Fidel Castro
by Nicolás Antonio Jiménez
Fidel Castro is dead.
That was the big news late Friday night. The longtime dictator, whose younger brother succeeded him 10 years ago — about the time Cigar Snob was hitting the scene — was no more. And just as soon as the news was out there, we began to see a wide range of reactions in the media, on the street, and, in some cases, in our homes.
Heads of state like Canada’s Justin Trudeau and, to a lesser extent, Barack Obama drew criticism for their official statements in the wake of Castro’s death.
Kiko Alonso (himself the son of a Cuban father and Colombian mother) became, at least for the weekend, Cuban Miami’s new favorite athlete, as he ended the Dolphins’ win over the 49ers by tackling Colin Kaepernick — who had recently drawn the ire of Cuban exiles by engaging in the kind of Castro apologist talk about the despot’s history that Cubans have been hearing for decades. The significance of the play wasn’t lost on Kiko; he later shared a photo of the hit, including the caption “Vamos Coño” (which translates loosely to “Let’s go, damnit”) and the hashtag #cubalibre (free Cuba).
The streets outside iconic Cuban restaurants in Miami, especially La Carreta and Versailles, were packed with jubilant crowds.
And in Cuban exile homes all over the country, champagne was uncorked as families toasted to the final assurance that this one monster in particular would never terrorize them, their families, or their countrymen again.
Carlos Eire, who won the National Book Award for his childhood memoir Waiting for Snow in Havana, ran through some of the reasons we should all be glad Fidel Castro is dead — and some of the things we should never forget about how he lived — in a Washington Post op-ed.
In sum, Fidel Castro was the spitting image of Big Brother in George Orwell’s novel “1984.” So, adiós, Big Brother, king of all Cuban nightmares. And may your successor, Little Brother, soon slide off the bloody throne bequeathed to him.
— Carlos Eire
This isn’t so much a celebration of a death as it is the manifestation of the catharsis that comes with knowing a man who did so much evil is finally out of the picture for good. It’s a loud sigh of relief (leave it to Cubans to sigh loudly and to the beat of congas accompanied by clanging pots and pans) at the kind of guarantee of safety that only biology and time can provide.
A few days have gone by. As the dust settles and everyone begins to litigate the significance of this event, many of us are left asking ourselves and everyone around us the same question we’ve asked every other time it’s felt like Cuba was on the verge of turning the page to a new chapter of its history.
Now what?
For those of us with lived or inherited experience with Castro’s evil, treating this as some kind of moment of victory or justice would be to lose sight of what’s important. Fidel Castro lived a long, long time. He died on his own terms, in privacy, and for every last second that nature and science and the unlimited resources that come with being the owner of nearly 12 million slaves would grant him. His brother and his tyrannical government survive him while millions of those who actively opposed him did not.
Whatever catharsis there might be on the island of Cuba is felt in secret except by those who are willing to risk their lives or their livelihoods to express themselves. One person in Cuba described the mood on the street to a member of our staff as “tranquilo, pero extraño.” Calm, but weird.
If what matters is the lives of Cubans, nothing has changed. Cuba’s constitution still makes it the most repressive regime in the hemisphere, and the system is such that new generations of government are deeply incentivized to keep it all in place.
Fidel Castro — to the extent that this is possible for any mortal — had the last laugh. That’s nothing to celebrate. The silver lining is that all that energy people used to leave their homes at the drop of a hat at 2 in the morning to bang on pots and pans, and toast with cigars and rum (including some, ironically enough, purchased from Castro’s monopoly, helping fund his life support) and all the time we’ve spent debating the potential impact of Castro’s death… all that can also be used to make sure that his last laugh doesn’t echo for very long.
For our part — and on this I think I can say that I speak for everyone else at Cigar Snob — we’ll continue to use our platform to speak some truth about Cuba in a media space that can sometimes seem eager to romanticize the island and ignore its dark side, perhaps because it’s hard to enjoy Cohibas and Havana Club when you’re reminded the brands’ owners wear olive green fatigues and jail their competition.
Fidel is dead. But this fight isn’t. Some things are bigger than cigars.
