There are two Cubas. On the Island are revolutionaries crusading to construct a Cuba that combats any attempt to subjugate her spirit to the US hegemony. On the (main)land are the modernists who look toward the United States as the guide and hope for revitalizing a Post-Castro Cuba. Consequently, the Cuban community is divided into two antagonistic camps: Resident Cubans living under Castro's Marxist regime, and Exilic Cubans living under a global capitalist system. Due to these political and economic differences, we Cubans are a people divided against ourselves.
This division creates a unique space in how we read the Bible differently than the rest of Latin America or other U.S. Hispanic groups. Theologians operating from a liberationalist perspective focus on Exodus as a source of hope for their existential situation. The story of a God who hears the cries of the oppressed and personally leads them toward liberation is a powerful motif. However, Exodus is not the rubric from which we Exilic Cubans read the scriptures. It is the second exodus, narrating the Babylonian Captivity, that resonates within our very being. Like the Psalmist of 137 we sit by the streams of this country, singing about our inability to sing God's songs.
• BESIDE THE MIAMI RIVER WE SAT AND WEPT AT THE MEMORY OF LA HABANA LEAVING OUR CONGA DRUMS BY THE PALM TREES.
In la sagüesera (Southwest Miami), on Calle Ocho (Eighth Street), is a restaurant called Versailles, dubbed El palacio de los Espejos (The mirrored palace). What makes this restaurant unique are the mirrored walls. Sitting at the table in the crowded salon, I constantly see myself reflected on one of many heavily-gilded mirrors. As we Exilic Cubans look in the mirrors surrounding us, we are in fact searching for our ontological origin. Not so much what we are, but what we see ourselves as being.
Versailles serves as a vivid illustration to Lacan's theory of the Mirror Stage. Lacan, the postmodern psychoanalyst, maintains that while I look at myself in the mirror, I assume that what I see is a reflection of a self ─ a secondary reflection faithful (more or less) to the likeness of an existing original self. Lacan would propose the opposite, that the image in the mirror is what constructs the self. My encounter with the mirror literally reverses the direction, and serves the function of forming my "I." Lacan's theory describes the fact that the delusive reflection of the Cuban in the mirror constructs an Exilic Cuban 'self' captivated by the belief in the projected 'imaginary', where both future and past are grounded within an illusion. In short, the ideal formed in the mirror situates the agency of the 'ego' in fiction, while projecting the formation of the 'self' into history (94-95).
My Cuban eyes see in the mirror the anticipated maturation of the power I desire to possess and read into my history the illusion of a "golden Exile." This is why it is so important to wear all the jewelry I possess, not so much to be seen by others but so that I can see. Our striving for power creates a history where we tell ourselves that before we Cubans came to this place, "Miami era un campo con luces (Miami was a village with fancy lights)." We, who possess the power to transform a lazy vacation city into the center of U.S. trade with Latin America, see within ourselves a superior quality when compared to other ethnic groups who have not transcended the barrio or ghetto. But as Lacan would ask, which is the illusion, the self or the reflection? To see myself as an Exilic Cuban through the mirror's 'imaginary' imposes an oppressive gaze upon other Cubans who do not look like me, such as those who came through Mariel in 1980, or those who stayed on the Island. They become my Other, categorized by their class and skin pigmentation.
How I see my Other defines my existential self. My subjective "I" exists when I tell the "I" who I am not. The subject "I" is defined by contrasting it with the objects "Marielito" or "Resident Cuban." In socially constructing "I" out of the differences with the "them," there exist established power relations which give meaning to those differences. Specifically, when I look in the mirror, I do not see a "Marielito" or "Resident Cuban," who are seen as black, criminal, homosexual and scum. By projecting my "I" into Marielitos and Resident Cubans, I am able to define myself as a white macho who is civilized and successful. As long as I continue to reconstruct myself in the mirror, any type of reconciliation between the two Cubas is futile.
