The Birthday Boy

I skimmed through a few birthday memories in this post, and some have been more memorable than others - my 30th was my all-time best, for sure, what with all the members of both my families plus childhood friends and my then-girlfriend together in the same room, most of them for the first time in 29 years, culminating with a short film recap of my life so far and everybody having chipped in for my trip to Cuba.

I've had some with events I regret - like when I was 3 or 4, coming home to a surprise party, pretending to be offended by it, and going as far as to refuse chocolate cake in protest of half my family being there. I still feel like a dick for it, and I felt like one even at the time (kids have consciences, I guess).

Then there's some like tonight: quiet, laid-back, just a few friends in a restaurant. Six people - enough to carry out and follow two conversations at once and have everyone involved, not too much to lose track of certain people deserving of your attention but too far to get it.

I'll remember my mid-thirties' anniversary because it was perfect: not overblown, over-hyped or out-of-proportion, no disrespect, no negativity, no one to mess it all up. Just good, old, middle-of-the-road, laid back fun.

Freedom Of Speech... Just Watch What You Say

Only in America - again.

In the Land Of The Free and Home Of The Brave, a Hispanic (Venezuelan) baseball team manager can have no consequences by insulting gays, but gets suspended (without pay), boycotted, picketed and petitioned to get fired for saying he ''loves'' or admires somebody... if that body is Cuban President Fidel Castro.

Sure, Ozzie Guillen is now managing the Miami Marlins, in a town filled with Cuban expats, but Castro is the former leader who freed his fucking people from American abuse, gave them universal health care, free quality university education - Cuban doctors are widely known as the best on earth - and provided his people with all the basic necessities to ensure a decent life in country as well as abroad despite an embargo that would bring other countries past the brink of famine.

The two most common knocks on the Castro regime are: rigged - or absent - elections, and the imprisonment of political dissenters, two areas of expertise seemingly reserved for Americans, whose last two-term chief actually lost his first election and then spent 8 years putting opponents in jail or ruining them in newspapers under the guise of ''national security''.

Yet Bush II didn't free his People from oppression, instead facilitating future oppressive regimes by giving the presidency too much power. But ''boo'' on the commies, right?

Not everyone is going nuts over this, at least.

The Cuban Revolution: 50 Years Of Freedom

There's a nice page on the BBC's website about the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution. It's rather complete for a one-page blurb, and offers insights into both sides of the long-standing argument, which are on one side that the Revolution actually brought freedom to Cuba, and on the other, the U.S.' opinion and pledge to ''free Cubans''.

Once more, the U.S.A. is alone on their side of the equation, pissed off that a tiny island can survive on its own despite a communist government and little else, 145 kilometers from their shores.

Reacting to the anniversary, a White House spokesman said the US continued to seek freedom for the Cuban people (...)

"The Castro brothers have not treated their people particularly well," said White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe on the eve of the anniversary.

"Many political dissidents are in jail. The economy is suffering and not free. And the United States will continue to try to seek the freedom of the people of Cuba, and support them."

Yeah. And people who disagree with the U.S.' policies for the past 60 years haven't... right. They wiretapped John Lennon, for fuck's sake. They imprison political dissidents daily with their Patriot Act, where they can abduct people from their homes without charging them with anything and have no rights to attorneys. Much better.

The article goes on to say

Fifty years on, the legacy of the revolution is complex. There is free education and health care but the state-controlled economy means wages for many Cubans are very low, on average about $20 to $25 a month.

yet doesn't mention that even the lowest wages amount is enough to provide with more essential stuff than welfare would in the U.S., and that the education and health care part will always be lacking in the States - and is going out of style in Canada too, as a matter of fact - along with the levels of quality it was known to have.

It also fails to mention that there are few nations and peoples as happy with their life as Cubans are - anywhere on earth. That a vast majority of them view the Castros and Che Guevara as both heroes and founding fathers, with an added touch of ideals to achieve and pride. That before this year, even natural disasters couldn't put a dent in the island's residents' spirit.

