He was severely brainwashed and traumatized but a few trips to various toy stores in West New York, New Jersey very quickly cured him.

Now we have an italian translation, too!

I suppose you could interpret it that way. But the point of the story is that they were made to relinquish God, so in their eyes, children's eyes, it wasnt God who gave them their treat. It was the revolution.

Just a thought.

a regular cuban folk meets fidel and tells him: "fidel, the situation is terrible, I'm hungry!".
fidel the asks him to drink 10 gallons of water and afterwards offers him a plate of food. obviously the guy can't eat anything after all that water, to which fidel conningly comments: "you see, you were just thirsty!"

The "Ice cream" story brought back tremendously powerful memories. I was born there in 1961 and we left in 1966. I VIVIDLY remember that incident at school, to this day. I've told this story many times and people in the States have a tough time believing it. I'm glad I've found others that can collaborate these to be true.

My version goes something like this - the teacher asked how many of us believed there is a God. Of course, we all raised our hands. She went on to say that there is no God and she would prove it to us. She put a picture of Christ on the table next to an empty drinking glass. She told us to bow our heads and pray to Jesus Christ to fill that glass with water. Like good boys and girls, we did. When we were finished we opened our eyes to see an empty glass. The teacher said, "see, I told you - there is NO God!" She then placed a picture of Castro next to the empty glass and this time asked us to bow our heads and pray to Castro that he would fill the glass with water. Like good little boys and girls, we did. When we opened our eyes.... a glass full of water! Amazing!

And that's how the brainwashing began.

I thank the Lord everyday (and my parents) for getting us out of that hell-hole many years ago!

I returned to Cuba in 2004 for the first time since we left in 1966. What an emotional journey. I was able to see the effects of that brainwashing on all of my cousins that remained. I saw the life sucked out of them. I saw their lack of drive and purpose. The lack of hope! Walking zombies. I pray for them daily.

I also pray for Castro - I pray that as his earthly life is coming to an end that he would repent and make peace with God. I also pray that God would allow him to live long enough to come up with an exit strategy that would end communism and would help the people he says he loves make a peaceful transition to a free democracy.

One can still dream....

Marquito,

The Puerto Rican Congressman you mention is José E. Serrano. He was elected in March 1990. During his election campaign he attended various anti-castro rallies as he courted the Cuban-American community for campaign donations. He was very vocal during this time denouncing the castro regime. Of course, all that changed as soon as he was elected.

“In recent years, Serrano has dedicated his public efforts to fiercely defend the communist oppression in Cuba and is today considered one of the Castro regime’s main lobbyists in Congress.”

Congressman Charles Rangel, also from New York has been a friend of fidel castro since the revolution. He is also a rabid defender of the Cuban dictator and his regime. Let’s hope that the democrats don’t win back the Congress and he has to keep his promise to retire.

Firefly: though I'm a nondenominational Christian, I can still say of my brethren: Catholics kick ass

I remember a story about a Jesuit teacher that goes like this. The topic is the causes of World War I.

The Jesuit teacher tells the student what he claims the causes to be, and then asks the student if that is correct. The student, naturally, replies that it is (not wanting to question his teacher, most likely, or due to ignorance.)

The Jesuit then informs him that he lied, and that those were not the causes of World War I. He then proceeds to give him another set of causes for the First World War. He then asks the student if THOSE are correct.

The student, again, says yes.

At this point the Jesuit tells him that he lied to him AGAIN. And then informs him that the lesson is you cannot expect your opponent to tell you the truth. You have to know the truth for yourself.

Harsh. But that's what INSTRUCTION is, opposed to 'education' or 'indoctrination'.

The Ice Cream story kind of reveals how evil these regimes can really be, even if only subtly. Twain once said "Never Let your schooling get in the way of your education." Good to see that Cubans know better than to buy into this crap.

As an aside, the student should know a game is afoot after the Jesuit lied to him the first time. Kind of like the recent Reuters thing?

I remember back during the Elian situation, a NJ congressman (some Puerto Rican guy whose name I don't recall) who was in support of sending Elian back said something to the effect of 'if freedom means having a TV in every room, game system, and cell phone, then I guess he (Elian)won't have freedom in Cuba.' It's sad that freedom, to many people, is interpreted as material wealth and possesions. Freedom of expression and religion are rarely even discussed any more. The realm of reason and thought is suffering.

Thanks for bringing this up.

Thank you. You pretty much hit the nail on the head.

I don't exactly remember the date, but I believe it was the 1959-1960 school year. It happened in the afternoon after we had returned to school from lunch break (children in my school went home for lunch at 12:00n and returned at 2:00p. School hours were from 8:00a-5:00p)

In my case it was not the teacher who possed the question (and this was for ice cream only) it was a "miliciana." The children in the classroom bowed their heads like good little children and asked God for ice cream. Of course nothing happened. Then as instructed, they bowed their heads and prayed for "papa fidel" for ice cream. You guessed it! All of the sudden the ice cream materialized.

I was nine years old at the time, and as my mother would have said, very HARDHEADED. I didn't bow my head nor prayed either time, but kept staring at the miliciana throughout the whole episode.

As they were passing out the ice cream, I refused mine. At this point the "miliciana" came to my desk, pulled me up by the arm and asked why I handn't prayed to God for ice cream, or to fidel! I replied like a good little Catholic "one doesn't pray to God for material things, and fidel is not my papa; only my real papa buys me ice cream."

Needless to say, I got my parents in a heap of trouble. Shortly thereafter we left Cuba.