heroes.
People know my father was José LuÃs Fuerte, and so it makes it difficult sometimes. They expect more from me. I used to be friends with Che Guevaraâs son in high school. We used to joke about our respective revolutionary burdens. Last I heard, he was a heavy-metal musician, pierced everywhere and trying to leave the country.
I thought of leaving too. At night on an inner tube with other
balseros
from the beach at Jaimanitas or Santa Fé. A friend of mine from junior high, Lupita Núñez, tried it in 1989, but she got picked up by the Cuban coast guard and sentenced to three years in jail. Others get eaten by sharks or go insane from the thirst. The people who make it to Miami become the real heroes of the revolution. My friends and I listen to the shortwave or spend hours trying to tune in to Radio Martà to get the news. Or if weâre really lucky, a TV report from south Florida.
Leaving. Leaving and dollars. Thatâs all anybody ever talks about anymore.
¡Basta ya!
Sometimes, late at night, I wonder how my life wouldâve been different if Mamá had left for the United States with her sister. TÃa Constancia lives in New York and has two grown children. I like to imagine how cold it gets there. Iâd like to wrap myself in fur and skate endlessly on frozen lakes. Round and round Iâd go, my breath a trace of vapor behind me. In Cuba, there arenât any lakes. And only the future is frozen.
When Iâm not out here on the Malecón, I ride my bicycle to pass the time. Not by choice, believe me. The damn island ran out of gas, and then the government started importing these bulky black bikes from China and tried to convince everyone that it was good for their health. Well, for once they were right. People started losing weight and having more energy for sexânot that thereâs ever a shortage of
that
here. Now something like a million bicycles clog Havana, and total chaos reigns in the streets. Itâs as if cars never existed.
I like to take my bike out of the city and ride for hours in the countryside. On weekends Iâve gone clear across to the Viñales Valley in Pinar del RÃo province. There are fields of tobacco everywhere you look. Mamá tells me her fatherâs family came from there, that they were refined people who recited poetry and played music every night. She still has the handmade violin my great-grandfather Reinaldo brought with him from Spain in 1903. Every now and then, Mamá takes the violin out of its little coffin and rubs the horsehair bow with a speck of rosin. I often think of my great-grandfather as I ride, suspended low over the earth, skimming along just fast enough to notice anything important.
My boyfriends come from everywhere. But the Canadian tourists are the easiest tricks, because they want to believe everything you tell them. Like that guy over there. Look how he canât keep his eyes off that trashy number in the hot pants.
¡Que nalgotas!
Something happens to their brains when they hit Cuba. My theory is that itâs the ratio of sunlight to oxygen to ocean here. Ninety percent of their cells are dormant until they arrive and see a good-looking
habanera
. Then all hell breaks loose. Unfortunately, theyâre so sexually deprived, they make you work harder than anyone else on the planet.
From what I can tell, the only people making a decent living here are the
babalawos
. Thereâs one around the corner from my building whoâs redone his entire house with money from
santerÃa
initiations. Only a couple of years ago, everyone knew where to find Lisardo Cuenca if he was needed, but it was all very hushed. His house looked like any other on the street, peeling with old paint. The occasional bleating of an illegal goat or the appearance of a horde of paralytics on his doorstep was the only clue to the secret power inside.
Now you should see the place. A thirty-foot statue of San Lázaro
People know my father was José LuÃs Fuerte, and so it makes it difficult sometimes. They expect more from me. I used to be friends with Che Guevaraâs son in high school. We used to joke about our respective revolutionary burdens. Last I heard, he was a heavy-metal musician, pierced everywhere and trying to leave the country.
I thought of leaving too. At night on an inner tube with other
balseros
from the beach at Jaimanitas or Santa Fé. A friend of mine from junior high, Lupita Núñez, tried it in 1989, but she got picked up by the Cuban coast guard and sentenced to three years in jail. Others get eaten by sharks or go insane from the thirst. The people who make it to Miami become the real heroes of the revolution. My friends and I listen to the shortwave or spend hours trying to tune in to Radio Martà to get the news. Or if weâre really lucky, a TV report from south Florida.
Leaving. Leaving and dollars. Thatâs all anybody ever talks about anymore.
¡Basta ya!
Sometimes, late at night, I wonder how my life wouldâve been different if Mamá had left for the United States with her sister. TÃa Constancia lives in New York and has two grown children. I like to imagine how cold it gets there. Iâd like to wrap myself in fur and skate endlessly on frozen lakes. Round and round Iâd go, my breath a trace of vapor behind me. In Cuba, there arenât any lakes. And only the future is frozen.
When Iâm not out here on the Malecón, I ride my bicycle to pass the time. Not by choice, believe me. The damn island ran out of gas, and then the government started importing these bulky black bikes from China and tried to convince everyone that it was good for their health. Well, for once they were right. People started losing weight and having more energy for sexânot that thereâs ever a shortage of
that
here. Now something like a million bicycles clog Havana, and total chaos reigns in the streets. Itâs as if cars never existed.
I like to take my bike out of the city and ride for hours in the countryside. On weekends Iâve gone clear across to the Viñales Valley in Pinar del RÃo province. There are fields of tobacco everywhere you look. Mamá tells me her fatherâs family came from there, that they were refined people who recited poetry and played music every night. She still has the handmade violin my great-grandfather Reinaldo brought with him from Spain in 1903. Every now and then, Mamá takes the violin out of its little coffin and rubs the horsehair bow with a speck of rosin. I often think of my great-grandfather as I ride, suspended low over the earth, skimming along just fast enough to notice anything important.
My boyfriends come from everywhere. But the Canadian tourists are the easiest tricks, because they want to believe everything you tell them. Like that guy over there. Look how he canât keep his eyes off that trashy number in the hot pants.
¡Que nalgotas!
Something happens to their brains when they hit Cuba. My theory is that itâs the ratio of sunlight to oxygen to ocean here. Ninety percent of their cells are dormant until they arrive and see a good-looking
habanera
. Then all hell breaks loose. Unfortunately, theyâre so sexually deprived, they make you work harder than anyone else on the planet.
From what I can tell, the only people making a decent living here are the
babalawos
. Thereâs one around the corner from my building whoâs redone his entire house with money from
santerÃa
initiations. Only a couple of years ago, everyone knew where to find Lisardo Cuenca if he was needed, but it was all very hushed. His house looked like any other on the street, peeling with old paint. The occasional bleating of an illegal goat or the appearance of a horde of paralytics on his doorstep was the only clue to the secret power inside.
Now you should see the place. A thirty-foot statue of San Lázaro
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