Yosniel Fernández opens his eyes and sees the blades of the ceiling fan spinning. The room is cool, the 33 °C are not noticeable. Beside him, his wife is asleep. And beyond his bed, a few meters away, in a smaller bed, his eight-year-old daughter. He stretches out his arm and picks up his mobile phone, which is connected to the power outlet, from the floor. The phone is charged and shows 7:30 AM. "Am I dreaming?", he asks himself.It's the first time the family sleeps all night and since January, when the President of the United States, Donald Trump, after ordering the extraction of Nicolás Maduro from Caracas and his deposition in a New York prison, decided that not a single more drop of Venezuelan oil would reach Cuba and prepared to sanction any country that wanted to supply crude oil to the regime.Yosniel gets out of bed carefully so as not to wake his wife and daughter. He doesn't even put on his slippers. He leaves the room barefoot. He walks down the narrow hallway of the house and in the living room he finds his mother, 73 years old, and his father, 77, both retired, drinking coffee in front of the television which is broadcasting a morning news report. Of course this is a dream, he thinks again, before heading to the refrigerator and serving himself two glasses of cold milk that go down his throat with an "inexplicable" pleasure, which he hadn't felt for more than three months.His parents offer him coffee and he sits next to him to listen to the news, which explains the improvement of the national electrical system in recent hours thanks to the Russian tanker Anatoly Kolodkin, who unloaded 100,000 tons at the end of March, about 730,000 barrels of crude oil, with the approval of the United States government. Yosniel listens to the Cuban Minister of Energy and Mines, Vicente de la O Levy, who says: “With this ship alone, we have enough until the end of this month”.When Minister O Levy acknowledges that the relief is circumstantial and that the Cuban energy system is operating at 50% of its capacity, Yosniel gets up and returns to his room where his wife and daughter are still sleeping. He doesn't wake them: the previous night they had agreed that neither his wife nor his daughter would go to work and school. Mother and daughter are exhausted: both the shop where the mother works and the daughter's school are more than five kilometers away from home, a daily round trip they have been making on foot for weeks due to the absence of public transport. Yosniel puts on his work uniform: nylon shorts and a white polyester t-shirt. He leaves the room again in silence and asks his parents to tell them that he will return at noon with some food for lunch.Making a living as a bike taxi driver

Yosniel is 37 years old and lives in Old Havana. In 2012 he graduated in civil engineering, although he never practiced his profession. In those days, an engineer of his type was paid, at most, a little more than 300 Cuban pesos, about 14 dollars a month. That's why he decided to become a taxi driver, a job with which he earned ten times more. But with today's crisis on the island, where a liter of gasoline costs at least 3,000 pesos and at most 6,000, in a country where the minimum monthly wage is 2,100 pesos, Yosniel was forced to park his taxi. Now he makes a living with a bicitaxi.“I dismantled the central body of a bicycle and added to it, by welding, a metal bench that serves as a seat over two wheels. To this new artifact, which is a sort of tricycle, I put a layer of plastic to shield myself from the sun”. Thus, Yosniel built his new means of production with which he works morning and afternoon transporting people from one side to another. I ask him to accompany him virtually for a while on his trips through Havana. He says yes on one condition: “I’ll get you on the bicitaxi and we’ll go for a ride, but without talking when I have clients, because you might scare them away”.I am inside his phone. Yosniel places me on top of him, to one side, between the plastic layer and a metal tube. The camera has been perfectly secured after he tied the phone with a cable. I am a kind of rearview mirror. Can you see well? He asks while he is already pedaling. His knees go up and down, his shoulders don't move, but they start to show through a blanket of sweat. I can't see better, I reply. I see few people walking through the streets, which are full of garbage scattered on the ground.Yosniel advances agilely through narrow alleys. He passes by a couple of small squares. He takes an avenue and there he finds the first client of the day. It is a middle-aged lady who indicates her destination: Belascoaín y Reina. Now we go slower with the lady's weight. Yosniel struggles the first few meters, breaking the inertia.Propped-up houses and impeccable hotels