Looking in the mirror, I reread history as one who escaped the tyranny of communism. Batista's departure from Cuba on New Year's Eve 1959 triggered panic as party goers rushed to their houses to collect their sleeping children, moneys, and anything of value. Those who were able to leave arrived in this country still in their tuxedos and dress uniforms, their wives in formal gowns and high heels. These first refugees arrived with "class" ─ not so much in the elegance of their attire, but in their high economic social stratum. Unlike other contemporary examples of refugees, both the Babylonian-bound Jews and the U.S.-bound Cubans belonged to the privileged upper social class. These Exilic Cubans, like their Jewish counterparts were not necessarily numerous. Yet, they represented the top echelons of their country's governmental and business community, facilitating our reestablishment in a foreign land.
The surreal scene at the Miami airport of well-dressed refugees was caused by the same forces that brought about the Babylonian exile. In both cases, the hegemonic northern power was responsible for the circumstances that lead to refugee status. Both Cuba and Judea were vassals of a more powerful Northern neighbor. Their strategic importance, Judah as a buffer zone between the powers of the north and south, and Cuba as a key to the entire hemisphere, made them desirable prizes. While Judah's exile was triggered by the physical invasion of Babylon, Cuba's revolution was a backlash to the U.S. hegemony. The economic restructure of Cuba by the U.S. created presocialized refugees along U.S. paradigms. An Anglocized elite that formed linkage with upper-class groups in the U.S. and Latin America was created to protect U.S. interests. Transition to Exilic existence was eased by the newly created space this group occupied.
This first wave (1959-1962) brought 215,000 refugees to these shores. Demographically, these new Cuban refugees were quite homogeneous. The vast majority composed an elite of former notables who were mostly white (94%), middle aged (about 34 years old), and educated (about 14 years of schooling). Not wanting to minimize the trauma and hardship of being a refugee, we who settled in Miami held an advantage denied other immigrating groups by entering a social environment made familiar through years of prior travel and business dealings. South Florida was seen as a pleasant vacation hub from which to await Castro's immediate downfall. The second wave (1962-1973) brought 414,000 refugees who were predominately white, educated, middle class and willing to work below minimum wages. Our hatred toward communism facilitated our usefulness as a Cold War propaganda tool to the U.S. dominant culture. A "golden exile" was constructed to contrast Castro's Cuba.
Pierre Bourdieu's concept of the habitus illuminates why Exilic Cubans ascended the socio-economic institutions of Miami. Being born into a position of privilege in Cuba, our socially constructed lifestyle facilitated our rise to the echelons of Miami's power structures. We merely had to assert what we were in order to become what we are--an effort done with the unself-consciouness that marks our so-called 'nature'. But what happens when the refugees are not from former positions of privilege? The third wave (Mariel Boat lift, 1980) brought 125,000 who, unlike the elite first wave, or the middle class second wave, resembled the population's masses. Approximately 70% were single males and 40% were black. Seen as scum, they become the scapegoat for all that is bad with the Exilic Cuban character. Marielitos became our Other.
• "SING," THEY SAID, "SOME MAMBO." HOW CAN WE SING OUR RUMBA IN A PAGAN LAND. MI HABANA, IF I FORGET YOU MAY MY RIGHT HAND WITHER.
Every Exilic Cuban has heard Celia Cruz sing the popular tear-jerker "Cuando salí de Cuba (When I left Cuba)." No other song best summarizes the pain of our existential location. "Never can I die, my heart is not here. Over there it is waiting for me, it is waiting for me to return there. When I left Cuba, I left my life, I left my love. When I left Cuba, I left my heart buried there." This popular Cuban ballad, written by a Chilean, illustrates the denial of accepting the reality of being, living, and most likely dying on foreign soil.
