I’m black and Cuban, Australian and Irish, and like most people in America, I’m someone whose roots come from somewhere else. I’m a mixed race, first-generation American.
Since he took power over half a century ago, Fidel Castro proved to be a brutal dictator who must always be remembered by his gross abuses of human rights, systemic exploitation of Cubans, unrelenting repression, and stifling censorship upon his own people.
We want to open up more opportunities for U.S. businesses and travelers to engage with Cuba, and we want the Cuban government to open up more opportunities for its people to benefit from that engagement.
Violet speaks Spanish and understands it. She loves Cuban food! My mom is very good at teaching her about our culture, whether it be the food or Spanish or explaining to her that she’s Cuban.
I think there’ll be a little more Cuban coffee in the governor’s office once I’m up there.
I’m Cuban and Puerto Rican and Miami is very Cuban oriented. Growing up around the music – all of the salsa and meringue influenced me as an artist. I find myself gravitating to latin influences, sounds.
We Cubans are voting for our new constitution, we’re voting for Latin America and the Caribbean. We’re also voting for Venezuela, we’re defending Venezuela because in Venezuela the continent’s dignity is in play.
Let’s be honest: The trade embargo with Cuba hasn’t secured our interests or helped the Cuban people. Because the way to promote positive change and better human rights in Cuba is through engagement, not isolation.
I might be a Cuban American, but I’m also an Afro-Cuban American.
So many people in this country have a dual loyalty. They have loyalty to America, but they also are determined to have their parade up Fifth Avenue once a year… a Cuban parade or a Puerto Rican parade – many other countries. So they really don’t forget.
The unyielding resistance of the Cuban patriots is symbolized by our 5 Heroes. They shall never back down! They shall never surrender!
Cubans are frantic when it comes to appreciating music.
Some call me a Cuban hyphen American. I reject that. I don’t believe in hyphenated Americans.
In 1962, President Kennedy expanded an earlier trade embargo put in place by a predecessor, President Eisenhower, to a total economic blockade, which pushed the Cubans further in Moscow’s direction.
Rebuilding our relationship with Cuba would be a win for American business and a win for the Cuban people.
I have been obsessed with seamed stockings my whole life, and I would collect vintage ones that were made in the ’40s and ’50s with the authentic styling of the keyhole, the welt, the reinforced toe and heels, French or Cuban heels, and hand-stitched seams.
I love my heritage. I’m very proud of being Cuban. But I clearly understand that I am an American first.
Thousands of people perish in the Straits of Florida every year. We understand it within the context of the Cuban reality.
Everyone has a black guy inside them. Mine is a Cuban sonero who is 80-something years old and sings better than I do. His name is Medoro Madera. Medoro has been recording since 1997.
We had no clue that Cuba was not Marco Rubio. You get there, and everyone is Afro Cuban. And you start to realize, ‘Where are the blonde, blue-eyed Cubans? Oh, they’re all in Miami.’
A profoundly disturbing thing you discover very quickly traveling in Cuba is that the most dangerous person for Cubans isn’t the police or even the secret police; it’s their neighbor. Anyone can report you for anything ‘outside’ the revolution – even if you haven’t done it yet.
You have to eat right. That does not mean that I don’t drink Cuban coffee. That does not mean that I do not have two cigarettes a day – that’s what I’m down to. I drink wine – you know, I’m normal. But I do eat well.
My dad is such a Cuban man – he’s as stubborn as me.
I love meat – I’m Cuban; I grew up eating meat, platanos, and arroz con pollo. I don’t believe in starving yourself, but sometimes I do cleanses and diets to prepare for a role.
I really admire Ana Mendieta. She was a Cuban American artist who died the year I was born and whose work examines violence, feminism, and belonging. Her art is always brave and visually arresting and vibrates with meaning.
The U.S. has long characterized Haitian immigrants as criminals. This tradition began in 1963 when the first boat of Haitians seeking political asylum was summarily rejected by U.S. immigration officials, while at the same time the U.S. admitted thousands of Cubans as refugees and political asylees.