The buildings on Reina street, piled up next to each other, are worn out, unpainted, and some are held up by wooden beams. On the corner of Campanario, two men are burning a pile of garbage. With long sticks, they help the fire not to get out of control. The smoke from the garbage rises into the sky and clouds several street corners. The landscape becomes a grayish blanket into which we enter. Yosniel and the lady cover their noses."That's why I don't like going out at this hour, because of the stench from the garbage," says the lady. "It's unbearable," says Yosniel. Shortly after, the lady speaks again and says she went out because, even though the power went out for only fourteen hours in her neighborhood yesterday, one must have full reserves. "I don't have charcoal to cook with because it's extremely expensive. Luckily, a friend will give me some wooden planks, and that's what I'm going to get now," she adds.When the lady comes down after handing him 600 pesos, Yosniel turns to me and explains: “Look at the country's level, that because in some places manufactured gas distribution doesn't reach, today cooking with charcoal is a luxury, because it costs more than 2,000 pesos, a person's salary, and firewood is what people have left. Any wood, chairs, tables, windows, that are burned, and with that we cook.” On a corner of the promenade, another woman accompanied by her daughter, dressed in a primary school uniform, get on the bike taxi. To Prado, they indicate. From a distance, I observe how a couple of sea waves, after hitting the reefs, rise above the wall and wet the avenue. "Let's see if more people come to class today," says the girl. "Well, daughter. I can't stay home with you today, I have an important meeting," replies the mother.After leaving them at the entrance of a school, Yosniel explains to me that once the crisis exploded, the government determined a series of measures, among which the reduction of the working day and the flexibility of attendance, both in workplaces and schools. “Here now people work and study when they can, that is, when there is no electricity, people stay home. And since there is almost always no light, there is no country. Almost nothing works”.Yosniel pedals and sweats along the Prado promenade looking for clients. We pass in front of several hotels. Their facades contrast with the buildings surrounding them: they are clean and painted. I see people sleeping on cardboard outdoors, others rummaging in the trash containers. On Neptuno street, a man stops him and asks him how much he charges to go to Lealtad/Gervasio. It's 600 pesos, Yosniel replies. "Too expensive," the man tells him.

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The Filmin platform premiered last Friday the documentary Isla familia, co-directed and starring Cubans Abraham Jiménez Enoa, a recognized –and persecuted– independent journalist, and Claudia Calviño, one of the leading producers of independent Cuban cinema. The feature film, which they recorded with their mobile phones and is the directorial debut for both, narrates how the couple decides to leave their country for Spain after strong repression and harassment by the Cuban regime. All while they await the birth of their first child.

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Iberia will temporarily suspend its direct flights to Cuba starting in June. According to the company, the decision is motivated by the "situation the country is going through" for several months, a fact that would have impacted demand "very significantly." The sale of flights, however, will remain open from November, when the airline plans to resume the route, "provided that conditions permit." In recent months, the company's operations in Cuba were already being affected by the serious situation being experienced on the island, where the United States has expanded its siege. In fact, as Iberia specifies, since last February 9, it has been necessary to make a technical stop in Santo Domingo to refuel the flights returning to Madrid.

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"I used to work in a publishing house called Linkgua at 45 Muntaner street. I was an editor and proofreader. And one day at the door I meet a lady about 80 years old, Carme Humet Cocinero. And she asks me if I can hug her because she hasn't hugged a black person in 40 years," explains Arsenio Rodríguez Quintana (Havana, 1964). Rodríguez hugged her and asked why she had asked. "She told me that her aunt, Maria Cocinero, had married a black Cuban named Longinos Betancourt who was a doorman in a building in Urquinaona. And she added that the son of this couple had played for Barça. It blew my mind. I knew nothing, and I'm Cuban, black, and a Barça fan," he adds. "Thus began Rodríguez's investigation to publicize the figure of Francesc SiscuBetancourt y Cocinero (1913-1998), the first black player in Barça's history. "Betancourt came to find me. It was a sign. Unfortunately, his family wasn't very interested in remembering Siscu's figureand they threw away many documents. I'm very sorry. So I had to investigate," explains Rodríguez, who has just published Ciscu Betancourt, first black footballer of Barça and the Spanish league, a book to vindicate this player who defended the jersey of a lot of Catalan teams. He debuted at Fort Pienc in the 20s and in 1961 he was still linked to football at Sant Cugat, where he coached. In between, good spells at Barça, Sabadell or Badalona, even scoring a goal against Real Madrid with the blaugrana jersey.

