Cyber-bembes

Cyber-bembes / Rosa Maria Rodriguez
Posted on July 22, 2013

On June 4, the 118 Internet centers that had been announced in the State
press begin operating in Cuba. As I receive the newspaper Granma on
Mondays I get Juventud Rebelde, Trabajadores and Tribuna de La Habana,
several days earlier I began to search the newspaper, which should have
information about the places that would offer the services, the
addresses, but as of the writing of this text, nothing has appeared; why?

The downpours of the five days prior to the date in the western
provinces drowned my ability to access the network during that time in
places where usually I connect and so I do not know if in the foreign
press showed the list to which I refer. Maybe the leaders hoped that
foreign tourists come to navigate the Cuban cyber waters and for this
they maintained discretion.

The fact is that the government media did not pay much attention to the
issue. It could be that the silence that is due to a Party direction,
perhaps thinking, from their disconnected cloud, that it might produce
social congestion at these access points and are trying to avoid it with
silence.

It is also possible that, on the contrary, they forgot to coordinate
with the newspaper editors — which is unlikely — in order to "give
abundant air" to the news in question. There is also possible, even more
remote, if we take into account the tight control over the media by the
authorities, and that the indifference is due to how distant the
Internet is for the majority of the citizens, the excessive process of
computer and telephone equipment, and that computers are almost never
offered for sale in this country. Generally computers are imported by
the minority of Cubans who can travel abroad.

The so-called southern television (TeleSUR) that is weighs on me to
mention, committed and manipulated and whose north is leftist
propaganda, mentioned the fact with great media fanfare on one of their
news broadcasts, and assured that the opening of these cyber centers is
part of the process of the "computerization of Cuba."

If in the national media they claim there are already around two million
cellphone users, why not include these potential navigators who already
have the tools to set sail? As always happens in dictatorships, the
paralyzing fear, secrecy, rights violated with extremist caution, and
the unjustified deception on the pretext that "the enemy is listening,"
are already very fragile arguments in a globally interconnected world.

This Monday the 10th the newspaper Granma mentioned for the first time
that there was a cybercafe in the Focsa Building, with 9 seats for
internauts. Where are the others?

The bembé is a religious festival of the Yoruba pantheon inherited from
ethnic groups uprooted from Africa and we incorporate it into the Cuban
cultural monuments. The news of cybersurfing points, however, wasn't the
celebration that many had anticipated. We're left, then, with continuing
the long and patient wait because everyone uses that service with the
tools at their disposal, without ridiculous prohibitive pattakíes or
discrimination, to celebrate with all Cuban users the respect of one of
the fundamental rights on the part of the Cuban dictatorship, which
constitute a real national celebration.

11 June 2013

Source: "Cyber-bembes / Rosa Maria Rodriguez | Translating Cuba" -
http://translatingcuba.com/cyber-bembes-rosa-maria-rodriguez/