In 2013: Reasons to Stay in Cuba

By Yoani Sanchez, Huffington Post Latino Voices

Someone has to be at the foot of the aircraft steps, to say goodbye, holding the handkerchief and wiping their eyes. Someone has to receive the letters, the brightly colored postcards, the long distance phone calls. Someone has to stay and look after the house that once was full of children and relatives, watering the plants they left and feeding the old dog that was so faithful to them. Someone has to keep the family memories, grandmother’s mahogany dresser, the wide mirror with the quicksilver coming loose in the corners. Someone has to preserve the jokes that no longer spark laughter, the negatives of the photographs never printed. Someone has to stay to stay.

This 2013, when so many await the implementation of Immigration and Travel Reform, could become a year where we say “goodbye” many times. While I respect the decision of each person to settle here or there, it doesn’t fail to sadden me to see the constant bleeding of creativity and…

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This article was first published in Huffington Post Latino Voices.

Yoani Sanchez, a University of Havana graduate in philology, emigrated to Switzerland in 2002, to build a new life for herself and her family. Two years later, she decided to return Cuba, promising herself to live there as a free person. Her blog Generation Y is an expression of this promise. Yoani calls her blog ‘an exercise in cowardice’ that allows her to say what is forbidden in the public square. It reaches readers around the world in over twenty languages. Yoani’s new book in English, Havana Real, is now available for pre-order here.  Time magazine listed her as one of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2008.