Four Women

By Alicia Roca
Researcher: Nichole Griswold

photo by Mimi Chakarova Every month Cubans are entitled to food rations. The elderly, pregnant women and children under the age of eight also receive two liters of milk a month.

It's six. Rosa fumbles with the light switch, roosters crow somewhere in the darkness. She pulls a chair by its back and climbs on it. She jiggles the light bulb; a little to the left, then to the right. At last, it hums, flickers and emits a dim orange glow.

"Hay que inventar." You have to invent, she says with a slight smile.

It is a phrase often used in Manzanillo, a parched, sweltering city of about 100,000 in Cuba's poorest province, Granma.

"No es facil." It's not easy.

Rosa explains that since the collapse of the Soviet Union a decade ago, everything is in short supply, particularly light bulbs. Those available cost $4, one-third the average Cuban's monthly salary. For Rosa, a 78 year-old widow who does not receive money from Miami relatives, light bulbs are a luxury. So are toilet paper (for which she substitutes newspaper), toothpaste, deodorant, and shampoo.

The first thing Rosa does every morning is clean. She wraps a damp cotton rag around a wooden stick and drags it across the concrete floor. Her back is hunched causing her spine to protrude. Her thin arms sweep slowly back and forth.

"I can't live in a dirty house. My husband always wanted a clean house."

But chores weren't always a priority. In 1956, Manzanillo was alive with revolution. Late that year the Granma, a boat carrying Fidel Castro and 82 men from Mexico landed 60 miles from Manzanillo. Waiting for them was Celia Sanchez, the daughter of a provincial doctor, and the woman who organized the underground network, based in Manzanillo, that would support them for the next two years. For months, Sanchez moved from house to house depending on the residents on Manzanillo to evade Fulgencio Batista's men. In exchange for the promise of a better future, the locals fed, housed and shielded her from government inquiries. With their support, Sanchez funneled guns, supplies, soldiers, nurses and even reporters such as Herbert Matthews of The New York Times to rebels in the nearby Sierras. Rosa remembers when Sanchez stayed in a house across the street from her. And she remembers the other women who became models for the modern Cuban woman.

Haydee Santamaria and Melba Hernandez were nurses in the attack on the Moncada barracks in nearby Santiago. The Mariana Grajales, an all-woman platoon, fought alongside men. Violeta Casel was the first female announcer on Radio Rebelde. Some, including Lidia Doce and Clodomira Acosta, Manzanilleras and mountain messengers, became martyrs after being tortured to death by Batista's men. The Giralt sisters, members of the underground, were gunned down at their apartment. Countless others, now forgotten, exploited stereotypes of women as naïve and incompetent when working as gunrunners or smuggling subversive pamphlets beneath their skirts.

"My mother always told me a woman has to look her best."

Manzanillo was their base and if peasants here suffered most during Batista's reign, they gained most in the early years of the revolution. The province was renamed for the boat, the Granma, that landed in 1956. A hospital that bears Celia Sanchez's name went up, schools opened and doctors arrived, but 45 years later, the revolution and its gains seem like ancient history. Manzanilleras are at the bottom of Cuba's reemerging dollar-based social strata. Gone are the fervent guerilla warriors and in their place are everyday women with everyday struggles. Like making a lightbulb come to life.

After Rosa cleans, she starts breakfast. The process takes an hour although she is making coffee and toasting bread. She drips liquid fuel into a spoon. Her hand shakes. She tips the fluid into a small bowl. She turns the iron burner on and places the bowl beneath it. She lights a match. Nothing.

"Le hechan mucha agua al combustible." The fuel is too watered down.

She smiles and tries again. It takes her fifteen minutes. The smell of gas is thick, making it difficult to breathe in the cramped kitchen, but Rosa won't open a window. She's afraid. A year ago a young boy broke in and stole Rosa's towels and iron.

"They weren't even towels. They were more like rags."

She still doesn't have any towels, and her only iron must be heated over an open flame. She irons her clothes every morning.

"My mother always told me a woman has to look her best."

Since the burglary, Rosa stays locked indoors. She always isolated herself, neighbors say, but now she only leaves to buy food and see doctors.

This is Rosa's litany: people had morals then. Today, the young don't want to work. They look for easy ways to make money. They are sexually promiscuous. They are struggling because they do not try to better their lives.

When she was young, life was different. This is Rosa's litany: people had morals then. Today, the young don't want to work. They look for easy ways to make money. They are sexually promiscuous. They are struggling because they do not try to better their lives.

