Im a news hound. Especially for certain topics, certain parts of the world, or certain journalists…. I virtually clip tons of things on the average day. Lately one of the frequent topics that I’ve paid extra attention to, is Cuba.
Surely Im not alone, but unlike people who are only hoping for a collapse of the political system there, I’m more interested to hear about people’s experiences, and learn about the different layers that make up today’s Cuba.
One of my favorite sources, who’s podcast interviews lately have me rewinding and listening twice or three times even, just to hear the details again, is RadioOpen Source. Chris has been speaking with different people with very different connections with Cuba, and it has made for some educational and eye opening audio.
The first guest was Patrick Symmes. I love this author for a book that mr. D-Rock gave me many years ago, Chasing Ché. Well, he’s been working on a book about Cubans and Cuba and spending alot of time there, he has some very interesting things to share from those adventures.
The second is a man by the name of Adrian Lopez Denis, a social historian and son of a Cuban doctor, who’s descriptions of Cuba dispel alot of the stories we’ve always heard. He also points out the very symbolic fact that while after his stepping-down, big news magazines used images of cigars to represent Fidel, the man had actually quit smoking 40 years ago. But beyond that he uncovers alot of facts about culture and society that are really worth listening to.
And while all this is going on, I’ve been amazed to watch my blogger friend Alexis Oriol, go from being a doctor for the Cuban medical corps in East Timor, to being a refugee without a country, to being a new resident of Miami. An unbelievable turn of events that has me asking out loud sometimes, “did this really happen”. But the answer is yes, and if you read spanish at all, I recommend reading through the blog. OR you can wait a few months because Alexis is sure to become an english language blogger and more American than most Americans (like me, for example)