The man with the typewriter
On 9 April 1948, the Colombian politician Jorge Eliécer Gaitán stepped out of his office with a group of friends to walk to Bogotá’s Hotel Continental for lunch. An assassin confronted him in the street and shot him three times in the face and chest. He died shortly afterwards. His supporters caught the 20-year-old culprit, […]
Fidel and Gabo
A review of Fidel & Gabo: A portrait of a legendary friendship, by Angel Esteban and Stephanie Panichelli Two of the best-known Latin American figures of the twentieth century, Fidel Castro and Gabriel Garcia Márquez (Gabo) were close friends. This book claims to be the story of their relationship, but does it do it justice? […]
No separate queue for Cubans
‘We’re leaving,’ my Cuban friend N. told me in November. ‘We’re building a raft.’ I was shocked, partly because he planned to leave, partly because of the way he planned to do it. I consulted another friend, who’d spent several months in a coastguard team, hauling people out of the water when their rafts fell […]
Hitch-hiking or bottling?
A few years ago, outside Cuba’s main towns, hitch-hiking was the main way of getting around. State-run buses were few and far between, trains (despite Cuba having the most extensive network in Latin America) might be scheduled to run at least once daily – but whether they ran at all was always subject to a […]
Forget Fidel Castro’s policies?
This letter to the Guardian, below, is in response to a piece by Zoe Williams, Forget Fidel Castro’s policies. What matters is that he was a dictator. Zoe Williams’ usually excellent judgment has let her down when she says of Fidel Castro that “What matters is that he was a dictator”, because she forgets the […]
The Last Soldiers of the Cold War
A review of the book by Fernando Morais On February 24, 1996, three small planes set off from Florida, planning to enter Cuban airspace over Havana and drop propaganda leaflets. They were piloted by members of Brothers to the Rescue, one of the many anti-Castro organisations that were then not only trying to reverse the […]
Overland from Cuba to Texas
Thawing relations between the United States and Cuba have brought an upsurge in Cubans trying to leave the island. They’re worried that they may lose their favourable US immigration status, becoming no more welcome than any other Latino who fancies life in the US. Since 1995, the ‘wet foot, dry foot’ policy has deterred people […]
A Cuban school
The village primary school in El Corralito in the province of Pinar del Rio has 30 students and 15 teachers. We were invited to their celebration of the ‘Day of the Teacher’ (December 22), along with all the students and parents (almost all those attending were mothers). The day began as it always does, with […]
Guantánamo – time to end the lease
Those who would protest that only regime change and full recognition of human rights in Cuba should precede any deal have surely had their arguments demolished. This month marks the 112th anniversary of the signing of the lease for the Guantánamo base between the Cuban and US governments. For at least half this period the […]
Empire’s Crossroads: A history of the Caribbean from Columbus to the present day
There are many histories of the Americas that begin with Columbus’s landing in what were to become known as the West Indies, but this is perhaps one of the few accessible accounts which focus on the Caribbean itself, and which follow through right to the present day. Carrie Gibson’s thesis is that the Caribbean was […]
John Perry lives in Masaya, Nicaragua where he works on