Heavy rain hit Havana on Wednesday, causing substantial material damage and leaving at least three people dead. According to official reports, 24 homes partially collapsed, while other three collapsed completely. The most affected areas were the northern municipalities of Centro Habana, Cerro, Old Havana, Plaza and Playa. So far local authorities have reported that more than 400 state-owned buildings were affected, including schools, warehouses, bus stations and bakeries. More than 1.400 houses flooded, over 200 water reservoirs were contaminated, and almost 40 electrical networks went out of service as well. Some of the main streets had to be closed, including the underpasses in the Fifth Avenue and Linea Street. Many of the buses that were circulating during the storm broke down. The official press reported two casualties: Julio Andino Arzonales, 23, from Old Havana, who was electrocuted by a fallen cable; and 79-year-old Marta Damiana Acanda, who drowned. The Victims At 100 Florida Street, in the municipality of Centro Habana, an adjoining building collapsed and crushed the house where Ernestina Ulacia had lived for 47 years. “We were in the house when it happened, my two daughters (15 and 24), my mother and I,” Ernestina’s daughter told OnCuba, “My mother,...

If Miguelito had not changed jobs, by now he would have been dead. Being ranger gives him less tantrum, and that's what he does now. He has had two heart attacks, one in January and the last in May. All due to the people, who find hard to change the tradition, I tell you, it costs them a lot, people get naughty, they don’t understand and me explaining: listen up, finally understand that if we have a funeral parlor, gee, there's no reason to hold the wake in the room of the house. That has been the main cause of the heart attacks. The first then the second. The stubbornness of the people made a clot immediately blocked a coronary artery, the valves got blocked, finally, people had to rush to the Matanzas hospital with Miguelito because, this happened in Santa Ana, a town 18 miles of that city. For years, a few already, they have had the funeral parlor. Since the owners of the house died,   it was empty and Miguelito repaired it, painted it, put toilet paper in the bathroom, armchairs, all ready. "Since the funeral parlor started only ten people held the wake there", he complains. 'Why's...

The Cuban public can enjoy this Tuesday January 22 at 8:00 pm at the Miramar Theatre " Land of Fire " by Chilean actress Carolina Pizarro. Directed by Julia Varley - essential figure of Odin Teatret , by Eugenio Barba – the actress , after appearing in the Magdalena Sin Fronteras international event , held every three years in the City of Santa Clara to discuss , debate and show the drama of the representation in the theater made by women, premiered in Havana a work that encompasses the present and past history of Chile from a very personal appreciation. Dedicated to Chilean actresses Mary Canepa and Rebecca Ghigliotto , the performance " explores the concept of journey, travelling to a land rooted in the memories of a woman’s imagination: a land where the fire is kept alive as a sign that a home still exists." The text – by Julia Varley and Carolina Pizarro is built with real women's stories, songs by Violeta Parra, Pedro Aznar , Atahualpa Yupanqui, and poems by Alejandra Pizarnik , Gabriela Mistral, Edson Pizarro , among others. There are references taken from Chilean past and recent history seen through the eyes of three generations...

Several national media announced that on November 20 the harvest would begin again in the country. It was then spoken of a "recovery" of the harvest, an “improved sugar performance," a” lift in the production," a” new dimension of the sector." The purpose, as declared by the directors, is producing 1 million 800 thousand tons of sugar, and 49 of the 85 sugar mills Cuba has started grinding. Exactly 11 years ago, Fidel Casto announced the closure of 70 mills on the island, and began the task called Alvaro Reinoso , which reoriented the sugar workers into other occupational profiles . OnCuba start posting “Sugar mill”, five stories of people who worked for years in the Habana Libre sugar mill, until, suddenly, it was shut down.  Recently you have decided to reduce areas of land devoted to sugarcane and close many sugar mills. That is laying off thousands of people ... have not you gone from one extreme to the other? ( ... ) We had, simply, to close the mills, or we going down the Bartlett Deep. ( ... ) Really I called the minister and said, "Look, please, how many hectares have you plowed? " He answered: “Eighty...

Every play has at least two or three truths. There are terrible plays, sublime plays, trivial plays, and plays that are neither of them and remained at a damned midpoint, but most of the time there is something you could save of the work. A movement of light, a scream by the actress, something, a silence in the room, the beautiful insanity of a character, or the actor who will say, “You cannot be a bad person and cry with an orgasm at the same time.” At ten o'clock at night in the city of Matanzas, the El Portazo theater troupe just had their ninth staging of Semen. El portazo is unlike any other troupes for artistic reasons and for reasons of resources. The artistic reason is that El portazo, seems a meeting of a group of theater lovers. And the economic reason is that I have not seen another group of theater at intermission to pass a cap for people to donate some money, because they do not have it, nor do they have an institution that gives them any, and they are infatuated, very infatuated with performing. They represented Semen, a text by Yunior Garcia under the direction...

