If there's one thing that I've learned since I've been studying Cuba and blogging about it, it's that there are Cubans in every corner of the world. One Cuban-Australian named Luis Garcia is releasing a new book called Child of the Revolution. He recently did an interview with Australia's Sunday Telegraph. Read it here. From what I can gather, the book may have some similarities to Carlos Eire's Waiting for Snow in Havana but Garcia is younger than Eire (he was born in 1959) and thus he has no recollections of Cuba Bc. I've already placed my order. Can't wait to read it.

If you havent read Marc's excellent post on The Lost City, then you should. And if you have read it, you should read it again. It's right here. And he wants your to hear your take on it here.

El Confeti has posted Ninoska Perez Castellon's heartfelt review here.

And Kathryn Jean Lopez, editor at National Review Online, does The Lost City justice with her excellent review here.

You may have heard of George Galloway before, the British parlimentarian who hasnt found a despotic tyrant he doesnt love. An outspoken anti-war critic implicated in the UN Oil For Food Scandal and also a former personality on the Celebrity Big Brother show, Galloway has reached new lows in his quest for the spotlight.

One of his latest screeds calls the murder of British Prime Minister via suicide bomber "entirely logical and explicable" in a recent interview. But it gets worse. Here's a photo of Galloway slobbering over one fidel castro, via HotAir:

And of course it wouldnt be a fidel castro lovefest without a long, televised barrage of bullshit:

Galloway comes to Castro's aid on TV show

ANDREW WOODCOCK

RESPECT MP George Galloway joined Fidel Castro on a seven-hour TV show designed to rebut claims that the Cuban president has amassed a multi-million dollar personal fortune.

Mr Galloway denounced an article in Forbes magazine which claimed Castro was worth £477 million as part of a "Yankee imperialist" conspiracy. During the Round Table show on Cuban TV on Wednesday night, the president insisted that he did not personally possess a single dollar, and would resign his position if anyone in the United States could provide proof that he did.

He gave up his seat for Mr Galloway, who told viewers: "The Cubans are the only people in the entire world who have a leader who can say that he doesn't possess one dollar to his name."

The Bethnal Green and Bow MP contrasted Castro - whom he addressed as "Commandante" - with Tony Blair. He said Mr Blair had recently bought a £3.6 million house in London which he would pay for after stepping down as Prime Minister with earnings resulting from his "humble service to the empire of the US".

Mr Galloway is currently writing a book about Castro and was in Cuba to carry out some research.

La Revolucion has sunk to new lows, folks, with fidel castro proudly boasting the support of a guy who appeared on bourgeois imperialist television like this:

It couldnt get any more ridiculous if they tried.

H/T Mike Pancier.

Last Saturday night, during the Cuba Nostalgia Convention's peak hours, the Babalú pavilion was rocking. We had the pleasure of featuring Rhett y Los Borrachos Empeñados as they played one hellova great set of tunes. my personal favorite is "El Negro y la Balsa (si no coje fidel)", but their own particualr rendition of Caballo Viejo was totally cool as well.

You can purchase their cd here. Tell'em Babalú sent you.

Here's a photo Amanda took as these guys played and sung their hearts out at the convention:

To Rhett, Michael, Tony, Mireya and the rest of los Borrachos: Gracias guys! You totally rock.

One of vacations greatest pleasures is the luxury of unscheduled time for reading. Early this morning I finished the wonderfully written magical “Love and Ghost Letters” by Chantel Acevedo.

I won’t give away any details and spoil the read for others. A nuanced novel, “Love and Ghost Letters” is centered around a parallel narrative between the main character's external existence and a clandestine spiritual hide-a-way.

In her acknowledgements, Ms. Acevedo writes, “I remember how I used to strain my eyes looking out at the horizon, sure I would be able to see Cuba from my place on the beach if the day was clear enough. Though I had never been there, I was attached to that slender chunk of land out in the ocean. Sometimes I swore I saw her. Impossible, of course, but I was fed on stories of a dream island where all things, nightmarish and beautiful, were possible.

”Love and Ghost Letters” transports us to that dreamed of Cuba, where we are caught between illusion, memory, and spirit. I didn’t want to leave.

Since I had received no response from Tom Fiedler and I had read Bob Norman’s blog post about the Herald’s new feedback option on some of its news stories I thought I’d try to get in touch with Rick Hirsch who is the Herald’s Managing Editor/Multimedia. Hirsch had talked with Norman about the feedback feature and I thought that perhaps he’d answer my questions regarding blogs. I sent him the same email I sent to Fiedler and he responded by asking that I call him. One can read a lot of things into that, like perhaps he didn’t want anything to be in writing. So I called him and left a message for him and he returned the call promptly.