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After a three-week journey from the Baltic Sea, crossing the Atlantic Ocean, to the Caribbean, the Russian tanker Anatoli Kolodkin will finally be able to dock in a Cuban port and will break the blockade that Donald Trump has been imposing on the island since January. “If a country wants to send oil to Cuba right now, I have no problem with it, whether it's Russia or other countries. It will have no impact, Cuba is finished.”, said the President of the United States, a few hours before the vessel reaches its destination. The 730,000 barrels of crude oil that the ship is carrying – about 100,000 tons – are estimated to alleviate Havana's fuel crisis for a month. At the same time, they will offer Vladimir Putin a geopolitical victory in the dispute with Washington over spheres of influence.

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More than half the country is plunged into darkness practically every day for several hours. This is the reality Cubans must live with as a result of the economic strangulation the United States maintains on the island. In addition to the already common daily partial blackouts, there are now nationwide blackouts, which are becoming increasingly frequent. Last week, the entire island was plunged into darkness simultaneously on two occasions, bringing the total to seven total blackouts in the country in the last year and a half, while the population faces one of the worst supply crises in decades.

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Since Delcy Rodríguez announced a "cooperation agenda" with the White House Just over 24 hours after Nicolás Maduro's capture, Caracas has been forced to capitulate to Washington week after week. The United States governs Venezuela through the back door and has managed to get Chavismo to implement reforms to liberalize the economy, while the Trump administration has restored trade with the Latin American country in a highly restricted manner and under exceptional conditions. In the two and a half months since the attack, Venezuela has opened its doors to the US for its natural resources. Trump himself acknowledged this last weekend at the summit in Miami with Latin American leaders allied with the White House: "We are getting enormous amounts of oil out," he stated. On paper, Chavismo's opening to US investment began at the end of January. At that time, the National Assembly approved an amendment to the hydrocarbons law, confirming a pragmatic—and forced—shift by Chavismo in the face of US pressure. The Venezuelan Parliament approved a bill that reduces state controls over the industry and places fewer obstacles in the way of foreign private companies participating in oil exploration. Until now, they could only do so in joint ventures in which the state always held a majority stake, but the new legislation allows this to change. In the area of ​​trade, the government of Delcy Rodríguez has also promoted a new mining law, approved in its first reading this week in the Venezuelan Parliament. Although the text may still undergo some modifications, the intention is to establish the legal framework to provide legal guarantees to companies, with the aim of generating confidence and attracting foreign private investment. In case of conflict, the law establishes mediation and arbitration mechanisms that should resolve disputes. the doubts that some major oil companies like Exxon expressed in their meeting with Trump in January, in which they called for reforms before investing in the country to avoid exposing themselves to asset seizure.

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Amid the economic suffocation the country is experiencingCuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel confirmed on Friday that several officials from his government recently held talks with representatives of the United States government to "seek solutions" to "bilateral differences." Until now, Havana had denied rumors that the two countries had begun a dialogue. Donald Trump himself... He had said that these conversations were taking place, But Havana denied it.

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US President Donald Trump raised the possibility of a "friendly takeover" of Cuba on Friday, stating that Secretary of State Marco Rubio is handling the matter "at the highest level." Speaking to reporters at the White House, the president said, "The Cuban government is talking to us. They have serious problems. They don't have money. They don't have anything right now, but they're talking to us, and maybe we'll have a friendly takeover of Cuba." Trump described Cuba as a decaying country in need of change, adding that he has heard about the island's difficulties since he was a child: "They don't have money, they don't have oil, they don't have food. Right now they're a country with a lot of problems, and they want our help." For its part, the Cuban government has stated that it is not holding any high-level talks with the United States, although it has not explicitly denied media reports that US officials may be maintaining informal contact with Raúl Guillermo Rodríguez Castro, grandson of the former president. Axios reported this month that Rubio had held secret talks with Rodríguez. US officials close to Rubio reportedly met on the sidelines of the Caribbean Community regional conference held this week on the Caribbean island of Saint Kitts and Nevis, according to a report published Thursday. Miami Herald.