Before the revolution, poverty and illiteracy were rampant in the countryside. Over half the population couldn't read. Women turned to prostitution to survive. Today there are other options, Rosa says. Education is available to everyone. How far they go with school depends on how hard they are willing to work.

Rosa lugs water in pails from metal barrels so she can bathe. The task is difficult for Rosa who suffers from arthritis, cataracts, and weighs eighty pounds. As she flips the bathroom light switch, cockroaches scatter. They are the size of small rodents, with wings.

Today the milk arrives and Rosa is happy. She loves milk. She would drink it three times a day if she could.

Every month Rosa and other Cubans are entitled to four rolls of bread, one pound of salt, four cans of fish, five pounds of rice, six pounds of sugar, ten ounces of beans, one pound of coffee and ten eggs. All this food can be purchased for about four pesos, or twenty cents and it adds up to 298 calories a day.

The elderly, pregnant women, and children under age seven also receive two liters of milk a month. But complications arise. Sometimes not all items are available; people tend to run out of food toward the end of the month. Additional food must be bought at higher prices, so the poor, like Rosa, stretch their rations by having one meal a day instead of three.

After bathing, Rosa finishes the coffee. She dips a teaspoon into a jar filled with sugar and swarming with ants. She pours the milk through a strainer and splits the curd between her dog and cat. The dog takes the cat's share. The cat meows and scratches Rosa's leg.

Rosa mixes the milk, coffee and sugar with a small metal spoon.

"A morning without coffee is like a dark, dark night," she says.

There is a knock at the door. She cocks her head.

"Voy." I'm on my way, Rosa yells.

She hooks a chain on the door, opens it a crack and peers out with one eye. In a sliver of light, a boy, about five-years-old, holds a golden peso in his hand. He reaches into the darkness and lays the coin in her palm.

"Who are these for?" asks Rosa.

"For my Mom."

"How many does she want?"

"Two," he says

"I'm poor. I don't have much, but everything I have is yours."

Rosa takes a clay bowl from her cabinet, drops the coin in it, and removes change. She slides a tattered brown box across the table, pulls its lid off and lifts out two cigarettes. She gives the boy the cigarettes, the change, and shuts the door.

All Cubans over the age of forty-four are entitled to two boxes of cigarettes. They pay four pesos per box. Like Rosa, many sell their cigarettes to buy other goods.

Rosa puts the money bowl on the cabinet shelf and dribbles oil into a pan without a handle. She rotates the pan with pliers. She places her breakfast, a white roll, in the pan and browns it.

She opens the cabinet and cradles a beige, intricately crocheted tablecloth. When her husband was alive, Rosa spent much of her time crocheting. Though she was college-educated, he forbade her to work or leave the house without him. They never had children. Prior to marrying him and prior to the revolution, Rosa worked as a tutor for wealthy children.

Rosa unfolds the tablecloth, shakes it and drapes it over the kitchen table.

"I'm poor. I don't have much, but everything I have is yours."

When her husband, Juan, was alive, life was better. She never wanted for anything. She calls those the happy days and divides her life into two periods- when Juan was alive and now. Juan died ten years ago, at the same time the island lost Soviet aid.

Relatives try to persuade Rosa to move to Habana or Santiago where conditions are better, but she won't. She won't even visit. There are too many memories in her house.

As she sets out to buy milk, Rosa stands before the bedroom mirror and brushes back strands of hair with her fingers. Missing clumps reveal pink skin several shades lighter than her caramel complexion. Rosa wraps a scarf around her head to hide it.

She flicks the window locks. She jams a chair up against the back door and locks the front door.

"Quedate aqui. Cuida la casa." Stay here and guard the house. Sandito, the dog, barks and wags his tail.

She slams the door shut and greets a neighbor.

"How are you?" he asks.

"En la luchita." In the little struggle, she says with a smile.

photo by Mimi Chakarova

As Rosa wakes, Felicia arrives at school.

Her class doesn't start until seven but the bus comes at 5:30 a.m. It's too far to walk and the horses-drawn carriages, the primary mode of transportation in Manzanillo, aren't out that early. Sometimes Jorge, Felicia's husband, takes her to school on the back of his bicycle, but Felicia prefers he stay home and attend to her son, Jose. Children stop receiving milk at seven and Jose is nearly eight. It is a struggle to find breakfast for him. Yesterday all he had was a piece of bread with cooking oil on it.

"But there are people in worse situations. Most of the kids in my class come to school on an empty stomach. How can they think with an empty stomach?" asks Felicia.

