From our Bureau of Utopian Holidays with some assistance from our Socialist Work Ethic Bureau
Never let it be said that Castro, Inc. promotes a Puritan work ethic.
As was the case in the Soviet Union and all of its satellites — including Cuba — workers joked: “They pretend to pay us, we pretend to work.”
The sarcastic joke still holds true for Castro, Inc. Of course, the effect of this attitude on non-oligarchs can be devastating.
From 14yMedio via Translating Cuba
Several concerns arose immediately among Cubans upon learning that July 26th holidays would be extended. The holiday commemorates the frustrated assault on the Moncada barracks, in Santiago de Cuba, by Fidel Castro in 1953. So the banks will not open? What will happen to the procedures in public offices? Taking a full week off amid the country’s disastrous production numbers?
The concerns were observed in the comments on the notes in the official media, last Saturday, reporting that for the seventieth anniversary of the event not only would July 25, 26 and 27 be holidays, but also “the convenience of declaring Friday the 28th as a non-working day was evaluated.”
“A non-working week! I hope that by 2024 we will overcome that, it is work and productivity time,” expressed the on-line commenter Cocuyo. Along the same lines, Ruffini opined: “Too many rest days affect the economy.”
More vehement was Ángel: “How do they do that, if what the country needs is for it to produce, uninterrupted. I don’t really know what they are thinking about.” And also Oslaida: “We all like to rest, but they just called for more production, how? With practically no work for a week? I don’t understand, with so many people who make a living from their business and illegalities.”
Leonardo made his anguish over the scarcity that the country is experiencing very clear: “Why more non-working days for more adverse situations, nothing comes to the butcher shops, to the bodegas and everything is closed. Before it was rest and parties, now there are worries”.
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