The article, though, mentions a kind of hope that change will occur, as Barack Obama could loosen up parts of the embargo, which would definitely be a step in the right direction.

So we solemnly celebrate 50 years of Freedom in Cuba, as the country was hit with its most difficult year in a long while, and hope for a much better one to come, and plenty more anniversaries in both the near and distant future. They have shown us that living on this planet can be done outside the American model without having to skimp human rights (unlike, say, China) and focusing on what is essential to create independent individual human beings - food, lodging, education and health care. Bravo.

Guess I'm Doing Fine

It's not the first snow storm of the year, it might not even be the second one, but it's the most annoying, for sure. The first one to make me forgo sleep because it'll be more of a bitch to get home and come back to work than just stay here and write.

I'll need caffeine and uppers: Pepsi, Rockstar (pomegranate flavour, with vodka, because it doesn't specify a daily limit I can intake), Wake Ups. To start. Then, in a couple of hours, I'll decide if I need more - or stronger - material. Hopefully not, because I'm more than due for a full night's sleep tonight... seven nights in the making. Wouldn't want my day's consumption to ruin the night I so rightfully deserve.

I'm seeing birds flying in the top-right corner of my right eye, my left eye feels like it's covered in Vaseline, my balance is off a bit; I probably look like a drunk when I walk the hallways going to washroom.

My headphones are on, and ironically '80s-style goth-rock fills my ears, adding to the sense that I'm out of synch with the world; Joy Division's Transmission, And One's Military Fashion Show, The Cure's The Blood... never has the 'random' feature been so focused.

My stomach grawls, as wretched gases fight to leave my body's premises. I'm freezing one minute, boiling the next. Outside, the world is not only covered in white Artic Leftovers but actually drowning in it, not inch by inch but foot by foot. Sitting inside, ten feet from the windowsill, I wonder if death will feel this weird, if I'm nearing it somehow with my decadent lifestyle. I wouldn't be ready, that's for sure.

To think two months ago I was in Cuba, the one place on earth that makes you truly wonder about divinity, but also the one place where you wouldn't need it.

My body is doing all it can to shut down. My eyes close, my brain blinks, my mouth won't open. Nine more hours and it'll be smooth sailing. Cold sweat covers me, shivers take over, a wonderful piece of machinery that needs to rest.

Beck comes on, with Guess I'm Doing Fine. Figures.

Beer And Unloading In Varadero, Cuba (or How I Learned To Start Running And Drop A Liquid Bomb)

It was an awful hour of the morning in Varadero, say 6AM, with no sleep and sun sneaking through the lead-like blinds.

Nothing else to do but start a new day anyway. Two glasses of orange juice and bacon, then time for rum and coke and the ocean.

Your body does weird things when you don't sleep. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you haven't lived - and you might want to try it before you keep reading. The metabolism goes much faster. I'm already on a 2-shit-a-day diet here, but sleepless it can go up to 5, I'm sure.

And the beach is far enough from the room, 5 minutes sober, maybe 15 otherwise - it's gonna be a bitch trying to keep this pudding from pouring down my leg.

I grab a book for when I get there, a strawberry-vodka for the road - and start walking. For subtlety's sake, I smile at passers-by. The 25 stairs between the ground level and the rooms are like a dream, over in a half second. The yardage to the door is me at the Super Bowl, going for a touchdown with no one in front of me. The easiest 6 points of my career. The key's in the lock socket before my hand is even out of my pocket. The door opens and I'm but one jump from my destination. I get naked 'cause I know what's coming next. As soon as my knees bend, the shit hits the fan. Best two minutes of my life.

Wipe off, get up. I need another goddamn drink.

Back From Vacation

1 week in Cuba. Best week of my year, despite catching a nasty cold on the very last day.

And how the heck do you catch a cold in 34 degrees Celcius (100 Fahrenheit)?

But that's a question that shall remain unanswered because, quite frankly... who cares?

It was nice to get a break from the Elections, both Canadian and American.

I wrote things out there though. They'll make it here soon enough.