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The Cuban Coast Guard killed four crew members of a speedboat from the United States on Wednesday. Havana claims they were Cuban exiles. Six other men on the same boat were wounded, as was one of the coast guards. The Cuban Interior Ministry maintains they were dissidents, some of whom were wanted by the regime as conspirators. They allegedly attempted to enter the country dressed in camouflage and armed with assault rifles, pistols, and homemade explosives. According to the Interior Ministry, the vessel failed to comply with orders to stop, as it was "illegally" in Cuban territorial waters. When the agents approached the American boat to identify the crew, they opened fire on the Cuban officers, wounding the commander. In a brief statement, the Cuban Ministry of the Interior detailed that the incident occurred in waters near the province of Villa Clara and that the American vessel was registered in Florida, USA, with the following identification: FL7726SH. For now, Cuban authorities have not provided details about the identities of those traveling on the vessel or their possible motives.

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Cuba is becoming more strangled with each passing day. If the country's situation was already critical, in the last month Washington has further increased the sanctions it has been applying to the Caribbean island for decades. cutting off Venezuelan oil deliveries to Havana and threatening to impose tariffs on countries that supply crude oil to the Castro regimeThe measures implemented by the White House violate international law and the UN Charter, as the UN stated last Friday, and are causing an "economic strangulation" in the Latin American country, in the words of Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel. However, few countries have denounced the US strangulation of Cuba, and even fewer have moved to help. In this context, following the example of the Gaza Flotilla, several social and labor organizations from around the world have launched a new humanitarian flotilla, this time destined for Havana. At the moment, few details are known about the Latin American humanitarian mission. Under the name Our America, the organization has explained that the vessels will sail through the Caribbean over the next month, carrying food, medicine, and essential supplies to the island.

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While US extortion has left Cuba mired in a deep energy crisis, has forced many airlines to halt flights to the country due to a lack of fuelMexican President Claudia Sheinbaum has extended an olive branch to the Cuban regime. This Friday, she declared that Mexico is willing to create an air bridge so that planes can refuel in the country and thus maintain their flights to the Caribbean island. Sheinbaum also indicated that the proposal could facilitate the delivery of humanitarian aid, which Mexico began sending this week and which the Mexican president assured would continue in the coming days. However, Sheinbaum also clarified that these shipments do not include oil. "If Cuba requests it, these conditions would apply, of course," the Mexican leader stated during her morning press conference, in which she made the launch of this air bridge contingent on a formal request from Havana. Furthermore, Sheinbaum noted that flights between Mexico and Cuba are continuing, and explained that aircraft can refuel in Mexican territory to maintain operations and even expand logistical cooperation. "They can load up, they can come to Mexico," the country's president pointed out. This option could help Havana mitigate the drop in tourism, a consequence of the cancellation of some flights in the country, which could have a major impact on an already severely damaged economy.

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Cuba has run out of jet fuel, further proof of the effects of the US oil stranglehold on an island that It was already immersed in a serious economic and energy crisisCuban authorities informed airlines this Sunday that, starting Monday, they would not have enough fuel to fill their tanks, and companies with daily flights to the island—mainly American, Spanish, Mexican, and Panamanian—have begun taking emergency measures. Spanish airlines Air Europa and Iberia, with daily routes to Havana, have opted to maintain flights from Madrid but have announced that from now on they will include a refueling stop in the Dominican Republic. Meanwhile, airlines from Canada, the island's primary source of tourism, have begun readjusting frequencies and routes, as well as offering cancellations or changes to reservations without penalty to customers. One of these companies is Air Canada, Canada's main airline, which announced on Monday that it will immediately suspend its services to Cuba due to the fuel shortage. However, it has announced that in the coming days it will send empty planes to Cuba "to pick up the approximately 3,000 customers" who are on the island and need to return to Canada. According to the notice from Cuban authorities to pilots, the restrictions affect all nine of Cuba's international airports and are currently valid for one month, from February 10 to March 11. Impact on tourism

