Makoto
Look into my eyes and tell me who I really am
- Jun 20, 2024
- 58
I'm writing all of this with a translator because it's been a long day and I don't have enough energy to translate. I just want to get it off my chest.
I live on an island in the middle of the Caribbean called Cuba, in the capital, Havana. Don't think that just because it's the capital means it's the best, no. There are no job opportunities for anyone, nor the freedom to create your own work. The dictatorship we are subjected to starves us to death and does not even allow us to harvest our own food without confiscating it.
I can't remember the last time I felt satisfied after eating. I have desires that I tell myself are cravings, but when I think about it, they're not really cravings, they're just hunger. I fantasize about evaporated milk and sugar, about chocolate, about eating bread nonstop.
I stopped fantasizing about meat so many years ago.
Oh my God, I'm so hungry I can't sleep, and I spend the whole night awake in the dark. I say dark because we don't have electricity, and no one does for very long here. There are blackouts every day for almost 20 hours, and right now I have electricity, and hunger won't let me sleep, but at least I can vent since the 3G internet seems to work, even though it's incredibly slow.
At least my younger sister doesn't go hungry. She's in high school, and while I'm at work, my husband helps me take care of her since he works nights. Our two salaries are barely enough to keep her fed and keep her from starving.
Our mother passed away four years ago, and our retired father lives with us. He had sold his house, where he lived with my mother, so I could leave this country and go live to Paraguay. With the sale of his house (the one where my sister and I grew up), he got a little over $1,000, which was just enough to leave this place and go to Bolivia, and then from there to Paraguay. You might be wondering why Paraguay? Well, because in Paraguay cubans can request political asylum, but we can't go directly since there are no flights. We have to go to countries that don't require visas for Cubans, like Bolivia or Trinidad and Tobago, and then find a way to emigrate illegally to Paraguay or Uruguay.
Once there, I could work and save money so that my husband, my sister, and my father could also leave the island.
But now it's all become a dream again.
Last week, my father called me with a health problem, and we had to have emergency surgery. This may sound crazy or impossible to anyone reading this, but I assure you it's true: in Cuba, there's nothing in the hospitals. There aren't even gloves, alcohol, syringes, or catheters. You have to buy everything yourself on the black market, and one of the most expensive things is anesthesia (yes, I'm telling you, you have to get absolutely everything yourself; there aren't even stretchers in the hospital, but you can't get that anymore, or maybe you can, but I didn't). The total cost was more than the money we had saved for me to leave the country and another $200 that my husband and I had to go into debt.
Now I also have to take care of my father, so I will be unable to work for three months, and the State won't pay us, and I fear for my sister.
Damn, that money was so precious to me. It was our ticket to a future, so my sister could make a name for herself in this life and not live in fear and hunger. I was so afraid of losing it that I'd stashed it all away in cryptocurrency.
I was really afraid that a neighbor would report us to the police for having physical dollars, and they'd search our house and confiscate everything. So I researched cryptocurrencies and had everything stored on an exchange called Coinex, which is the only one that can be used from Cuba. I put the money there with the help of a computer-savvy friend.
That money is more than our husband and I could save in 10 years, even if we go hungry even more. And now I'm going to be out of work for a few months.
GOD! Please, I beg you, help us! I have faith in you, in your son. My Lord Jesus, you who can do everything, please, I ask you, for my sister, for my Father. Please help us in some way.
Lord, may your will be done
I live on an island in the middle of the Caribbean called Cuba, in the capital, Havana. Don't think that just because it's the capital means it's the best, no. There are no job opportunities for anyone, nor the freedom to create your own work. The dictatorship we are subjected to starves us to death and does not even allow us to harvest our own food without confiscating it.
I can't remember the last time I felt satisfied after eating. I have desires that I tell myself are cravings, but when I think about it, they're not really cravings, they're just hunger. I fantasize about evaporated milk and sugar, about chocolate, about eating bread nonstop.
I stopped fantasizing about meat so many years ago.
Oh my God, I'm so hungry I can't sleep, and I spend the whole night awake in the dark. I say dark because we don't have electricity, and no one does for very long here. There are blackouts every day for almost 20 hours, and right now I have electricity, and hunger won't let me sleep, but at least I can vent since the 3G internet seems to work, even though it's incredibly slow.
At least my younger sister doesn't go hungry. She's in high school, and while I'm at work, my husband helps me take care of her since he works nights. Our two salaries are barely enough to keep her fed and keep her from starving.
Our mother passed away four years ago, and our retired father lives with us. He had sold his house, where he lived with my mother, so I could leave this country and go live to Paraguay. With the sale of his house (the one where my sister and I grew up), he got a little over $1,000, which was just enough to leave this place and go to Bolivia, and then from there to Paraguay. You might be wondering why Paraguay? Well, because in Paraguay cubans can request political asylum, but we can't go directly since there are no flights. We have to go to countries that don't require visas for Cubans, like Bolivia or Trinidad and Tobago, and then find a way to emigrate illegally to Paraguay or Uruguay.
Once there, I could work and save money so that my husband, my sister, and my father could also leave the island.
But now it's all become a dream again.
Last week, my father called me with a health problem, and we had to have emergency surgery. This may sound crazy or impossible to anyone reading this, but I assure you it's true: in Cuba, there's nothing in the hospitals. There aren't even gloves, alcohol, syringes, or catheters. You have to buy everything yourself on the black market, and one of the most expensive things is anesthesia (yes, I'm telling you, you have to get absolutely everything yourself; there aren't even stretchers in the hospital, but you can't get that anymore, or maybe you can, but I didn't). The total cost was more than the money we had saved for me to leave the country and another $200 that my husband and I had to go into debt.
Now I also have to take care of my father, so I will be unable to work for three months, and the State won't pay us, and I fear for my sister.
Damn, that money was so precious to me. It was our ticket to a future, so my sister could make a name for herself in this life and not live in fear and hunger. I was so afraid of losing it that I'd stashed it all away in cryptocurrency.
I was really afraid that a neighbor would report us to the police for having physical dollars, and they'd search our house and confiscate everything. So I researched cryptocurrencies and had everything stored on an exchange called Coinex, which is the only one that can be used from Cuba. I put the money there with the help of a computer-savvy friend.
That money is more than our husband and I could save in 10 years, even if we go hungry even more. And now I'm going to be out of work for a few months.
GOD! Please, I beg you, help us! I have faith in you, in your son. My Lord Jesus, you who can do everything, please, I ask you, for my sister, for my Father. Please help us in some way.
Lord, may your will be done