Lourdes Casal writes that "Exile is living where no house holds the memories of our childhood" (qtd. by Rivera-Valdés 226). Both the Exilic Jews and Cubans were forced to deal with this incompressible pain. Judaism was constructed in Babylon through the pain of questioning the sovereignty of a God who would tear God's people from their homes and plant them in a foreign land. Likewise, we Exilic Cubans subconsciously reconstructed ourselves in Lacan's mirror. We internalize and naturalize our image in Lacan's mirror so that we can begin to shape outside structures, always masking our drive toward mastering them. This reconstruction took the form of la Cuba de ayer. La Cuba de ayer on U.S. soil created a Cuban territory with its distinct cultural milieu and idiosyncrasies that served to protect us from the pain of initial economic and psychological difficulties caused by our uprooting. Cuba became more than just the old country, it was the mythological world of our origins. An ethereal place where every conceivable item es mejor (is better): from the food, to the skies, to pests. Everything aquí (here) when contrasted with allá (there) is found lacking. Unlike the predominate stereotypes of other immigrant groups who left painful memories of the old country behind, joyfully anticipating what they perceived was a new country where the streets were paved with gold, we Cubans did not want to come to what we perceived to be an inferior culture. Like the Babylon Jews, we rejoiced every time someone says "Let us go to our house" (Psalm 122). Attempting to avoid our pain, we construct a mythical Cuba where every guajiro/a (country bumpkin) had class and wealth, where no racism existed, and where Eden was preserved until the serpent (Fidel) beguiled Eve (the weakest elements of society: blacks, poor, etc.) and brought an end to paradise.
Is it any wonder that when Exilic Cubans read Psalm 137 we are stirred to the very being of our soul? We fully comprehend the tragic pain of sitting by the rivers of an alien land unable to sing to a God the Psalter secretly holds responsible. The hope of returning to one's land becomes a foundational building block of being an Exilic Cuban, yet with the passing of each year, the cemeteries of Miami increase with headstones engraved with Cuban surnames. Rather then proclaiming, "next year in Jerusalem" we tell each other, "this year Castro will fall," as though this one person is the only thing that prevents us from "going home." In reality, the hope of returning home has been replaced with a private desire to adapt and capitalize on our presence in this country.
Jeremiah writes a letter to the Exilic Jews to forget about their hope for a speedy return. He tells them "to build houses, settle down, plant gardens and eat what they produce; . . . [they are to] work for the good of the country to which exiled . . . praying on its behalf, since on its welfare [they] depend" (29:5-9). Like the Exilic Jews, Cubans suffered no unusual physical hardship; on the contrary, life in Exile opened up opportunities that never existed in the homeland. Similarly, Cubans entered trade and grew rich, with some, like Nehemiah, ascending the political structures to hold a profound power over those who did not go into Exile. The United States is where Exilic Cubans placed their hope. Yet while Jerusalem was falling, Jeremiah bought a plot of land (32:9-11). His message juxtaposes God's judgement with deliverance. The true hope for Jerusalem did not lay in Babylon, rather, it was rooted in the homeland. Yet while we are looking toward Cuba to define our present reality in this country, we are also looking toward the U.S. to define the future of Cuba.
For example, in 1973 Exilic Cubans attempted to rectify the separation with the homeland by building a shrine on U.S. soil for La Virgen de Caridad to serve as both a political and sacred space. This sacred ground contains the image of a nation while living in a foreign land. Standing in the shrine, one can simultaneously occupy space in both la Cuba de ayer and the Miami of today. The presence of Cuba's patron in Miami indicates that she too came from Cuba as an exile in the same way that the Divine left the rightful habitation of the "defiled" Jerusalem to reappear before the exiled Ezekiel.
The building of the shrine to our patron saint, along with the construction of "little Havana" contributes to a self-deception that avoids realization of our physical location and the 'uprootedness' transforming our individual reality. For this reason, the message of Jeremiah is as relevant to us Exilic Cubans as it was to the Babylonian Jews. His task, according to Walter Brueggemann, was to articulate God's sovereignty as hope for those preferring the self-deception and denial of losing one's land, way of life and known world (12, 18).
• YAHWEH, REMEMBER WHAT THE COMMUNISTS DID . . . A BLESSING ON HIM WHO TAKES AND DASHES THEIR BABIES AGAINST THE ROCK!