A few days ago Felicia gave one of her students a peso for a haircut.

"Some of these parents just don't care."

Felicia lives near the ocean in a neighborhood called El Malecon. Her school is in the hills, in one of Manzanillo's poorest barrios.

Felicia waits in the teacher's lounge for school to begin. She is a secondary school English teacher. Secondary school includes seventh through ninth grade. Schooling through ninth grade is mandatory. After that, children with the best grades go to the pre-university level where there are general schools and scientific schools. Others go to military schools, art schools and technical or trade schools. Few of Felicia's students will go on to the pre-university level. Masters and doctorates are available by invitation only.

At seven, students file into the classroom. The other teacher is absent, so Felicia has eighty students instead of forty. She turns on a small color television. It is time for tele-class, a new one-hour live broadcast from Habana. The government developed it five months ago in response to the teacher shortage. The same tele-class is shown to seventh, eighth and ninth graders.

The rowdy children settle down when the television teacher begins speaking. He greets them. His name flashes on the screen. For the next hour he speaks in English. He asks the children to repeat after him, to respond in English, to copy sentences. But they don't understand any of it and talk among themselves instead. Felicia paces the aisle shushing the children, warning them to listen. Several students walk in late. All the seats are taken so they sit on the floor or stand. Some can't see the television.

"I didn't know you lived so far from school," Felicia says to one latecomer.

A bell rings signaling the end of class. The children jump out of their chairs. They had no chance to ask questions, nor did Felicia have a chance to teach. Prior to tele-classes Felicia wrote lesson plans, led discussions, and assigned homework. Now she maintains order. Some suggest taping tele-classes enabling teachers to pause them for questions, but there aren't enough videotapes.

Most people go home for lunch, but she lives too far away. "Six years without lunch. I am so hungry," she says.

At 8 a.m. Felicia walks to the teacher's lounge and waits. She only teaches one class today, but stays in case she is needed. She is paid 300 pesos a month, roughly $15.

At noon she strolls around the corner to buy a snack. She stops at a small concrete house with children in front. One little girl has a Barbie Doll. The others chase after her.

"Dejame ver la muneca." Let me see the doll, says a thin, curly-haired girl in a red T-shirt.

A sign on the door lists today's specials: Pru, a root drink, Fritura, a fried corn patty, and pizza. She settles on the pizza and a sugary pink drink similar to Kool-Aid. The pizza costs two pesos. It is a small thick bread with tomato sauce and crumbled cheese. In three bites it's gone. Most people go home for lunch, but she lives too far away.

"Six years without lunch. I am so hungry," she says.

It will be another six hours before Felicia eats dinner. Her breakfast of coffee didn't stop the hunger pangs, nor did the tiny pizza. But she would rather she go hungry than her son or husband. She often goes without to provide for them. One time she went a year and half without shoes. Today, she nearly forgets it's her birthday.

"I'm celebrating by cooking and cleaning," she says when she remembers she's now 33.

Eight years before Felicia's birth, women revolutionaries founded The Federation of Cuban Women (FMC). The goal was to eradicate machismo and create a more equal society. They fought for eighteen weeks of paid maternity leave, free contraception, pre-natal care, abortions, and a national daycare system for working mothers. But equality is still a distant goal. Women, especially Manzanilleras, bear a disproportionate burden.

Felicia prefers not to discuss politics.

"My politics are my son and my husband, my family."

While her father is not in her life, Felicia has a close bond with her mother, who raised her.

Today, she nearly forgets it's her birthday. "I'm celebrating by cooking and cleaning," she says when she remembers she's now 33.

It is time for an assembly. The teachers in the lounge trudge to the schoolyard. A doctor stands at a podium yelling because there is no microphone. She's hard to hear and the children talk among themselves. It is nearly one hundred degrees and there isn't a breeze. The sun is merciless.

"Escuchen. Es importante." Listen, it is important, says the doctor.

The doctor alerts the children to the dangers of viral meningitis. She describes the appearance of the mosquito that carries it, and symptoms. Fumigations are occurring across the countryside, she tells the children. Only a few people have as yet contracted the illness, but it hasn't been seen in Cuba for decades, and health officials fear an epidemic. They suspect a mosquito carried it across the Atlantic on a cargo ship from Africa.

"Can we count on your help?"

"Yes," the children shout back.

Felicia leads the children upstairs then returns to the teachers' lounge. She makes small talk to pass the time. She opens a worn brown book and points at a United States map. She smiles.

"Where is Michigan?" She has a friend in Michigan. It would be nice to visit, she says.

