Change is coming to Cuba, but pain persists

Kelly: Change is coming to Cuba, but pain persists
AST UPDATED: FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 2015, 8:04 AM
BY MIKE KELLY
RECORD COLUMNIST | THE RECORD

HAVANA — Inside a small house where a 1952 Ford Mainline sedan sits in
the back yard under a mango tree and the morning blanket of humidity
stifles any hint of a breeze, a woman sits in her tiny living room
staring at a photo of a brother she lost to the revolution.

Maria Elena Cabo Alum is 70 now. Angel Cabo is 73. Fidel Castro's
communist revolution, which swept Cuba more than half a century ago, did
not kill Angel in a physical way. He says it gradually smothered his
creative spirit.

So six years ago, he left – for New Jersey.

"There he is," Maria Elena said Thursday as Angel stared back at her
from the pages of a photo album — frozen in time as a young man in some
snapshots, weathered by the years in others. "I miss him."

The revolution that broke up the Cabo family and so many others may now
be undergoing what some observers believe is its most profound identity
crisis in years.

Despite a series of reforms in recent years — the sale of homes and cars
is now allowed, for instance, and some travel restrictions have been
lifted — concerns persist that the single-party Castro government
continues to treat dissidents too harshly while also moving too slowly
to embrace other democratic and economic changes.

That debate will likely come into greater focus in the coming days as
Pope Francis, the spiritual leader of the world's 1.5 billion Roman
Catholics, arrives in Cuba on what billboards here are proclaiming a
"Missionera de la Misericordia" — a Mission of Mercy — before continuing
on to the United States.

It is not the first visit to Cuba by a pontiff. But it is the first by a
Latin American pope who has shown no reluctance to speak forthrightly
about human rights and the need for governments to treat people with
dignity.

Francis has been credited by U.S. and Cuban officials with encouraging
the secret talks that led to the resumption of formal diplomatic ties
this summer. But experts say one of the issues the pope may address,
either in Cuba or in talks with American officials, is the harsh impact
on Cuban life of the U.S. economic embargo, which remains in place after
more than a half century and has left Cuba struggling to import
medicine, food and construction materials.

The revolution, the embargo and other issues are seen through the eyes
of ordinary Cubans as a far more nuanced story – a tale of families like
the Cabos, with some members who left home because they felt constrained
by communism and others who stayed behind.

It's an often painful story — one that is earnestly discussed and
debated in the cafes and homes of Hudson County's Cuban community and in
remarkably similar settings here in Cuba's capital city. On its most
basic level, it is a story of what was taken away to a new homeland and
what remained in the old.

Two perspectives

Angel Cabo, a lifelong pianist, was forced to pound the keys of a piano
in a theater orchestra on the outskirts of this city, which still takes
immense pride in its musical history.

Even when most of his friends were retiring, Angel said he needed more
freedom to choose the songs he wanted to play.

He believed New Jersey offered him a chance to escape the stifling
dictums of the Castro government. He also wanted to teach. So six years
ago, when he was in his late 60s, he moved to Guttenberg, where today he
is a successful piano instructor with a loyal following.

Maria Elena Cabo Alum stayed behind in Cuba — but with no regrets, she says.

Her family – the husband she married 51 years ago, along with her son
and daughter and their children — received free health care and free
education through college, courtesy of the government.

"We'll die as revolutionaries," said Maria Elena's husband, Humberto,
70. "The revolution gave us the right to get my education."

In a recent interview at his home in Guttenberg, Angel Cabo shared a far
different view of that revolution.

"I lived more than 50 years under communism," he said. "I worked a lot,
but I could never buy a car. I had to walk long distances to have money
to buy hot dogs or some chicken for my family. Now that's over. I'm an
American citizen."

In Cuba, Maria Elena acknowledged a degree of sadness as she heard about
the pride her brother has in his new life and citizenship.

"What is awaiting our children?" she asked, as she reflected on her own
future in Cuba. "We can't allow our children to grow up in a society
where they all move to other countries. It's like we're in a drought here."

Aging population

This sense of loss and how it has caused millions of Cubans to leave may
evolve over the coming decades into a profound social and economic
problem in Cuba.

Benito Esquenazi, who left Cuba as a young boy in 1966 and now lives in
Teaneck, said he still speaks to relatives in his homeland. But in
recent years, he has found that many voice the same hope – to move
somewhere else.

"Everybody that I talked to there was looking to leave," said Esquenazi,
54 and a vice president at a Manhattan financial services firm.

President Raul Castro, who replaced his older brother, Fidel, as the
nation's leader eight years ago, publicly expressed concern several
years ago that Cuba's population is rapidly aging, in part because so
many younger Cubans are emigrating to the United States, Latin America
and Europe. By 2020, Cuban social scientists predict, the retirements of
older citizens will outpace the entrance of younger people into the
country's workforce.

Whether such demographic and migration patterns will force major changes
in Cuba's politics and economy is still an open question.

"The Cuban government is in kind of a holding pattern," said Ted Henken,
a professor of Latino studies at Baruch College and co-author of the
recent book "Entrepreneurial Cuba." "Just as U.S. policy on Cuba has
been frozen in time, life in Cuba, in terms of real change, has been
frozen in time."

Back at the Alum home in the Boyeros district in southwestern Havana,
Maria Elena opened an envelope on Thursday and silently read a recent
letter from Angel as a fan hummed in an adjoining room. Looking up, she
said she understood why her brother left — and that, in some ways, she
agreed with his decision even if she has never seriously contemplated
leaving Cuba.

"My brother left to make a better life," she said. "I didn't go through
the trouble he went through."

As for her homeland, she is hopeful.

"I think change will come," she said. "But it will take a little while."

Email: kellym@northjersey.com

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