Hugo Chavez generously donated to the motherland of Martí and Fidel, and that some Americans like writer Ernest Hemingway and sociologist C. Wright Mills loved intensely. All the rest of the countries in the area are well connected by those cables, except Cuba.
Maybe they invite you to Varadero or Cayo Guillermo, which I emphatically recommend. But there’s no use in trying to know where you are along the road by opening Google Maps. An irritating sign will come up saying something like “it is not possible to open the application in this location”. You also won’t be able to check your social networks. Internet communication is slow, expensive and unreliable, as is the phone. Imagine what would happen to the international competitivity of the North American economy if it had those issues! It is best not to think about it. Nor imagining what would happen with a favorite topic of your government: “national security”. God forbid that while you are there there is an emergency, because by the time you get the message and are able to reply, the issue will be over. Cuban problems, inefficiencies of the revolution? Nope. The blockade, plain and simple.
And you can in fact end with this criminal aggression against freedom of information, that is part of your attributes and does not even have to go to Congress. In fact, I must say that, slowly, there is a change in connectivity and telecommunication, but there’s still a long way to go. If you order your people to make it happen and allow Cuba to have the same connectivity as Jamaica or Dominican Republic, you would prevent that the massive influx of American tourists that are beginning to come to Cuba and the hundreds of thousands of Cubans that live in Florida and are beginning to return, speak so badly about the “useless bureaucrats in Washington” as I heard over and over, days ago, from people annoyed by the lack of Internet.
Another practical advice: Cuban gastronomy is excellent. You will surely be offered the finest delicacies, such as the Cuban lobster, red like the revolution. The US has fine lobsters, too, but there’s nothing like the Cuban ones. But for the people in your entourage, who will probably not be as lucky, the culinary offer may seem disappointing, because there are not many things to eat, even in the best places in Havana. Why? Because Cuba has enormous restrictions to import any sort of good, even food, or medicines, from the US. They can’t use dollars, they have to triangulate every operation with third-party countries, any banks that enables them to do commercial transactions can be sanctioned with scandalous fines —like the 9 billion dollars that the Treasury Department asked the French bank Paribas. President Hollande, instead of dismissing the fine, which would be the sensible thing to do since US law does not apply outside the country’s borders, only protested that he thought it was“excessive”. De Gaulle must be rolling over in his grave…
As if this weren’t enough, if Cubans want to buy food from the US, they have to pay for everything in advance (this doesn’t happen anywhere else in the planet) and pay outrageous amounts for freight ships, because the blockade laws establishes that ships that have transported goods to, or from, Cuba can’t dock in the US in the subsequent 6 months.
Are you not a believer in the virtues of free commerce? Then let Cubans practice it!
Finally, President Obama, to avoid taking up more of your time. I know that you, as the cultivated man you are (a notable exception to the collection of rather crude men that preceded you, such as Ronald Reagan, Gerald Ford and George W. Bush), and as a true politician, you must have an ardent desire to talk to Fidel. Because that is the reason that moves you to visit Cuba in such an intempestive manner. You know that the Commander will turn 90 next August 13, and you want to be early to greet him, because on those days he will receive a lot of visitors. Of course: you have to discuss things first with Raul, but you know well that Fidel is the last survivor of the great statesmen that the twentieth century had, and that the trail of his leadership goes well into the twenty-first century. I can assure you that talking to him will enrich you: you will meet an extremely cultivated person (you have to tolerate coarse and primitive beings like Netanyahu, or eminent mediocres like Cameron, Rajoy and Hollande, or bandits like the Gulf oil lords, not to mention your neighbors south of the Rio Grande!). You will have the opportunity to talk to a man that knows an overwhelming amount of general information, a statesman that was ahead of his time in denouncing the climate change and the threats it poses to the human race in the 1992 Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit, a topic that also concerns you; he pioneered the promotion of biotechnology and nanosciences in a little country harassed by potencies and underdeveloped; and, besides, with a fine sense of humor.
I pity you: insulted day after day by the beasts of Fox network and surrounded by ignorant troglodytes like Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, it will be refreshing to speak to a wise man like Fidel.
I will finish by reminding you that Pope Francis, in an unprecedented gesture, went to Washington and spoke in a joint session of both chambers of Congress. If representatives and senators had a little decency, they would fulfill the Pope’s exhortations and annul the sanctions right away, with no further delay. But you don’t have to wait for them, use all the attributions of the White House. Latin America, always generous, offers you one last chance to enter history as the President that changed the course of events: free Cuba from the blockade. Tell your representative in the peace talks between Colombia’s government and the FARC-EP to accelerate the agreement. Do not miss this opportunity. You could make your way to history.
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1 Comment
What a sensible essay in a field and on a subject that has little that is sensible in the U.S. press.