I’ll hand it to him; he chose his words very carefully. In the discussion he certainly acknowledged that the standard for what straight news reporters can and can’t say on their blogs is different. But he never really answered the question as to whether these standards for Herald bloggers exist anywhere in writing or whether the bloggers themselves have to determine what is appropriate, knowing that a faux pas can be damaging to their careers. My distinct impression was the latter. I received a comment from Matt Pinzur who is a Herald reporter and blogger in response to this post and I think it backs up my theory that it’s basically a wild west scenario where each person is living by his individual code.

Many thanks for the mention and the link. Our education blog is pretty new - just a few weeks now - so I'm still trying to set the right tone. I've tried to be careful to provide some analysis without inserting my opinion. I don't think that line is always entirely clear, but I try to think of it this way: as a reporter, I don't think it's OK to say I like a certain idea or oppose a particular plan. But I do think it's OK to point out background or other information that helps shine light on the motives or context behind an issue. For example, I've written often about the political risks that School Board members will face when voting about Vamos A Cuba, the controversial children's book, and about why certain board members are more likely to vote a certain way. But I would never opine on whether I think the book should be kept or removed.

I'm really happy to see this discussion taking place, though, because it's new territory for the Herald (and most newspapers), and the perspectives of thoughtful people will help us find our way.

During our phone call Mr. Hirsch mentioned that there are “many different types of blogs” and that some are very opinion driven while other serve as “connective tissue” that “connects the dots” on a particular subject matter. I think he was trying to counter the argument that I didn’t make to him but have made in writing, that a blog without opinion is not really a blog. But he also said that some of the Herald’s blogs will be successful and others won’t. He defined success as large readership and said successful blogs are prolific and allow engagement with readers.

I moved on the topic of comment moderation. I asked specifically about any guidelines for Herald bloggers with regards to removing comments that might include hate speech or false information. Again the impression that I got was that there is no set policy. He mentioned that the feedback mechanism in herald.com’s news items allows for readers to “sound and alarm” if they deem a particular comment inappropriate. Then and only then will a Herald employee look at the comment and determine whether or not it needs to be removed. He said “we don’t and can’t monitor” comments posted readers 24/7. He acknowledged that this may result in objectionable comments being allowed to linger for longer than they would like. Mr. Hirsch mentioned the ownership transition at the paper and that because of it, the blogs are not uniform. Some use Typepad and others use Blogger. But he said he would like for all the blogs to have a mechanism similar to herald.com’s for alerting Herald staff about potentially offensive or inappropriate comments from readers.

I asked him he envisioned a future where reader feedback would become so important so as to create an editor to do this job full time. I mentioned that letters to the editor of the newspaper are chosen and edited. He pointed out the Internet is a different medium without space limitations. He feels that it’s “the public’s discussion” not the Herald’s. I expressed my belief that blogs are like talk radio. Highly opinion driven with limited audience participation; the callers are a miniscule percentage of the listeners and so it is with blogs and the people that post comments but that the Internet can draw certain types of people who want to dominate the discussion. He agreed with this, but it sounded like he viewed this as a necessary evil, the price that has to be paid to have the interactive element in a blog sponsored by a MSM outlet.

In short, Mr. Hirsch was very nice and I appreciate his taking the time to talk to me but a million question marks remain about the Herald and its blogging future. Time will tell which blogs succeed and which will fail.

The following is a photo of Cuban children scavenging in the remains of a home destroyed by flooding in Marianao, Cuba:

The Real Cuba has more pictures along with commentary and more info on the floods caused by severe rains.

You can also read an on site report from havana by Jaime Leygonier, an independent journalist, here. (pdf format)

Friend Marc Masferrer finally got a chance to see The Lost City. He doesn't live in Miami. He's written his thoughts on the movie and the Cuban exile experience here.

Son-of-a-bitch, fucking communists is right

I've been meaning to write this post for a while. I recently finished reading After Fidel by Brian Latell. Latell is a former CIA analyst with more than 20 years of studying Cuba under his belt. In November of 2005 The University of Miami's Institute for Cuban and Cuban-American Studies named Latell a Senior Research Associate.

