Havana’s Alluring Pull—A Personal Synopsis of The Cuban People

America, the land of the free, where those in extreme poverty have an opportunity to thrive has been a light in the distance, unattainable yet faithfully present to the world. From the distance, giantess lady liberty rejoices—her new children assimilating into fruition. The voices in the distance echo in her mind; she scurries with a flame in hand hoping to get a warm lit glimpse of the faces of her new unknown children. Although devoted and loyal to the agonized bodies crying out, the blue ocean stands as a wall thousands of miles in distance. In the minds of the Cuban people, those worthy enough to touch American soil return glistening, as if touched and cleansed by the grand architect of the universe. This new emerged power radiates from their bodies, and although they were once a brother or a sister of the many, they return changed as kings and queens, established with a new soaring hierarchy. Their standing among the world is grandiose, reaching the zenith of their class. Upon their new arrival, the smell on their skin changed by the winds of enrichment, their skin radiates bright and robust—to each Cuban, the travelers have changed and are flowing in riches beyond their wildest dreams. They can say what they please, they have the luxury of cars, they have money to eat all the food they desire: rice, eggs, pork, beans, and the ever exiled steak. They salivate with desire. Their cravings become inexplicably ravenous, causing abdominal grieving and an unexplained longing to alleviate their growing appetite. They seek opportunities from the people of the outside world to discuss the life outside of communism. They solicit the traveler for riches, because the traveler has advantages beyond the Cuban people. In Cuba, you make connections to take what you can. As the towering poverty in my country disrupts the flow of mental happiness, many find new ways to drench their indisposition with sexual cures. A prostitute, a pingero, the sexually immoral are not hard to find on the corners under lamp posts. The discretion is high, as many understand the reasons for such public humiliation and extreme abandonment of the human body and morale. As the building’s colors burn and fade by the sun, and as the buildings crumble from the ocean’s mist, a weathered gray emerges as a metaphor of depravity—the bleeding hearts of the Cuban people are grand, satin red, flowing through veins of struggle, and through that struggle they hold a life unparalleled to the world beyond the ocean prison wall. They are a happy, lively people. They dance and carouse until the night’s sweet intoxication ends. From the outside world, the spiritual and sexual pull of these people is alluring, electrifying, and invigorating.  The mental wounds are only but a reminder of the many battles faced; their sense of freedom is dancing, debating, and drinking until the night’s end. The hardship, although present, is drowned by the happiness of family and music. My people are kind, blissfully naive, yet lucid. No culture can be equalized to that of the Cubans. The free wish to one day return to their homes in hopes of finding the satin red on the walls of Havana, where love was poured on the concrete walls through patriotic sacrifice and pleasure. Until that day, the intolerable struggle continues to cause uninvited grief and grime on the newly cleansed.