Reunion with Cuba

It did not take the US press, however, with the New York Times as a major exception, many weeks before declaring that the Cuban revolution, which began in earnest with Batista's escape New Year's Eve 1958, was communist inspired and led, and already in the spring 1960 was the picture the sign of Cuba or Castro Country as it is often called, quite similar to the image of the Eastern European countries. But in June 1960 this was a false picture, based on bad and uncritical information and first and foremost on a complete lack of knowledge of the difference between the many movements the world knows to the left of the Democratic Party in the United States.

Today, the impression from Cuba can be summed up in one sentence: what this type of American press said a year and a half ago, it now seems to be true – largely, but what they say Today, it is not yet true. So, in a sense, it seems that they were right, but the question is whether these highly conservative critics of Castro have been right in the same way that the scientist who makes his predictions based on theory and data can get right, or in the same way the man who says incessantly that "now is twelve" is undeniably getting right twice a day, or if it is in the same way as the mother who is so scared that the child will play with matches that she eventually drives it to set fire on the house with its gloomy predictions and admonitions. Certainly, only Cuba is so dynamic that yesterday's truth does not hold today and certainly not tomorrow.

Like Eastern Europe. But you notice the difference as soon as you set foot in the airport: it is primarily the posters. Firstly the amount, there were a million of them last year then there are three million this year. But last year it was signed Fidel, Ché, Camilb, Cienfuegos and other heroes of the revolution, this year even quotes from Fidel's speech in the flood of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Khrushchev, Mao and other communist leaders quotes. And the pictures: well, Castro has declared that pictures of living Cubans should not hang in public – in return, there is a flood of pictures of Lenin and Mao, and only Cuba's pale, high-browed martyr Jose Marti can sometimes be seen […].

Foreign newspapers like the New York Times found it impossible to get hold of Cuba – last year it went. However, working as a journalist in Cuba is easy – at least if you are not from the United States. But telegrams are being censored.

On a huge transparent over one of the avenues it read: «If the Yankees can't live 90 miles from a socialist country, then they should move, too! ” This slogan had some of the same banter and wit that characterized most of them last year, but otherwise the familiar, slavish, Eastern European pompous style has taken over: forward comrades, against the victory of socialism! Peace and friendship between the peoples! etc. For someone who has traveled a bit in Eastern Europe and is used to seeing this there, it would seem strange to see it for the first time in an American neighbor, just 90 miles from Florida. Particularly unsympathetic was a poster with a picture of a little boy: «This boy becomes either a patriot or a traitor. What do you want?""Teach your children what the revolution has accomplished». Still other posters made fun of representative democracy, which was portrayed as the regime one had under Batista. It is true that Cuba had too many newspapers and that most of them were under Batista's control. But no pretext and none of the mistakes of the past can justify the alignment that has now taken place. There are still many newspapers, Revolucion, La Calle, El Mundo, Sierra Maestra, etc. but they are no more different than Drammens Tidende and Buskeruds Blad, and the same applies to the weekly magazines. The only one that stands out is the body of the Communist Party Today, Today, which is Cuba's largest newspaper, better technically and in many ways more interesting […].

There are speakers everywhere, and while last year they often played music, they now seem to send news and messages and talk incessantly. That radio and television are completely one-sided speaks for itself – but it must also be said that both they and the newspapers run a magnificent mass information campaign with all kinds of lessons of a highly neutral and excellent nature all day and week.

In short: The propaganda press on the Cuban citizen is very strong, probably it is so strong that it works against its purpose. Each time the leaders get a new idea, and with their tireless energy and willingness to do so very often, a new propaganda campaign is started, new posters are pasted on the old ones, so you can follow the history of the revolution by doing some kind of geological excavation in the teams. Probably it will be too much; even those who are still enthusiasts, and there are many, will probably go somewhat tired. It also doesn't help that the bookstores have practically only propaganda literature and nothing from the US or the West, and that 50 percent of the films shown in Habana were Russian.

Supply difficulties. It is not true that there is any serious food shortage or commodity shortage in Cuba today, but what is true is that the difficulties are starting to register. The US embargo primarily affected importers and those who wanted luxury items such as pictures, TVs, refrigerators, etc. – ordinary consumer goods were not so badly affected. However, it is true that it is difficult to get razor blades, soap and ballpoint pens – but then one day a ship from East Germany or the Soviet Union with a few millions of one or the other – thus resolves for a while. Their economy is catching up more than before, it's not the steady flow of goods – but the distribution system is not so bad so a new shipload is soon noticed across the island [...].

But milk, butter and meat represent problems, and it is rationed out in the same way as in many countries during and after the war […]: one is referred to a particular store, goes early in the morning to get a queue number, and then comes back out of the day. However, the most important function these cows have, besides providing meat if there is something in the store, is to convey rumors: Cubans have a rumor talent that is incredible and long training in counteracting a one-way press – generation training.

In the restaurants, you can still get excellent and plentiful Cuban food, even if it is barely in some places. In the most expensive places you can see people sitting over delicious meals and complaining about the scarcity while gnawing on their chicken legs, and people can come to the middle of the street and shout to one so everyone hears it: «Isn't it terrible, we can no longer speak freely! " Thus there is a certain contradiction between reality and what many claim – but everywhere one can notice a tightening relative to 1960, a certain gloom and this is especially true in the view of what the future will bring. They feel isolated and in many ways they are, except there have never been so many and so distant nationalities in Cuba as now.

Last year, one had to vigorously deny being American – people insisted on it on the streets – this year few would think that they were not Russians, or at least Czechs or East Germans. I was even indicted in Russian a couple of times on the street by young Cubans who obviously take the program on Russian in high school seriously – Russian should now be introduced next to English as a foreign language to make Cuban youth more equipped to meet the new socialist world. Cuban revolutionaries did not hide the fact that they probably thought the revolution would come to the somewhat remote country north of the Florida Strait too – but it would probably take time.

It would be completely wrong to say that the Cubans have now turned to Castro because they have discovered that this is fast moving towards total communism according to the Eastern European pattern. The impression is that the revolution and its men have the same support in the countryside as before, because it is primarily the peasants who have won the revolution […]. The three main communists are Blas Rock, which controls unions completely and soon all possible other organizations; the gray eminence Fabio Cultivable, who is Polish-born and has long been in the Soviet Union and the previously mentioned editor of Hoy, 45-year-old Carlos Rafael Rodriguez, who was a minister in a coalition government with Batista in 1940. In an interview with him last year, he expressed his great sympathy for Castro's revolution, but also that the Communists want to stay in the background – this year he was less available for interview when it just had been another assassination attempt on him. He wears a goatee ala Lenin, writes leaders ala Lenin and is referred to as the brain of the Cuban Communist Party. He shares with Cuevara the responsibility for financial planning – but has little of Castro's immensely captivating personality – who can still keep an assembly enchanted when he discusses with voices from the floor – whether it is arranged in advance or not. That is why Castro's popularity is even much greater than the government's and theories were constantly heard from anti – government people who are also Castro – that Castro was a prisoner in his own government and also wanted to get rid of the communists, but could not. «If Castro only knew what was happening, and his advisers did not try to hide it from him, then it would probably be different» was frantic.

However, failing beliefs and failing confidence in the Cuban government means for increasing faith in the United States.

It was bitter to visit Cuba this time, not just for someone who thought the revolution had such rich promises because it built on so much fundamentally good and human – but because all this good and fine is still there, but under the pressure of the heavy , gloomy in the present and future.