At five Felicia heads home. It's a fifteen minute walk downhill to the horse and carriage stop. She hails the first one.

"Hay lugar, cochero?" Any room, she asks.

But all are full. Another fifteen minutes pass. At last, one with room. The cochero stops and Felicia climbs on.

"This is a Cuban taxi," she says with a smile.

She points at a passing horse and carriage.

photo by Mimi Chakarova Cuban women struggle to make ends meet.

"Would you believe me if I told you that man was once the best history teacher in Manzanillo? He quit and now makes more money as a cochero."

Has Felicia ever contemplated quitting her job? Perhaps for a more lucrative one in the tourist sector?

"No, I love my kids," she says. "I'm a teacher."

Her best friend Angel works at a tourist resort nearly three-hundred miles away in Cienfuegos. He has friends from abroad who visit and leave generous tips when they check out. When Angel visits he will hide a five or ten dollar bill somewhere in her house. Sometimes she'll find one in a pair of pants or under a dish. It's her only access to dollars.

"He knows I won't accept it if he hands it to me. We're all struggling and he can't afford charity anymore than I can. But by the time I find it, he's already gone."

After a twenty minute ride Felicia pays the cochero one peso and begins the long walk home. When she arrives, Kevin, the dog, is whimpering. He's tied up and hungry. If she were to untie him, he would run outside and be stolen. She puts leftover rice and beans in a tin plate. Kevin wags his tail and devours the food.

Felicia's mother and Jose are waiting too. Jose's elated face is smeared with dirt. She hugs him and tells him to clean up. She prepares a bucket of water and finds a bar of soap.

While Jose washes in the backyard, she carries a bucket of water to the outhouse and pours it into the toilet to flush it.

She changes into shorts and a tank top and walks to the kitchen. She points to the kitchen ceiling. There are several lose bricks.

"Watch out. They could part your skull."

The kitchen is filled with chicken wire, bags of concrete and scraps of wood.

It was Jorge who rode his bike up into the mountains in search of firewood when there was no combustible liquid to light the burners. It was Jorge who found platano trees when there was no food.

Jorge is planning to fix the house. They bought it for a good price because there are holes in the walls and ceiling. Mother, father and child share a small room with a bed, a crib, and an armoire. Jose sleeps in the crib. They cannot afford a bed for him. Even if they could, there's no room for one.

Felicia is proud they have a home of their own.

"We own this, we don't rent," she says.

Felicia's first marriage was to Salo, a man she met in college. They were happy for a while, but after Jose was born, he began to change. He became distant and withdrawn. He dropped out of school. Then he disappeared only to resurface in jail. He had built a raft and attempted to reach the Dominican Republic. Instead, he washed up on Cuba's southern shore. He spent four years in jail for attempting to leave.

"He said 'If even a dove, an animal, migrates in search of better conditions, shouldn't we humans?" After that she divorced him. She was hurt that he had not discussed his decision with her. She was even more hurt that he would abandon their son. It was then that she began dating Jorge, a childhood sweetheart.

"If it weren't for him, Jose and I would have starved during the Special Period," says Felicia, referring to the early 1990s when food was even scarcer.

It was Jorge who rode his bike up into the mountains in search of firewood when there was no combustible liquid to light the burners. It was Jorge who found platano trees when there was no food.

"You ate whatever you could because you never knew when you'd have your next meal."

Felicia makes dinner. She pours rice onto a piece of cloth. She sits at the table to clean the rice.

She lifts the tablecloth to reveal a table made of wood scraps. Rusted nails jut from it.

"Jorge made it."

She continues picking out bugs, rocks, dirt and discolored grains of rice.

It takes fifteen minutes before she pours the rice in a bowl, lugs water in from out back, and washes the grains. Next, she cleans the beans and lights the burners.

Jose runs clutching a piece of pink paper. He prances around the kitchen, waving it in the air.

"Look what I found today, Mami. Colored paper!"

Ana starts work at seven. Her job is a forty-minute walk from her home. Her boyfriend usually takes her on the back of his bicycle, but not this morning.

Today reminded her of the days when prepared breakfast for the two older children, sent them to school and then went to work with her youngest child in her arms. That was thirty years ago when her husband left her for another woman. She was twenty-four then and raised her children without any assistance.

Single mothers are more common nowadays. Between 1973 and 1988, 39 percent of all Cuban children were born to single mothers, by 1989, 61 percent.

"No era facil. But we survived."