The title of the book is a little misleading. I thought the book would mainly consist of Latell's educated guess as to what will happen when fidel finally leaves the stage (on a plane or in a pine box). But the majority of the book is dedicated to fidel's past rather than Cuba's future. It is an in-depth exploration of fidel's idiosyncrasies and his psyche. Where Latell distinguishes himself from others who have covered this material before is that he pays particularly close attention to fidel's brother, raul and details aspects of the brothers' relationship that, to me at least, were previously unknown. It really is an excellent book and I highly recommend it to anyone that wants to see behind the curtain of Cuban government propaganda. In light of fidel's recent displeasure with the Forbes magazine report about his personal wealth this book gives some unique insights into the man's egomaniacal yet very calculated thinking.

By the way if you are interested, as I was, in speculation about the challenges in store for a post-castro Cuba then read this Rand Corporation report. It's free, but it's very long and a little redundant. The executive summary may be sufficient to satisfy your curiosity.

The castroite left loves to dismiss the Miami Cuban community as just "older Cuban men" who are simply not 'with it' enough to adjust to the real world outside Calle Ocho or Hialeah.

It's basura.

I posted a photo essay on Cuba Nostalgia on Publius Pundit last night from Julio Zagroniz's beautiful photo album to show otherwise, and attracted the most interesting, intelligent discussion from the international readers at Publius.

Lovely young Cubanitas are part of Miami's democratic revolution in the glowing city's permanent rebuke to castro, but, the very idea of denouncing people for being old is utterly foreign to Cubans. I noticed from Julio's pictures that the young and old mix it up quite happily and there's no preposterous "stigma" to being an "older Cuban man" as the left - and castro, too, by the way - would try to convince us. Miami's diversity includes old, middle, young, very young men and women, with no leftist-invented exclusions.

Publius is a blog dedicated to chronicling international democracy revolutions around the world. One part of the blog's collective philosophy is - if the babes show up, it's a real democracy revolution. Babes are essential. If it's just angry young men in masks breaking windows and setting fires, it's a fake and a loser.

Anyway, decide for yourself from this group of Julio's photos here.

Just received an email from Enrique, purveyor of the latest addition to the anti-fidel, Cuban-American blog family: Freedom 4 Cuba, with the following letter to the editors of the Toronto Star:

Castro converts dollars

May 25, 2006. 01:00 AM

This article by Oakland Ross is an excellent introduction to the economics of Cuba. However, he seems to have overlooked Fidel Castro's most innovative and startling attempt to overcome his cash problem, the "convertible peso."

Basically, the convertible peso is a tax on the millions of dollars of remittances by Cubans in exile, to their families back home. Not content with stealing the money through vastly inflated prices in the consumer stores that were run by the government and only accepted dollars, Castro now immediately confiscates the remittances as they come into Cuba and then issues "Monopoly money" — convertible pesos, levying a 10 per cent tax on the dollars as they pass through his hands.

In effect, it is a forced loan by ordinary Cubans to their government — at negative interest. There was even a conversion period where Cuba soaked up all the dollars already in circulation in Cuba.

Outsiders might wonder at this sudden need by the Cuban rulers for all the useful cash in the country, whether they have an eye on the increasing political instability and are looking to pad foreign bank accounts in advance for their own sudden exile.

There's little question that within days after Castro's exit from the scene, the convertible peso won't be convertible any longer. Where all those U.S. dollars will have gone at that moment in time, no one knows.

So, let's take a layman's look at fidel castro's Cuban economy, shall we? Let me see if I have this all correct.

First, there's the income. Contrary to popular belief by some myopics, Cuba's income from exports such as sugar or tobacco or nickel or rum is negligible. There remain, I believe, only a handful of working sugar mills on the island where there were once hundreds of profitable ones. Cuban cigars may be coveted, but the island cant produce enough of them each year to truly beef up its economy. Same thing goes with nickel. And rum is made all over the world, thus, regardless how good Cuban rum may be, the competition is just too stiff.

But Cuba does one export that is highly profitable. Some estimates for this export state that it produces a income of close to one billion dollars a year. Ive mentioned that export before: The Cuban Exile, Cuba's number one money maker..

It is a brilliant ploy by fidel castro. Divide the Cuban family by allowing some to exile or make some lives so absolutely desperate, so absolutely deplorable that they chose to leave, while other family members must stay behind. Separate the Cuban family, the one thing that is more important to a Cuban than anything else. Thus this assures a steady income in hard currency - US Dollars - for the regime in remittances.