The sector most affected by the fuel supply cut is tourism. This activity, essential to the Cuban economy, which has been under pressure for decades due to US sanctions, has experienced a sharp decline as a result of Washington's oil blockade. First, on January 3, the White House ended oil shipments from Venezuela, which was its main supplier of crude. And On January 29, he threatened tariffs on countries that supply oil to the island.This has virtually cut off the flow of Venezuelan crude and forced countries like Mexico to suspend shipments. Although he hasn't openly admitted it, Donald Trump has promoted a policy of strangling the island with the aim of economically collapsing the Cuban regime, at the expense of the poor living conditions of its population. Trump asserted that Cuba "is about to fall" and publicly stated that the Caribbean nation cannot survive without Venezuela's support, thus pressuring the Cuban government to reach an "agreement" with the United States. To cope with the lack of imports, the island's authorities have approved an emergency package that includes the objective of "reducing hotel infrastructure." As the EFE news agency has confirmed, several hotels in the country—mainly in Varadero and in the north—have closed their doors urgently and transferred tourists to other facilities as a cost-saving measure. Tourism in Cuba was already struggling due to the combination of the pandemic, US sanctions, and the country's economic crisis. In seven years, it has lost three-quarters of its visitors: last year ended with only 1.8 million international visitors, compared to 4.7 million in 2018.

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I can't see my father in the darkness. I only hear him: "Wait, we'll find somewhere with light." He guides me to his left hand, to the screen of his phone, which he hasn't used in the last 18 hours so he can make this video call. El Cerro, his neighborhood, has been without electricity all that time. We walk together through his house, and although everything is dark, I can make out the silhouette of my grandmother's porcelain vase on the living room table, the tapestry of the rearing horse hanging on the wall, the two pots with taro stalks dangling from the macramé, and the photo we took the day we were taken. It's midday, and my father is celebrating his birthday, 67, the same age as the Revolution.

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Having taken control of Venezuela, Donald Trump is now turning his attention to Cuba. The US president is aware of the island's weak and isolated situation. after the overthrow of Nicolás MaduroHe has signed an executive order imposing tariffs on countries that supply Cuba with oil. "Cuba will not be able to survive," he asserted during the presentation of a documentary about First Lady Melania Trump. The president considers the weak Cuban communist regime to be "an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States" and declared "a national emergency regarding that threat" during the signing of the executive order. However, he did not specify what types of tariffs will be applied nor did he name any specific country. Trump maintains that Cuba is a "failed nation," but when asked if his intention is to "strangle" the Caribbean country, he responded that the expression is "very harsh." "You have to feel bad for Cuba because they have treated the people very badly. We have many Cuban-Americans who have been very mistreated and would like to return," he stated.

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US President Donald Trump said on Sunday that he "thinks it's fine" for his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, to be the next president of Cuba, after urging the island's government to reach "a deal, before it's too late." "I think it's fine!" Trump commented on his social media account, Truth Social, sharing a post on X from a user who predicted that "Marco Rubio will be the president of Cuba." Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, has been a key figure in the administration's US actions against Venezuela and Cuba. Shortly afterward, Trump warned Cuba that it would no longer receive money or oil from Venezuela and stated that the island had been "living for years" off Venezuelan resources in exchange for "security services" for the "last two dictators," referring to Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro.

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The successful military operation against Venezuela to kidnap Nicolás Maduro has further enraged Donald Trump, who has spent the last two days threatening one country after another. To the recurring intimidation tactics of recent months against Greenland—which have been repeated in the last few hours—have been added threats against countries in Washington's so-called "backyard," especially Cuba and Colombia, which appear to be in the crosshairs of the US president.

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The hurricane Balm, one of the strongest ever recorded in the Atlantic, is still following its path of destruction after crossing JamaicaCuba and, early Thursday morning, the Bahamas as well. Scientists have already concluded—proven with data—that this phenomenon is a direct consequence of the climate crisis created by the burning of fossil fuels. A specific study by Imperial College London concludes that global warming has made this hurricane four times more likely. If there were no climate change, a hurricane of that intensity would have occurred only once every 8,000 years, the study says. But human-created conditions have increased wind speeds by at least 18 km/h and raised them to the 295 km/h recorded on record. Balm when it made landfall in Jamaica on Tuesday, as a Category 5 hurricane.

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The Catalan imprint on the Caribbean over the centuries was so profound that some surnames are still recognized brands today, as is the case of the rum makers Facundo Bacardí and Andreu Brugal, both from Sitges, or the Havana cigar producer Jaume Partagàs, from Arenys de Mar. But these names do not end the list of Catalan entrepreneurs who left their mark, because the case of Josep Gener Batet, born in L'Arboç del Penedès and son of a boatman who supplied his products to alcohol exporters to America, is also very relevant.

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