Seeds of Change - Loudspeakers for Cuban Voices (Pt. 3)

This post marks the eleventh entry for the current Roots of Hope blog theme: Seeds of Change. To read some of the previous entries, see What comes next: study abroad and youth-led change in Cuba, How Cell Phones Can Shake a Nation, Begin from the Beginning: the need for open dialogue, From New Orleans to Havana, Cuba's Economic Reforms: A Window of Opportunity.

A brief introduction:

For the purpose of the Seeds of Change theme on our blog, we wanted to tell our readers about the power of translating blogs. As many of you know, for Cuba's blogging community, the people who translate their blogs represent the opportunity to reach a broader audience, maximize their impact, and BE HEARD. As an example, Mary Jo Porter - who acts as translator for Yoani Sanchez - describes the effect of her work in an interview we featured earlier this month. What we found as we set out to feature blog translating in an entry, was that the greatest testament came from Cuban bloggers themselves. And so, we will be featuring their answers and comments over the next weeks.

To follow up Regina Coyula's response and Orlando Luis Pardo's answer, here is a message from Yamil Dominguez over email:

This is Yamil. First of all I have wanted to thank you directly for a long time for all the precious help you gave me by translating with so much dedication for our blog. Me, my family and friends always have you in mind, we talk about you often. Your work has been excellent, I read it myself once I got back home to the US. At this moment I am in the process of starting again, Marleny will come soon, and she will write to you herself.

About the work of helping translate Cuban blogs I think it is very important for every idea to become freer and to be respected, for this reason if one can count on the help of putting it in other languages it is much better. Thanks to your translations, for example, many have been able to read the details regarding my case and understand with a better outlook the realities of Cuba that are so hidden and unknown for so many.
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Te escribe Yamil, primero que nada quiero agradecerte directamente desde hace mucho tiempo toda esa valiosa ayuda que me distes al traducirme con tanta dedicacion para nuestro blog. Mi familia y amigos siempre te tenemos presente , a cada rato se habla de ti .Tu trabajo ha sido exelente , yo mismo lo he leido una vez que llegue de vuelta a casa a los EU. En estos momentos me encuentro en el periodo de recomienzo , pronto Marleny vendra , ella misma te escribira.Sobre el trabajo de ayudar a traducir los blogs de Cuba opino que es muy importante que cada idea se haga mas libre y sea respetada, para eso si se cuenta con la ayuda para que salga en otras lenguas es mucho mejor, gracias a tus traducciones por ejemplo muchos han podido leer detalles sobre lo acontecido en mi caso y entienden con mejor panorama las realidades de cuba ocultas y desconocidas para tantos .

Besos y abrazos de Yamil y su familia

Click here to visit Yamil's blog.

Seeds of Change - Loudspeakers for Cuban Voices (Pt. 2)

This post marks the fourth entry for the current Roots of Hope blog theme: Seeds of Change. To read previous entries, see What comes next: study abroad and youth-led change in Cuba and How Cell Phones Can Shake a Nation.

A brief introduction:

For the purpose of the Seeds of Change theme on our blog, we wanted to tell our readers about the power of translating blogs. As many of you know, for Cuba's blogging community, the people who translate their blogs represent the opportunity to reach a broader audience, maximize their impact, and BE HEARD. As an example, Mary Jo Porter - who acts as translator for Yoani Sanchez - describes the effect of her work in an interview we featured earlier this month. What we found as we set out to feature blog translating in an entry, was that the greatest testament came from Cuban bloggers themselves. And so, we will be featuring their answers and comments over the next weeks.

To follow up Regina Coyula's response, here is a message from Orlando Luis Pardo:

The word of independent Cuban bloggers is like a light that is true, but very fragile. Before the totalitarian power of the official media, every effort is small to boost this alternative current within today's Cuba. To translate to other languages, to make accessible to other audiences of the world these independent looks into the Absolute State, is a gesture of solidarity of incalculable human and historic worth.

The volunteer translators can hardly feel the emotion that they provoke in each author with each one of the posts they help disseminate. Never have the critical voices within the island counted with such a citizen platform of world support. Never have we felt so accompanied in the midst of the most uncivil solitude(socialipsysm: what I like to call this sub-existential situation after half a century of a Revolution that is "irreversible" even by our Constitution).

We can only give you back our love vocalized in the most elementary of words: Thank you…Or even better, of course, because we already are even without knowing each other: Thank you, brothers...

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La palabra de los bloggers independientes cubanos es como una luz verdadera, pero muy frágil. Ante el poder totalitario de los medios oficiales, todo esfuerzo es poco para potenciar esta corriente alternativa dentro de la Cuba de hoy. Traducir a otros idiomas, hacer accesible a otras audiencias del mundo estas miradas independientes al
Estado Absoluto, es un gesto solidario de incalculable valor humano e histórico. Los traductores voluntarios difícilmente puedan sentir la emoción que provocan en cada autor con cada uno de sus posts que ayudan a difundir. Nunca las voces críticas dentro de la Isla contaron con tal plataforma ciudadana de apoyo mundial. Nunca nos sentimos tan acompañados en medio de la más incivil soledad social (socialipsismo:
me gusta llamar a esta situación sub-existencial tras medio siglo de Revolución "irreversible" hasta por nuestra Constitución). Sólo podemos devolverles nuestro cariño vocalizado en la más elemental de las palabras: Gracias... O mejor, por supuesto, porque ya lo somos incluso sin conocernos: Gracias, hermanos...