The psalmist prayed that the enemy's babies be dashed against the rocks. The pain of Exile can lead to revenge toward those perceived to be responsible for one's expatriation. Mimicking the psalmists, U.S. Congressman Diaz-Balart, who is an Exilic Cuban, called for a post-Castro Cuba with a "numerically larger army than it has today" to launch a campaign of retribution against anyone who participated in "collaborationism with tyranny." Ten years in prison will not be enough for those who are guilty. The congressman called for the abduction of foreign investors presently doing business with Cuba, having them brought to the Island, and punished (Kiger 57).
Hatred is not limited to one side of the Florida Straits. While the Resident community calls you a gusano (worm) for leaving the Island, the Exilic community calls you a traitor for attempting to reconcile. Each Cuba sees itself in the mirror as the true remnant. Resident Cubans see themselves as the true Cubans just as King Zedekiah's nobles who remained in Judah saw themselves as true Jews (Ez 11:14; 33:24). Similarly Exilic Cubans see themselves in their mirror as God's "good basket of figs" as opposed to the "bad basket of figs" which Jeremiah (24) uses to represent King Zedekiah and all those who remain behind. Resident Cubans are seen as pseudo-Cubans in need of being educated in the ways of capitalism and democracy.
Before we attempt to paternally educate Resident Cubans, we of the exile must first recover from our amnesia. Jeremiah strives to overcome the Babylonian Jews' attempt to displace blame for their proscription. He explains that their condemnation is due to "no one doing justice." Our own sins, and the sins of those to whom we were vassals, are the cause of our exile. Our reconstruction of the Cuba de ayer ignores the reality that La Habana was in a U.S. constructed exotic space where the repressed libidinous appetites of the Anglos could be fulfilled. The commercialization of vice afforded North Americans the opportunity to experience life outside of their accustomed moral space. La Habana of 1958 was a U.S. brothel with Mafia controlled casinos, holding the infamous distinction of being the sex and abortion capital of the Western Hemisphere. As a playground for North America, Cuba developed an unequal distribution of wealth and violated basic human rights to maintain the status quo. They built their house through the oppression of people (Jer 22:13-17). No communal covenant based on justice and compassion existed between the elite and the masses. By continuing to scapegoat the communist, we deflect attention from our own responsibility.
Maintaining la Cuba de ayer insures the death of our perceived enemies today and creates the Cuba of tomorrow--a Post-Castro Cuba based on horizontal oppression, Resident Cubans subjected to Exilic Cubans. The continuous support of the embargo by Exilic Cubans denies Resident Cubans basic medical supplies, and causes death among the sick, elderly, and infants. In a sanitary way, we are dashing the 'enemies' babies against rocks when we deny, for example, insulin to those babies born diabetic. Ironically, the Exilic Cuban has no desire to physically return to the Island, for any type of return would mean a tremendous economic sacrifice. Like the Exilic Jews, we have become well-to-do, and unmotivated toward any possible rush back to the homeland (Bright 362-363). The hardships required in nation building do not out-weigh the luxuries of living in Miami.
While our two Cubas struggle with each other, the U.S. is positioning itself to reimpose its hegemony. In the same way that the Persian court created a postexilic community to secure its national interests, the U.S. has promised to "rebuild" Cuba, ensuring that any post-Castro government sacrifices its sovereignty. Such a future would create a hierarchical community dominated by those dedicated to the economic concerns of U.S. business people. To achieve their goals, the U.S. created a government in exile known as the Cuban-American National Foundation (CANF), recently headed by Jorge Mas Canosa, presidential hopeful of a post-Castro government. CANF was started in 1981 when fifty white Exilic-Cuban businessmen paid ten thousand dollars to purchase a seat on the Board of Directors. Elgarresta, working for Richard Allen, then national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan, created an Exilic Cuban political action committee to funnel monies to U.S. candidates in order to effect mainstream U.S. politics.