The castro regime then prohibits the use of dollars by ordinary Cubans and makes it compulsory for all Cubans to use the "convertible peso" for all purchases and trades each dollar, if I recall correctly, on a par with each convertible peso. So, technically, for each dollar sent to Cuba, a Cuban only gets 80 cents in worthless Mickey Mouse money. The convertible peso is worthless outside the island and since Cubans arent allowed to have dollars, they cannot convert them back to greenbacks even if they wanted to.

But wait! There's more.

We all know that everything and anything is available in Cuba, despite the evil embargo - from Heinekens to Trojans to Tampax. These things are imported by some foreign corporation to Cuba via Alimport or some other arm of the castro regime. Said Cuban corporation gets these items at wholesale and in turn sells them for a substantial profit, and by substantial I mean huge, at their stores. Thus the castro regime gets yet another cut right off the top.

In the case of goods manufactured in Cuba, the maunfacturing plants are usually a joint venture between the Cuban government and a foreign investor. The investor supplies perhaps the machinery and raw materials while castro supplies the location and the workforce. Wages for said work force are paid in hard currency from the investor to the castro regime, who in turn pockets said hard currency and pays said workforce in the convertible pesos. Thus, the castro regime gets yet another cut of hard currency in an extremely one sided ratio. After all, said company may be paying a wage say of $1 per hour per employee, which means that each week an employee would earn $40. Yet the average salary in Cuba is around $12 US. A month. Where does the other $148 a month go to?

The same rationale applies to non-manufacturing ventures in Cuba such as the tourism industry.

Of course, there are the black markets where ordinary Cuban can use dollars from abroad to purchase goods, but since everything in the island is controlled by State, every single dollar traded on the black market ultimately ends up in the hands of one fidel castro. The man is sitting on a gold mine.

Forbes reported this month that fidel castro is worth $900 million dollars. A very conservative estimate by any standard as fidel castro ultimately controls the entire island. he controls every single cent traded on said island. He ultimately controls every single person or company trading said cent on said island. Does anyone really think fidel castro is merely worth a measley $900 million?

And we aint talking convertible pesos either.

Via El Confeti, Cubanet reports that the Mexican government has deported 57 rafters back to fidel castro's island prison.

Such is the absolute hypocrisy of the Mexican government. They publish pamphlets to teach Mexicans exactly how to enter the US illegally and then jail and deport Cuban refugees back to the island. And what sticks in my craw even more is that we Cubans, as their "hispanics" or "latinos" brothers, are supposed to accept the mistreatment of these Cuban balseros and then join in and support their protests for amnesty and whatnot.

Message to President Bush and Co: Screw Amnesty. Send their asses back to Mexico, where as Mexican citizens and unlike Cubans in Cuba, they can freely elect a government of their choice to ameliorate and improve their living conditions.

Funny how not a single MSM reporter or journalist or filmmaker has ever had the wherewithal to report on the numerous actos de repudio that are staged daily in the island prison. Via Cubanet:

Mob excoriates independent journalist

HAVANA, Cuba - May 22 (Ernesto Roque Cintero, UPECI / www.cubanet.org) - A mob congregated in front of independent journalist José Antonio Fornaris' home May 18 and staged an "act of repudiation" against him.

The government maintains these mobs are spontaneous manifestations of the popular will and calls the events "acts of revolutionary affirmation." Dissidents have long claimed that the mobs respond to and are organized by the government's security apparatus. In fact, the mob that congregated in front of Fornaris' home was backed up by a car loaded with loudspeakers, not the sort of thing the average Cuban has at his ready disposal.

The crowd of about 70 strong chanted hurrahs to the revolution, and called Fornaris a mercenary, and a salaried lackey of the empire, referring to the U.S.

Fornaris called the whole thing "terrorism sponsored by the State."

This isn't news really, but the newspaper business is dying. The causes are many but one of the main catalysts is the Internet. It’s a similar scenario to cable channels killing off the network news broadcasts. The reason is simple people want choices. At least there were 3 network news broadcasts (even though they were often indistinguishable from one another) but in many cities, including my own, the daily newspaper business is a monopoly. It has been here since The Miami News went out of business in 1988.

Since then the quality of The Miami Herald has been quite questionable. Many of the paper’s journalists are “cub reporters” making rookie mistakes. Oftentimes there appears to be nobody editing the paper too. I remember one issue in 1999 previewing Super Bowl XXXIII featuring the Minnesota Vikings logo on the masthead as the representative from the NFC instead of the Atlanta Falcons. The opponents had been determined more than a week before and yet they managed to get it wrong.