Ana and another cook are in the kitchen. It's a small room without windows. No one else is allowed in because years ago, someone put crushed glass in the children's food.

For the past three decades Ana has been a cook at the Circulo Infantile, a government-run day care center. The program provides low-cost daycare for working mothers at 20 to 70 pesos a month depending on the parent's salary and the number of children in the family. Initially, the program was free but it became too expensive for the government.

The children are between 6 months and 6 years-old. They begin arriving at 6 a.m. and are picked up by 7 p.m. Ana's responsible for preparing their morning snack and lunch. At 9 a.m. children have milk or orange juice, if available. Today the children had a yogurt drink and bread.

Ana would like to retire, but she needs the money. In Cuba, women can retire at 55, men at 60.

Ana and another cook are in the kitchen. It's a small room without windows. No one else is allowed in because years ago, someone put crushed glass in the children's food.

"Te imaginas?" Can you imagine? asks Ana.

photo by Mimi Chakarova

Outside, the children are divided into groups. All the workers are women. Each one has a group of ten to fifteen children. They sing songs and play with the children. One woman, about Ana's age, is in charge of the 3-year-olds. She sings a song about rabbits. A boy cries as his father leaves. Two others fight over a red flower. A little girl pulls a little boy by the ear and he screams. There aren't enough chairs to accommodate latecomers.

"I'm so tired," says the teacher.

She holds up laminated pictures glued on popsicle sticks.

"What's this," she asks.

"A lion," says the crying boy.

"Yes, a lion. And where does the Lion live?" she asks

"In the zoo."

Across the yard, 6-year-old boys sit at tables, drawing on scraps of notebook paper. A pencil breaks and the caretaker sharpens it with a knife. As the boys draw, the girls play at life-size stations made of cardboard. There is a factory, a kitchen, a beauty salon, a hospital, and cars. A group of girls plays in the kitchen. One cooks while the others sit at a table. The cook serves equal portions to each girl.

"Eat all your food. It's rice, beans and chicken," she says.

When Ana gets home at 3 p.m. she makes dinner immediately so she can have the evening to herself. Her boyfriend comes home at four. Tonight Ana is visiting a friend, Oda. Oda moved to Habana six months ago. This is her first time back. Oda is homesick and unhappy about the move. She wants to return to Manzanillo because her family is here. In Habana she is isolated, depressed, and losing weight. A robust Manzanillera is considered beautiful. When her friends call her "flaca", thin, it is not a compliment. They say it with concern. They pinch the pink spandex of her dress to show how loosely it fits her.

"Tienes que comer, Oda." You have to eat, says her worried sister.

Ana carries a Batido de Trigo, a wheat smoothie to Oda.

Though Oda loves her husband, she is considering leaving him to come back. Like many women in Manzanillo, her family is her priority. She feels uprooted in Habana, though conditions are better.

"Have faith in God. It will pass," says Ana.

She is a devout Baptist as is Oda.

"Ponte de rodilla y ruegale al Señor." Get on your knees and beg the Lord for strength.

"It isn't easy," replies Oda.

A robust Manzanillera is considered beautiful. When her friends call her "flaca", thin, it is not a compliment. They say it with concern. They pinch the pink spandex of her dress to show how loosely it fits her.

Oda's sister, Flora needs advice too. For the twenty years of their marriage Flora tolerated her husband's affairs. He was recently arrested and Flora went to visit him. Another woman was there.

"Votalo ya." Dump him, advises Ana.

"There's a point where you have to say 'no more' and love yourself more than you love him. You can't live like this."

Ana knows about cheating men. She complains that Cuban men are mujerieros, womanizers.

"They don't want to stay with one woman," she complains.

After Ana's husband left her, she met another man. She fell in love and they were together for several years.

"But he was too good-looking." Women chased after him.

"The women here, they don't care if a man is with someone."

So Ana left him. He is a tall, handsome man with a black mustache. Even now, when they meet on the street, she hardly resists his charms.

"He wants to be with me, but who can be with a man like that?"

After that relationship Ana met another man. She was with him for eight years but he followed another woman to Habana. Later he returned, ill and disheveled. Ana nursed him to health.

"I guess I was better." Ana smiles.

They have been together five years since then. He lives with Ana.

"But it's my house. I own it." Ana's eyes sparkle. The pride in her voice rivals the tone with which she speaks of her children.

"It's not much, but it's mine."

photo by Mimi Chakarova

As Ana arrives home, Belen is cleaning. She wets a gray rag and wipes it across the counter. It's 9 p.m. and she just walked in the door. She too had a long day. She leaves for work at 7 a.m. and it's a forty-five minute walk, but she likes the time alone.

