Packing up home 'easy' in
needy Cuba
Packing up after having his press
accreditation withdrawn, BBC correspondent Stephen Gibbs
reflects on whether the Cuban authorities really need to go
to the lengths they do to control information.
Moving home, they say, is one of life's five most stressful
experiences. It comes in at number three. Ranked a bit below
bereavement, a bit above divorce.
But in Cuba it is different. Packing
up a home in Cuba is easy.
The reason is that you do not have to
go through that agonising problem of wondering about what to
do with all your junk. You can sell it, or give it away. All
of it. In a matter of hours.
Cuba is a place where almost all
consumer items are prohibitively expensive, or, more likely,
not available. And scarcity breeds desire.
Most Cubans, and plenty of foreigners
living on the island, spend the majority of their time not
thinking about the country's future, or transitional
governments, or the health of Fidel Castro, but on rather
more mundane things. Like how to find a square meal, a
fridge that works, or an electric fan.
Farewell 'presents'
I had a first-hand glimpse of all this
when I returned to my home in Old Havana, just days after
hearing the disappointing news that I was one of three
foreign correspondents to be stripped of their press
accreditation by the Cuban government. Our reporting was
deemed "negative" by a nameless committee.
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Sadly, and often inaccurately, many Cubans assume
that anyone who is leaving the island is going on to
better things
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As I entered my apartment the phone was
ringing. It was an ex-pat friend from who I had not heard
from for some time. The conversation went along these lines:
"I am so sorry to hear you are being thrown out," he said,
"what a disgraceful attempt to intimidate the foreign
press."
And then, after a brief pause, the
real point of the call: "That sofa in your living room...
are you selling it? And what about the microwave?"
As the news spread that I was on my
way out, my Cuban neighbours congratulated me on what they
saw as a promotion. Sadly, and often inaccurately, many
Cubans assume that anyone who is leaving the island is going
on to better things.
Then came the not-so-subtle requests
for a farewell present. I soon realised that anything would
do. A broken watch, a 2005 calendar, all were received with
embarrassing gratitude.
Unexpected visitor
I had little time to decide which
memories of my life in Cuba I would keep for myself.
One I did manage to save was a copy of
the first story I had filed, just days after arriving in
Havana.
I had gone to meet some members of the Hemingway family, at
the elegant hilltop villa where Ernest lived until 1960. We
all gathered in the garden to hear about a project to
archive the author's papers.
Then something completely unexpected
happened. Fidel Castro showed up.
In his military uniform, he walked,
slightly awkwardly, around the side of the swimming pool
where Ava Gardner had once swum naked. He apologised for
interrupting, and then, with his arm around one of the
female Hemingways, gave a lengthy speech. He ended it by
saying how much he regretted not getting to know Ernest
Hemingway better.
"When you are young, you think
everyone is going to live for ever," he said.
Censored jokes
Back in my apartment, I put the copy
of the story in my "keep" file, together with something else
which brought back another memory.
It was a DVD of the film Hotel Rwanda.
One Saturday night, a couple of years
ago, the Oscar-nominated film was put on Cuban state
television.
I was at home watching it, when, a few
minutes after the opening titles, I noticed that some shots
had been clumsily repeated. It had been edited.
I happened to have a DVD of the
original version. I put it on to compare the two.
It became obvious that the Cuban
censors had gone to the trouble of cutting out a 30 second
portion of the film. The banned images contained a couple of
harmless jokes about Cuban cigars.
State control
One of the enduring questions that has
crossed my mind whilst working in Cuba is whether the
government really needs to go to the lengths it does in
managing the flow of information to its people.
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Those that support the revolution believe that
their future is in good hands. Those that yearn for
change feel that things are out of their hands
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Cuban officials are surprisingly
unapologetic on the issue. Their justification is that Cuba
is in the midst of an undeclared war with a shameless US
administration which is determined to undermine the Cuban
revolution.
They sometimes allude to what they
seem to regard as the British government's distinguished
censorship of the press during World War II.
But still I wonder whether all the
control is necessary. One of the side effects of 48 years
with the same leader is an extraordinary degree of
resignation amongst the people. It works both ways.
Those that support the revolution
believe that their future is in good hands. Those that yearn
for change feel that things are out of their hands.
Given that, would it really threaten
the status quo if you could buy a foreign paper in the
streets of Havana? Or if the foreign press in Cuba were able
to act a little more freely?
I doubt it. But clearly someone right
at the top feels that such an experiment is not worth the
risk.
From Our Own Correspondent was
broadcast on Saturday, 1 September, 2007 at 1130 BST on BBC
Radio 4. Please check the
programme schedules for World Service transmission
times.
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