If you are playing a Hispanic character who has to speak in dialect or in an accent, nail that dialect or accent. When I hear a character that’s supposed to be Cuban speaking with a Mexican accent or vice versa, it grates on me and immediately pulls me out of the story.
The U.S.S.R. had absolutely nothing to do with the triumph of the Cuban Revolution.
I want all Hispanics in the Republican Party, in the Democratic Party, whether Latin Americans, Central Americans, Cubans, Mexicans, I want us to unite.
My mom can cook really good Cuban food, so we go eat there on the regular. And the Cuban coffee – you know how you drink coffee at a really young age.
One October day in 1976, a Cuban airliner exploded over the Caribbean and crashed, killing all 73 people aboard. There should have been 74. I had a ticket on that flight, but changed my reservation at the last moment and flew to Havana on an earlier plane.
I realized that I had traveled to Havana during what now seems like the childhood of the Cuban Revolution, if you think that Fidel has now been in power for 44 extremely long years. I started looking at the revolution as history, and not as part of the daily news.
America is the greatest country in the world, but the Cuban people are great… They’re beautiful, warm people.
I gladly accepted the commission but was uncertain about what the end result would be. On the one hand, Cuban music was conquering the world; being heard everywhere, and our small island was already producing one of the popular musical genres of the 20th century.
I do eat what I want. I love meat – I’m Cuban: I grew up eating meat, platanos, and arroz con pollo. I don’t believe in starving yourself, but sometimes I do cleanses and diets to prepare for a role. I choose a lot of greens, proteins, and fats, and I like to be really active.
For more than fifty years, our policy towards Cuba was not making life better for Cubans. In many ways, it was making it worse.
The most terrifying moment in my life was October 1962, during the Cuban Missile Crisis. I did not know all the facts – we have learned only recently how close we were to war – but I knew enough to make me tremble.
Mentors don’t have to be the Daymond Johns or the Mark Cubans. A person running a successful bodega or a tax firm in your community for the last 20 years, that person is working just as much as the individual who’s running General Mills.
Rock stars love Cuban heels because a lot of them tend to be diminutive. And I’ve never met a man who doesn’t mind having an extra inch or two anywhere on his body.
Culture is a fluid, ongoing process. People tend to look at culture in a fixed time but it’s constantly moving and evolving, as is the conversation between Americans and Cubans.
For tech, I like the ‘DailySearchCast’, ‘TWiT’ and anything Veronica Belmont does on CNET. I think Perez Hilton is a riot, and the rest of my consumption is by people: Folks like Dave Winer, Fred Wilson, Mark Cuban, Brian Alvey, Jeff Jarvis, Xeni Jardin, etc.
The embargo doesn’t affect the United States, not even minimally; all of Cuba’s economy is smaller than that of Miami-Dade County, and the ones who suffer the most are Cubans. If you talk to them in the street, they’re the ones most interested in the opening of a free market in their country.
I’m Cuban, so I know for a fact that we are the largest minority group in this country.
When it comes to wrestling, judo and boxing they are at a good level. They can compete in an international level. On the amateur level it is extremely high. Transitioning to MMA for them would be easy. I think we will see a lot more Cubans in MMA as it gets easier for them to complete.
Soon, I’ll be like all the others. The time will come for all of us, but the ideas of the Cuban Communists will remain.
From the moment he took office in January of 1961, Kennedy had been eager to settle the Cuban problem without overt military action by the United States.
President John F. Kennedy demonstrated the value of presidential credibility at the height of the Cuban missile crisis, when he sent emissaries to America’s allies in October 1962 to secure support for the quarantine of Cuba.
The lesson of the Cuban Missile Crisis is plain: Strength prevents war; weakness invites it. We need a commander-in-chief who understands that – and who won’t leave us facing a foe who thinks he doesn’t.
Experience acquired in the heroic battle against Batista’s tyranny showed that the enemy, no matter what his strength, could not defeat the Cuban people.
Fidel Castro’s most scandalous show trial was not mounted against a political figure but against a writer: Heberto Padilla. In 1971, after 38 days of detention, Mr. Padilla was forced to ‘confess’ at the Cuban writers’ union to the charges of ‘subversive activities.’