"Give me hot chocolate now," demands her 9-year-old brother.

She ignores him and pulls a strand of black hair behind her ear. She swats away flies with her hands. Her cheeks are flushed.

"Nowww" he whines.

She rolls her eyes, sighs and lifts the milk off the cupboard shelf. They have to drink it as quickly as possible. They don't have a refrigerator.

When her mother isn't home, Belen is the matriarch. As if on cue, the 5-year-old twins, run in. They are clad in underwear. Their petite facial features are perfectly chiseled, as if from marble, and their wavy black hair in a disarray. One twin is screeching, the other laughing.

"Nina me jalo el pelo," Nina pulled my hair, says one, eyes wide with astonishment.

The other continues laughing and runs out the back door.

In the living room, Belen's grandfather and his trio make music. Two of the men are middle-aged. They arrive immediately after work every day and stay for hours. Belen's seventy-year-old abuelo is the oldest and most experienced musician. He founded the trio half a century ago. Belen grew up with the sounds of his guitar, as did her mother.

The three men fill the house with traditional Cuban love songs, boleros. They sing of loves lost, unparalleled devotion and beautiful women.

"O mi amor, por siempre tu." O my love, for always it will be you, her grandfather croons.

"Are you hungry?" Belen yells. With one hand on her hip, she wipes the sweat from her forehead.

He stops singing.

"Of course I'm hungry. When's dinner going to be ready?" he asks. There is irritation in his voice.

Belen prepares the rice. Melodies arise in the background.

"They say it's women's work," she whispers.

Divorce is common. Many Cubanas have been married multiple times. Couples can divorce easily if their marriage "loses meaning" or if a spouse is "abandoned" for six months.

Belen's ex-husband, Luis, had the same idea. She thought he was romantic at first. He seemed protective, not controlling. She drew other conclusions when she found he was cheating.

"Tenia otra mujer." He had another woman, says Belen.

Belen and Luis only knew each other for a month before they were married. She was flattered that a man ten years older was interested in her; especially a good-looking man. It was a way to get out of the house, and start a life of her own. But the marriage only lasted 9 months. Why did they marry so quickly?

"Because he wanted to," she says. She doesn't want to discuss him anymore.

Divorce is common. Many Cubanas have been married multiple times. Couples can divorce easily if their marriage "loses meaning" or if a spouse is "abandoned" for six months. In addition, boys as young as 16 and girls as young as 14 can legally marry.

By 1987, more than one-third of marriages and divorces occurred among adolescents. In 1992, a majority of married couples were under thirty. Such marriages lasted on average less than two years.

Belen's ex-husband still pursues her. He loiters outside her work. He offers to walk her home. He brings her gifts. She tells him, "I don't want anything to do with you."

Just a few months have passed since their divorce, and she is eager to wed again.

"Do you want to see my wedding album? The gown is beautiful."

She is looking for a boyfriend, but prospects are slim. She doesn't have time to look for a man, and there aren't any at school. She yearns to be a mother and wishes she had children. She smiles at the thought. She would have some already if her ex-husband weren't sterile.

Her gaze shifts. An cat jumps over the fence. It is emaciated and severely burned. Most of its black fur is missing and its pink skin is covered with pus, open wounds and blisters.

"It was caught stealing."

The cat went into a house through an open window or door looking for food. Someone then threw hot water or oil on it.

"It was probably a piece of meat or fish."

When her mother isn't home, Belen is the matriarch.

Nowadays, Belen works at Manzanillo's only medical school where she is a waitress at the dormitory cafeteria. There are many extranjeros, foreigners, but tips are rare. For the past 3 years Belen has also been a student at the school of gastronomy, a trade school for restaurant and hotel workers. She's learned basic English and service skills. She's learned how to set a table and how to take an order.

When she was 14, Belen had the opportunity to go to pre-university. Her grades were high, and teachers encouraged her to pursue college. The pre-universities are located far away in the mountains where students spend half the day studying and half the day working in fields to develop respect for the land and laborers.

After several months at school Belen returned because she was homesick. Others say she missed a boyfriend. That was when she chose to attend a gastronomy trade school.

"Me gusta." I like it, she says.

Where will she be in 10 years?

She laughs.

"I don't know. I haven't thought much about the future."

She would like to work in a place with more tourists, but that is competitive. And the idea of leaving home for Habana scares her. She looks down and separates the discolored grains of rice.

"I'm not going anywhere," she says.

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