Seeds of Change - Loudspeakers for Cuban Voices

This post marks the third entry for the current Roots of Hope blog theme: Seeds of Change. To read previous entries, see What comes next: study abroad and youth-led change in Cuba and How Cell Phones Can Shake a Nation.

A brief introduction:

For the purpose of the Seeds of Change theme on our blog, we wanted to tell our readers about the power of translating blogs. As many of you know, for Cuba's blogging community, the people who translate their blogs represent the opportunity to reach a broader audience, maximize their impact, and BE HEARD. As an example, Mary Jo Porter - who acts as translator for Yoani Sanchez - describes the effect of her work in an interview we featured earlier this month. What we found as we set out to feature blog translating in an entry, was that the greatest testament came from Cuban bloggers themselves. And so, we will be featuring their answers and comments over the next weeks.

To start, here is Regina Coyula's message:

Hello to all translators,

The voluntary translations of our blogs is an invaluable labor. This work allows the reality of our country to be seen from a more realistic point of view, different from the one official propaganda has offered. I hope it has helped many people form a more complete -and complex- idea of my country. Thank you so much for making me a part of this.

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Saludos para los traductores,

Es una labor inestimable la traducción voluntaria de nuestras bitácoras, pues de esa manera la realidad de nuestro país puede verse desde un punto de vista diferente al que ha ofrecido la propaganda oficial. Espero que haya ayudado a muchas perdonas a formarse una idea más completa -y compleja- de mi país. Muchas gracias por el pedacito que me ha tocado.


See Regina's blog here. To get involved in translating blogs from Cuba, visit www.hemosoido.com

Featured Blog from Cuba: Rebeca Monzó Mieres

A Botched Robbery

By Rebeca Monzó Mieres (translated into English by Chabeli Castillo)

A friend from Spain sent me a package in the mail, on July 6th, containing medicines, two cell phones, one for myself and the other one for another person, with their corresponding chargers, three flash drives, and some office supplies.

The package arrived in less than fifteen days. When I was notified of its arrival, I went to pick it up to the Ministry of Communications facilities. At the moment that the package was handed to me, the employee noticed that on the outside of the box protected by a transparent plastic from the TransVal Company, was a loose cell phone battery. After we opened it up to its content, we saw that the two cell phones declared on the original invoice were missing. Only the batteries were left (botched robbery) whose models corresponded to different brands, and the empty box of one of them.

I immediately went to make my claim to the Technical Department of the Postal Zone Six for Services to the Population. There, they also charged me $25.00 pesos. I don't know if that was because of my mismanagement or what.

It is assumed that the mail is inviolable, and especially when the content has been declared to the pertinent authorities. How is it possible that accidentally all packages, including mail, even a simple magazine from a foreign university get here damaged, and come along with the obviously expected note?

Right in that place, an employee, very kindly, informed me that if I wanted to, I could go to Calle 100 and Boyeros, where all the packages arrive before they are processed by the Ministry of Communications, but the problem was that they did not serve the public there. This seemed a joke to me, but the woman told me this very seriously.

I decided to write a letter, to explain this story with every detail, and send it to the Juventud Rebelde (Rebel Youth) Newspaper, which has a section called Acknowledgment of Receipt, where they use to receive and publish this type of complaint. What results to be ridiculous and deplorable is the botch of the robbery.

Original Blog Post: Un Robo Chapucero by Rebeca Monzó Mieres.

Rebeca Monzón Mieres: an autobiography

I was born in Havana, on November the 14th… well, the year does not matter; I will just tell you that I'm from the era of the four - speed record player and the pressure cooker.

I am a teacher, "quasi journalist" (I missed a semester to finish). I worked in the radio for two years and was a diplomat in Paris. I also worked as a salesperson in El Rastro, Madrid. Then, I was Professor of Ceramics and Pottery in the same city and a bureaucrat for many years. Since 1986, I am an “independent artist”, member of the Cuban Association of Artisan Artists. I have done exhibitions in and outside the country. I’m earning a living as an artisan, and now I have a blog because I love to write.

To read some of Rebeca Monzó Mieres's other posts (in Spanish) see below:

Erre con Erre Cigarro

Mujeres Liberadas

Jugando al Capitalismo

Rompiendo el Bloqueo

4 De Julio

Llover Sobre Mojado

Featured Blog from Cuba: Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo

Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo was born in Havana on December 10, 1971. This incredibly eloquent Cuban blogger graduated from Havana University in 1994 with a degree in Biochemistry. In an unusual move, left a career in science to be engulfed in the world of literature and citizen journalism.

Orlando has been blogging since 2008 in his blog Lunes de Post-Revolución (Post-Revolution Mondays), in which he reflects on his life - and that of others - within Cuba. For more information, check out a recent interview in a fellow blogger's blog, Claudia Cadelo's.

To read some of Orlando's writings translated into English, see these entries:

#TWITTHELP

CONSTANTÍN ANSWERS IN DIARIO DE CUBA

WAIT FOR ME IN CAPITALISM, MY LOVE

In addition, here is a beautiful new post that hasn't been translated yet.