Newspaper circulations are down across the country while the papers are charging more than ever for advertising space. Some of the unsavory methods the papers have resorted to in order to maintain their circulations include giving the paper away for free at places like Dryclean USA. Almost every week I get at least one edition of The Miami Herald on my lawn even though I am not (and can’t remember ever being) a subscriber. I am quite sure that this isn’t a mistake, but rather the result of guaranteed distribution promised to some advertiser.

It seems that at least some at 1 Herald Plaza have seen the future and believe that the role of the traditional fish-wrap will be greatly diminished. Tom Fiedler, the Herald’s Executive editor, recently distributed a memo to Herald employees acknowledging as much.

Additionally, we’ve seen a recent proliferation of blogs by Herald writers and columnists that are apparently sanctioned by the paper (they carry the Herald’s masthead at the top). The paper finally seems to be taking a few clumsy steps into the future. I say clumsy because there seems to be little strategy behind the moves the paper is making. So 48 hours ago I sent Tom Fiedler the email below.

Hello Mr. Fiedler,

My name is Henry Gomez and I write for several blogs including:

floridafishfan.blogspot.com
cubanamericanpundits.com

I am writing a piece about the proliferation of Herald Blogs (the ones that are officially sanctioned by the Miami Herald and written by various reporters and columnists from the paper). I was hoping that you could help me by clarifying a few things.

First off, does the Herald give any guidelines to its bloggers? In other words is there a protocol that Herald bloggers must adhere to that perhaps other bloggers don't? If so, is the protocol different for reporters than it is for columnists? Some Herald columnists also report, where do they fit in with regards to the rules for blogging (if there are any)? If these rules exist are they publicly available anywhere? If not, why not?

Are there any rules for Herald bloggers with regards to the comments sections of their blogs? Is there a policy regarding the practice of "comment moderation" (where the blog owner deletes or edits comments that may [be] offensive or consist of personal attacks)? Or are they supposed to leave any comment intact regardless of its content or veracity?

In your opinion what is the role of blogs in the Herald's future? I know from a memo you wrote to Herald employees that the Internet is an area where you want to see the Herald's presence and importance grow. How do blogs fit in to this? Are they merely a method of advertising the paper (either the printed paper or the online version)? If not, then what is the purpose of these blogs?

Sincerely,

Henry Gomez

I re-sent the email yesterday. I have not received a response to date. Now, I know Mr. Fiedler must be a busy man and unlike Alisa Valdes-Rodriguez, I don’t think the Herald “owes” me anything. But I think it speaks volumes that I didn’t get answers to some very straightforward questions. I did get several hits on my blog yesterday from Knight Ridder (the publisher of the Herald) in Miami so I assume he checked it out to see what it’s about.

I don’t think the Herald has really thought out an endgame for its blogs. Perhaps my email helped Mr. Fiedler realize this and thus he has not wanted to comment while he consults with his people and determines what exactly those standards are. If so, the Herald is in worse trouble than I thought. Well Tom, as Ted Knight said in one of my favorite movies, Caddyshack, “We’re WAITING!”

UPDATE: On a related note, Bob Norman of the The Miami New Times has a blog post about the Herald's new comments sections on its online news articles. Hat tip to Alesh at the excellent Critical Miami

Henry "Conductor" Gomez

I think every Cuban family has that one member - whether an uncle or an aunt or a cousin or a great aunt or uncle - that is a bit on the eccentric side. In my family's case, being that my grandfather had sixteen brothers and sisters and my family is huge, we have a few. The closest relative I have that earns the "eccentric" moniker is my Madrina - my Godmother - Tia Olga, my mom's sister. There are hundreds of little anecdotes I could tell about my Madrina - like the fact that she drives all around town but never, ever, makes left turns - but those would be a subject for another post someday.

Tia Olga has always been the lover of music in the family. She always carried around a radio in her car along with a Mr. Microphone, maracas, a set of claves and a guiro. And every Thanksgiving, every birthday party, every Noche Buena, Tia Olga would regale us with song.

My grandparents loved this, of course. Come Noche Buena, Tia Olga would get a scotch or two in her and quickly sneak to her car and bring out the instruments, set them up, and just begin singing even if there was no one around to listen. After a song or two, her audience would begin to appear. The first few usually being my grandfather and grandmother.