Russians arrived in Cuba with a gift. They knew exactly what they should bring. They can afford arriving anywhere; they always have good things to offer. They are Russians, and therefore they just can’t present any theatre play, but Ana Karenina. They were asked to open the Theatre Festival and they did. In fact, Havana´s 15th Theatre Festival was officially inaugurated at the National Theatre the Russian way. Twenty four actors left their venue at Arbat Street in Russia, in the facilities of the Evguéni Vajtángov Theatre and came to Havana to perform. Almost a century old (more than 90 years), the Evguéni Vajtángov Theatre has a long history. “Every show is a party and there is no party without a show” said once Vajtángov. Not a word was said in about two and a half hours during their presentation. The audience was certainly astonished. Everything said was said with gestures, music, rhythm and the body. This might take us to question art itself. Was it theatre, dance, ballet? What is actually theatre language, if any? The black swan, for instance, has to combine gesture and face to make us understand its pain. The train –something quite frequent in Tolstoy’s works, everything...

“Today before dawn, I went up to the hills, I looked at the skies humming with fireflies and said to my spirit: When we know all these worlds and the pleasure and wisdom of everything they contain, Will we be calm and satisfied? And my spirit said, No, We will only have reached those heights in order to carry on.” Walt Whitman If you are already up there, climbing up there, then you have to walk through the Escambray; up and down a hill, rest on the roadside, take some water and continue , see how the sun there is such a sun and the cold of 3.00 p.m. is so cold, and grab a bag and go on, ask where something is, try the mountain cocoa which tastes like Spanish lime, fight against very black mosquitoes and keep going. If you by chance find a girl, a man of many merits and a bad leg, and go 270 meters underground, then you've walked a considerable part. But do not get surprised of the merits of the man, nor when knowing the girl did not know the sea, or that someone had electricity at sixty. You should go up to...

Many cargo trucks, large eighteen-wheelers with containers, some military jeeps and Suzuki motorcycles in and out from La Campana. They are seen by the narrow road always doing the same route. They enter the village, in silent, and then leave it the same way. Nobody there notices that. People in La Campana in and out of town, quietly, like the trucks. You do not know what they carry, you can only infer that they always carry something inside, but you fail to define exactly what it is. In la Campana people are serious, very serious and concentrated. That is why, not everyone can live in La Campana. You must have at least the requirement of discretion. The chatty or talkative person can not live there, nor careless people. Those who do not keep secrets or uncompromising persons can live elsewhere in El Escambray, but not exactly in La Campana. So I was recommended there that if my thesis is on theater, I would limit myself to talk about theater, an interesting and beautiful art form, and not to find out anything else. It is not advisable. -          And why not? -Because it's better. But you have a good topic, the...

Genaro has to do with women and Manolo not so much, and Genaro to land and Manolo too, and the two are related, in some way, with the Japanese and spring, and the height and superstition, and blue empty bus stops that makes you a little sad and in which you should not ever wait for a bus. Genaro and Manolo are farmers of this century and they don’t even show it. The peasants of this world, or better, the farmers of this year, and the past, and some earlier last year, chew gum and wear pullovers, jeans and brand name sneakers, give some rest to the horse and use the car, do not hear, in some cases, the rooster crowing in the morning because their sleep tends to be long and heavy and prefer to add chocolate to milk. Genaro is close to 60 and Manolo forty-five. Genaro wears a hat and boots, has a badly cut fading mustache and deep blue eyes. Genaro says everything fast, so you have to be careful to understand everything. Manolo has that easiness of the countryside at two in the afternoon, is wearing an old blue cap, and his mustache is a...

Yera town has a grocery store and a woman is responsible for it, another woman who wears her jet-black hair to her waist is in charge of the Committee for the Defense of the Revolution ( CDR), there are also a 62 years old man, a school that had only one student, a clinic that had a doctor, an ordinary and boring dog, a stream, and a deaf woman . In Yera town, people like playing dominoes, and check all the time their blood pressure, and do not walk too much. Because they say it can not be possible that the only good thing of this place is thatTVs do not need antenna for having a good image reception. Other things are needed, for example, beer. And they trusted on me. ******** This is a strange place . It seems odd that there are people who have faith in Journalism despite living at more than 400 meters above sea level. Indeed, they are the only persons I've met who still has faith in Journalism and they only see transportation three times a week. - Three times? -Three times. Monday, Thursday and Sunday - What about the rest? -You decide whether...