Cubans dance today

If you see us dancing in the street, don’t be too quick to judge us. Cubans have suffered so much. In the passing of Fidel, a spark of hope has sprung. No one of good will wishes death on anyone, but when a person like Fidel who took everything from you; your freedom to worship, your freedom of speech, your freedom of expression, well, you can’t help but to feel a sense of hope in the future for Cubans all over, at his passing. Fidel yielded so much power and used it, not ...for the common good, but for his own good, he imprisoned our family members for speaking out, he rationed our food, he indoctrinated us that God does not exist, that life is not sacred, that abortion is a practical and efficient way of birth control, that marriage is not sacred, that all children must learn how to shoot rifles and defend the regime, he deceived many with the lie that Cuba was suffering only because of the US embargo. This tyrant we find out around midnight, left us in way much more gently than the cruel way he allowed many of our own family members to go. Fidel forcibly took power in 1959 and used it to keep the Cuban people oppressed. Since the 1960’s, my family has mourned the loss of the Cuba that once was. We were one of the lucky ones to be able to escape. In the 1980’s my mother visited her parents and was devastated to see what was once a first world country had become in 2 decades, a third world country. When you hear people proudly say that the education and health care is free in Cuba, yet you know that your own Cuban family suffers because they are not deemed worthy of the free health care and they are told what they are going to study….it hurts. When your own family is willing to throw themselves into the ocean with the hope they will land in another country in order to make a new life, when you painfully remember how your own aunt was not given medication in the hospital (just a few years ago) because the government deemed that since she was going to die anyway, they would not “waste the medicine” on her, She died in much pain and suffering because her life was not worthy of the free health care, well, I ask your forgiveness for today. We dance because perhaps a new day has dawned. So, if you see us dancing in the streets, just be as merciful to us, as you are asking us to be of Fidel. We dance because we realize today that evil is not permanent, that goodness will prevail. We pray that one day that dance of joy will be in the streets of Havana!