My grandparents were always the first because in between loud renditions of Beny More or Orquesta Aragon or even El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico, Tia Olga always sang a tune or two, sometimes acapella, of one of my grandparents favorite singers: La Reina del Bolero - the Queen of the Bolero - Olga Guillot.

I remember many a Noche Buena or Thanksgiving sitting out front with my grandfather when one of my aunts would peek through the door and say: "Papa. No quieres oir a Olga Guillot? Ya empezo el show." Loosely translated: "Dad. Dont you want to listen to Olga Guillot? The show has begun."

And my grandfather would get up from his chair and lead me out back or to the Florida room where Tia Olga was already crooning away some bolero or another made famous by the incomparable Olga Guillot.

After my grandparents passed, the family sometimes gathered around during one family reunion or another and listened to my Madrina sing a soft rendition of one of Olga Guillot's boleros, remembering just how much her music was loved by the old folks.

This year, Cuba Nostalgia payed tribute to Olga Guillot. Her exhibit featuring photos of her in her heyday in Cuba, old movie posters, album covers made here in exile and her music playing in the background was the first thing you saw as you came into the convention center. She honored the convention goers a few times with her presence, and you could barely keep your eyes open from all the flash of cameras whenever she was around.

My good friend Al of Cuban Crafters Cigars - who incidentally came by the Babalú pavilion and donated a bundle of cigars along with a very nice humidor - knows Olga Guillot's daughter and led me to one of the vendor spaces where La Reina del Bolero was signing autographs. It was hot and the crowd was all around her, all clamoring for a kiss, an autograph, or even glimpse of the singer's famous smile.

Al spoke to Mrs. Guillot's daughter and within seconds I was right in front of the Cuban legend who asked me my name, thick Sharpie pen in hand, and when I responded said "Ay, que nombre mas lindo." She then gestured for me to hand her my picture of her for her autograph but I had none.

"Me Puedes firmar la camisa?" I asked. Would she sign my shirt.

And as she signed my Babalú shirt, the one with my aunt Amanda's eyes, the one that represents my Cuba, my culture, my family and our past, my eyes welled up. I couldn't help but think of my Tia Olga, crooning away on her Mr. Microphone with the entire family gathered all around.

Some people may visit the Cuba Nostalgia Convention and see marketing and advertising and complain about a paltry $12 entrance fee. Others, they get to caress their past, relive a few moments with loved ones long gone, and remember old folks on their rocking chairs, hand in hand, with boleros in their hearts.

We know what Ana Menendez didn't like about Cuba Nostalgia but what might she do differently if she were in charge. Check it out here.

Ms. Menendez,

I have a few questions for you about the inane drivel you wrote in The Miami Herald today.

How do you think that all those exhibits get created if it's not for corporate sponsorship?

How do you think the rent for the facilities gets paid if there aren't corporate sponsors?

How do you think exhibitors would come to Cuba Nostalgia if they couldn't sell their wares?

How many of the tens of thousands of people that attended the event do you think feel the same as you, and how many think you are just a stupid pinko bitch?

As for courage, it takes no courage to throw stones at us from 1 Herald Plaza. You are definitely not a trailblazer in attacking the Cuban-American community. Those of us who might wear a t-shirt with a bullet-riddled Che Guevara don't claim to be courageous. We just have a message we want to communicate, and that is that the man should not be idolized. I don't know why I'm even explaining this to you. It's obvious that you are beyond hope.

Enjoy your life as a miserable hater.

Perhaps next year you can save yourself the $12 and stay far far away.

Because Ms. Menendez went to Cuba Nostalgia and failed to see the forest for the trees. The following is an email I received from a Babalú reader who attended the convention:

Hi Val,

Thanks again for the t-shirts and the cigar, it was a pleasure to meet you and George on Saturday and to see how successful your effort was this year at the Cuba Nostalgia. I have never gone before and I really liked it did not know what I was missing, enjoyed the band show too (by the way, there where some good looking ladies watching the band play).

Definitively will be attending next year.

I also got to sent an e-mail to Cuba with George's help...I wonder if you have gotten any replies from the SOB in Havana or any of his cronies.

I also got to meet Felix Rodriguez and to contribute (bought another hat to add to my collection) to the Brigade 2506 Museum effort.

Also took advantage and bought some beautiful color prints from the Cuban countryside that I already mounted on frames and will adorn my new salt-waterfront home in Cape Coral when is completed later this year.

