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Nice article on what Obama's Cuba decision means
My parents are Cuban exiles. Here’s what Obama’s decision means to us.
By Ruth Behar December 18 at 11:51 AM
Ruth Behar, a professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan, is the author of An Island Called Home and Traveling Heavy, which tell the story of her return journey to Cuba.
The author in Havana. (Courtesy of Gabriel Frye-Behar)
I walk a tightrope with Cuba.
I’m a daughter of Cuban exiles who’ve pledged not to return until there is political change. Yet I’ve traveled to the island numerous times since the early 1990s; it’s the site of my research as a cultural anthropologist.
I never forget that every trip back is an insult to my parents, and that their immigrant labor has made possible my education and my privilege to travel back and forth to my native land. “Be careful, Ruti,” they say. “Don’t talk too much.”
When we left in the early 1960s, we were labeled “gusanos,” or worms, of the revolution, and traitors, maligned for choosing to immigrate. Despite all of my trips, my parents’ paranoia is lodged like shrapnel in my memory. I’m an American citizen, but having been born in Cuba I’m required to return to the island with a Cuban passport.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/postev...n-means-to-us/
By Ruth Behar December 18 at 11:51 AM
Ruth Behar, a professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan, is the author of An Island Called Home and Traveling Heavy, which tell the story of her return journey to Cuba.
The author in Havana. (Courtesy of Gabriel Frye-Behar)
I walk a tightrope with Cuba.
I’m a daughter of Cuban exiles who’ve pledged not to return until there is political change. Yet I’ve traveled to the island numerous times since the early 1990s; it’s the site of my research as a cultural anthropologist.
I never forget that every trip back is an insult to my parents, and that their immigrant labor has made possible my education and my privilege to travel back and forth to my native land. “Be careful, Ruti,” they say. “Don’t talk too much.”
When we left in the early 1960s, we were labeled “gusanos,” or worms, of the revolution, and traitors, maligned for choosing to immigrate. Despite all of my trips, my parents’ paranoia is lodged like shrapnel in my memory. I’m an American citizen, but having been born in Cuba I’m required to return to the island with a Cuban passport.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/postev...n-means-to-us/
