Jack's Blog

You spend some days mostly waiting for them to be over. I remember how serious my dad was when he told me to never wish my time away, and I think about this during mundane things like the DMV line. However, I always end up wishing I could fast forward an hour or three. There are days like that, then there are days like today, where I can not begin to recount it all. My thoughts run off like a list, and I continuously jump to the next thing, in fear that something might be lost in the mix.

Fifi is a remarkable woman who lives in Arroyo Narañjo, traditionally one of the poorest areas of Havana, and, due to her social works, has been on the cover of the NY Times, traveled around the world and helped countless impoverished people. Of the US, she says the people in Boston are too uptight and serious – she prefers San Francisco.

Through her leadership, the mothers of her town built over 300 apartments and 30 social buildings. When I say built, I mean they wielded the pick and the axe, they shoveled the dirt, and they drew the plans and sifted the concrete. One morning when they were sifting concrete, a drunk walked by and stared at these women, stunned. He asked them if they were going to make the buildings out of meringue.

Today she spoke to a group of civil rights workers from Kentucky. We call them the Blockade Runners, because they are publicly traveling to Cuba in protest of the travel ban. Here is an article about them from the Louisville Times:

article from luisville paper on blockade runners

They are a brave and intelligent group of people, and have made me think about how an individual would go about changing the blockade. One difficulty is that it is impossible to change something if you don’t know anything about it in the first place. Because of the lack of communication between the two countries, most of the knowledge of the other place is approximated, or simply wrong. This is why traveling, like they are doing, is so important. I am only afraid that the shortness of their trip will preclude them from understanding the complexities of Cuba, much of which Jack and I don’t understand after a month. But it is a good start.

We met two rappers from the community. Their songs are a hip-hop/Reagatton mix with Cuban flavor, and pretty damn good.

I like this picture of a mother carrying her daughter because it represents the road of life.

The past sits exhausted in the background, while the present carries the future, which looks at us, the Americans. A Cuban told me the future of the world is in the hands of the Americans, which I believe. The little girl looks to us, while the mother has turned her back and carries the future away. What are we going to do?

Abdul, another representative of the future, might have the binoculars upside-down, but he guards his house nevertheless.