Like I told you and George, I work for (a) Cruise Lines for the last 13 years as a software engineer in the I.T. Department in (Broward). I read the blog on the daily basis and have spread the word among other Americans that I meet on cruises in order to educate them about the reality in Cuba that you don't get from the MSM.

The closest I gotten to Cuba in the last 34 years that I've been in the states is to watch the coastline from these cruise ships when I travel on vacation, that's all. More than half of my family still there that I have not seen in all this time.

By the way, I have a piece of interesting news for you:

I have a cousin in Spain that is seeking some sort of asilum there (they sent her on a seminar and she's staying) and spoke to her for a long time on Monday morning.

She told me things that gave me hope since I didnot get to talk much of these things in detail when I used to call her to Cuba (in order not to get her in trouble).

According to her, everyone in the island is so feed up to their necks with Castro, so totally tired of him and his system that is not even funny anymore.

She has friends in the military that cannot stand him any longer and all they're waiting for is for Castro to kick the bucket. Basically saying that almost nobody in Cuba still is Comunist or believe in that bullshit Revolution of him for that matter.

So la historia no lo absolvera, that's guarantee.

I felt much better and a sense of hope after she said that. Because now I sense more than ever (even thought I always felt that way) that the system will colapse after his death because the people will loose the fear of him that they still possess.

Having said that, nobody there still has the balls to kill him yet but, I do agree with her that Castro has so much security around him now that no one can get close to him.

I also know this guy in the islands that owns a cigar store (he's not Comunist, thought). He's Venezuelan married to a Cuban lady there in Cuba trying to get her out of the island now along with the little daughter that he has with her.

He has gone to Cuba to those cigar dinners events that Castro sponsors and basically told me the same thing:

This guy said that at the event Castro's table is totally surrounded by a ring of big "Orientales" bodyguards. That there is at least a four tables belt that no one can get even close to, and, when Fidel leaves the building, nobody can exit the building until half an hour later at the least.

Muy cousin also told me that the ones still defending his revolution are really scare of what is going to happen next because they know they're in big trouble (I guess those are the ones beating the dissidents).

And those masses are the events are the victims of Castro's blackmailing within his society but at the end he has no real support among them as well.

Almost no one believes in him anymore (how interesting...but not surprising).

So I guess the only ones still believing in him are some of these idiots in Latin America, Europe, Hollywood and the MSM.

I guess that forty seven years of bullshit lying, paredons, inhumman and injust imprisonings, all kinds of human rights abuses to the people and a complete failure of a system has finally taken a toll on all the Cubans.

Now, I'm picturing more that ever:

Una vez que se muera el perro, se acabo la rabia.

That's for sure what's going to happen there. So we must keep the hope alive more that ever.

Like I was telling Mr. Moneo Saturday, some day (sometime soon within the next two years) when we are least expecting, someting is going to happen to that son-of-a-bitch that makes him kick the bucket and the champagne will start to flow like rivers here in Miami.

So take care, good luck, continue the good fight, keep blogging the truth to the world, that is definitively making a difference.

Always keep a bottle of champagne handy at home for when the Freedom day arrives. It may be sooner that we think.

Send my regards to George too.

Oh, and one other thing, Ms. Menendez, some people - like you - are perfectly content to live on this city, while others - like all of those who visited and enjoyed the Cuba Nostalgia Convention - prefer to live in it.

I opened the Miami Herald this morning, started to eat my cereal, then promptly almost had to spit in back in the bowl when I read Ana Menendez's column trashing Cuba Nostalgia.

What didn't she like about it?

Check it out below, with a few comments afterwards.

Nostalgia is now for sale, and it's costly

By Ana Menendez
amenendez@herald.com

Cuba Nostalgia drew thousands to the fairgrounds last weekend, a three-day extravaganza that proves there is no story so worn or threadbare that it can't be repackaged and sold at a profit.

There was old art, there was sad art and somewhere amid the hackneyed paintings of mulatas and their roosters there must have been some authentic sentiment. It was just hard to spot past the shameless shilling.

Well represented in this paean to sentimentality were: Bacardi Mojito, La Bodeguita Goya, Navarro Pharmacy and Southern Chevy Dealers, this last one honoring the heart-warming Cuban tradition of driving.

Yes, the Cuban American National Foundation was there, featuring a video installation that would have been right at home in an edgy Wynwood gallery. The CANF information booth (''Adopt a Dissident'') stood in solidarity alongside Costco Wholesalers, Comcast and Miami-Dade Transit, which was ready to fill the gap for all those not lucky enough to win the 2007 Chevy Cobalt in the drawing next door.

