THE PROCESS AND THE WOMEN
People have a strange opinion about Americans here, that we are all vegitarians and non-smokers – basically, they think we’re squares. They are surprised when we eat animal, then bust out our Cuban cigars.
We went to Rolo’s film today, El Proceso, which was very interesting and well done. He had great access to many places, and somehow shot quite a bit in the States. The story is about five Cubans who were arrested in the USA.
They were infiltrating orginizations in Miami thought to be behind terrorism that has occurred in Cuba. The US arrested them for being terrorists, then tried them in Miami, where the Cubans claim they will not get a fair trial. The five are still in jail there. In light of the post 9/11 era, and the belief that countries have rights to use spies in other countries for national security, it’s an interesting twist on the system. Could you imagine if the US sent them to Guantanemo with other POWS?
Hopefully, the film gets out to more Americans, because it was something I knew nothing about, and a very strange case in a very strange time of the world.
Rolando, who in one of those bizzare coincidences has a sister living the Woodlands – a suburb of Houston – invited us to sit with the filmmakers during the screening, and said our opinion was very important to him because we are Americans.
One of the producers is from San Fransisco, and she thought our project was fascinating. She introduced us to three women who were there for the film. One was a professor of architecture at the University of Havana, and she said our project is very important, for reasons we will explain in our film. We, of course, agreed with her.
The second was an abuela who is famous here in Cuba. She lives in a barrio on the periphery of Havana – a place not even Cubans want to visit. It makes the ghettos of the US look posh; buildings are falling down, many of them don’t even have roofs. Hungry, sick people fight the daily struggle to get what they need to live. She gathered more than 80 mothers and together they learned how to build and fix things, then began putting up buildings themselves, some as high as five stories. She won an international humanitarian award, voted on by 50 countries, and went on an international speaking tour. That’s how you change the world from your home, right there.
Her daughter, the third woman, is a tall, striking black girl with curly red hair who teaches dance. She is going to teach us salsa, if we in turn teach her English. All in a good day’s work.