Not to be outdone, The Miami Herald was also there, chasing after the lucrative target audience of octogenarians who consider this paper the mouthpiece of Satan.

THE POSTER

The official posters near the entrance set the cartoon tone for the whole spectacle: Curvaceous Cubanas in frilly cuffs waved maracas while cigar-chomping, congenial-looking fellows strummed guitars. ''Bienvenido a Cuba Nostalgia,'' it said above a prominently displayed logo for Merrill Lynch.

It was downhill from there. After several hours of wandering the space, I was forced to face a series of painful existential questions such as: How many $3.50 magnets of the Virgin of Charity does the average family need? Who buys pillows that say La Habana? Isn't there a better venue for selling boxes of desiccated Gallo Pinto? Is that really a painting of Burt Reynolds with a hat of roosters?

By the time I got to the booth for Memorial Plan cemeteries, I thought I was prepared for anything. But my heart nearly stopped at the sight of dozens of people lined up for some promotional give-away that featured a spinning wheel. Fortunately, this one turned out to be not the Wheel of Fate but the Wheel of Umbrellas and Visors. At that point, I was just relieved that no one was raffling off a free plot.

Cuban Americans have come a long way in this town. Out of the sorrow of leaving family and lives behind, they rebuilt what they could in a new place and struggled through the bad and lean years only to arrive near the end of their story and find it written as farce.

From the sublime to the Bacardi Mojito lounge.

People strolling through the Expo Center Sunday sometimes seemed delighted and sometimes just plain stunned as they gamely powered through the commercial pitches.

''Your roots are your roots,'' said Stella Menéndez (no relation to me). ``Still, it's a shame. It used to be more historical.''

`I FEEL GOOD'

Her brother-in-law, Martin Menéndez, 67, had a simple reason to be there. ''I come because I feel good here,'' he said, browsing through the $59.95 guayaberas.

By a certain age, men like Menéndez have earned the right to their nostalgia. The sad thing is that there's so much money to be made from it.

Saturday marked the 104th anniversary of Cuban independence, a struggle that killed thousands, including Cmdr. Antonio Maceo, who survived 24 battle wounds in his career before dying at the battle of Punta Brava.

That was fortitude in the service of an ideal. Today anyone can sell a T-shirt of Ché Guevara with a bullet hole in his head and call it courage.

As rip-offs go, the $12 entrance to Cuba Nostalgia wasn't nearly as offensive as this notion of an Exile's Bazaar: a place where history is a marketing concept and memory is always priced for a quick sale.

I understand someone complaining about the fact that everything these days seems to be sponsored by some company looking to make a buck. Then again, isn't that the way a free market operates? Ana Menendez, a by-the-book liberal if there ever was one, doesn't seem to understand that. It's one thing to bemoan the prices and heavy advertising, but it totally misses the point of what Cuba Nostalgia is about.

Menendez, as many of us know, is great at missing the point.

I'm not going to say that Cuba Nostagia is the perfect event. It's not. But for many of us who had to leave Cuba, it's an event in which we can look back at the Cuba of old, at our youths, at better times. That's nostalgia. It's a perfectly normal feeling. Perhaps Menendez could have seen that, but no, she's way beyond being nostalgic about Cuba. Apparently, being nostalgic about Cuba is for us dumb, cigar-chomping, Hatuey-swigging, fidel-hating Republican neanderthals who never miss an opportunity to squeeze out a few bucks from our fellow citizens.

Menendez's sarcasm throught the piece is tripe in its purest form.

Right at the end, she couldn't resist a shot at us Che-haters. No Ana, you missed the point again (how could someone as smart as you be so wrong so often?). It's not courage that inspires someone to sell a T-shirt of Che's last moments. It's motivation to spread the truth, to spread justice about a murderer.

Perhaps Ana doesn't understand what Che was really about. Perhaps it upset her to see an "icon" exposed for the farce he really was.

I'll let you readers decide.

This past weekend at Nostalgia, I was busy talking with a visitor and happened to look up. Standing in front of the Babalu pavilion was Enrique Encinosa. I was thrilled for the opportunity to thank him for writing "Unvanquished", the story of Cuba's resistance to fidel castro.
This book changed my life, it's heartbreaking and inspiring, filled with story after story of brave Cubans fighting for their homeland. If you don't see it at your local bookstore, it's available here.