CANF has written a constitution for a Post-Castro Cuba complete with legal codes, and a sector-by-sector economic analysis. In the early '90s, CANF created the Blue Ribbon Commission for the Economic Reconstruction of Cuba. The commission envisions a libertarian Cuba where all of the nation's infrastructures would be run and operated by the private sectors. Upon Castro's downfall, Mas Canosa plans to send to the Island "a ship of hope," full of investors, stockbrokers, and bankers (Slevin A-10). Obviously, the impoverished Resident Cubans lack the necessary capital to refurbish and head power plants, airports, railroads, or utility companies. This task will fall into the hands of foreign corporations. By August 1990, the University of Miami's Research Institute for Cuban Studies began to collect data to produce a Registry of Expropriated Properties in Cuba. The purpose of these land registers is to compensate previous Exilic owners for the loss of their property and assets. Yet what will happen to those presently occupying these properties?
From within the Exilic Jewish community, a prophet arose who became a subversive yet redemptive voice. While we do not know his name, his work is found in the latter chapters of Isaiah. Appealing to the community's old memories he plots a new trajectory to discern reality, a realty that conflicts with the self deception of the exiles. Isaiah's vision is inclusive (49:6; 56: 1-8; 66: 18-21), calling the Exilic community to become "a light to the nations, that [God's] salvation may reach to the end of the earth." The focus is on a God who acts on the side of those who are oppressed and afflicted, as opposed to the partisan politics rampant in the postexilic Jewish community. Rejecting this prophetic voice, Exilic Cubans are aggressively taking the opposite role--that of the Zadokite priestly party. The inclusiveness of Isaiah's community is rife with accusations of being "communist dupes or agents" if one varies from the rigid anti-Castro rhetoric advocated by CANF. Hanson points out that the Zadokite 1) moved away from Isaiah's (60:21; 61:6) egalitarian call for a nation of priests by firmly holding power in their own hand, 2) replaced Isaiah's (Is 56:3-7) mission to the nations with a pragmatic parochial strategy of domestic consolidation, and 3) compromised the sovereignty of God with that of the Persian emperor, even to the point of proclaiming that God elected a pagan, Cyrus, to be His messiah, His anointed (255). Thus the Zadokite hierarchy struggled over against those who embraced the restoration of Isaiah's egalitarian visions. The failure to create Isaiah's vision can be traced to the Persian Court's self-serving support of the Zadokites. The construction of a postexilic Judah was possible because it contributed to Persia's international goal of creating a buffer between them and their enemies, the Egyptians. As such, Judah's existence depended on Persia's good will (Ezra 7:11-18). The nation was rebuilt at the price of being a vassal (583 to 332 B.C.E.) to its more powerful northern neighbor.
Ezra (7:25-26), with legal and financial support by Persia, was sent to create this buffer zone where the inhabitants strictly obeyed the "laws of [their] God and the law of the [Persian] king." Like Ezra, a demand is being made to Resident Cubans to "put away your foreign wives." However, some of those 'wives' may be worth keeping (such as high literacy rates, 100% social security system, high doctor per patient ratio, low infant mortality, and long life expectancy). Ignoring Isaiah's egalitarian call, the postexilic community soon found itself weakened by economic abuses. Exilic Jews profited from the economic misfortunes of the Resident Jews, while concealing their prowess in piety (Isa 58: 1-12; 59: 1-8). The Resident poor found themselves enslaved as they lost their lands to the returning Exile (Ne 5:1-5), and were cheated from wages by those from the Exilic who set up new business (Mal 3:5). This domination will repeat itself. The planned post-Castro community will lead to the subjugation of Resident Cubans to Exilic Cubans who in turn will be subjugated to the U.S. hegemony. The options presently available to Exilic Cubans are similar to those faced by the Babylonian Exilic Jews. We can follow the example of Ezra by forcing Resident Cubans to "put away their foreign wives," and establishing a vassal political system that enriches the Exilic community to the determent of the Resident community. Or, we can follow Isaiah's egalitarian vision which attempts to construct a reconciled just community. This paper advocates the latter.
Bright, John. A History of Israel, 3rd ed. Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1959.
Lacan, Jacques. Êcrits. Paris: Seuil, 1966.
Prohías, Rafael J. and Lourdes Casal. The Cuban Minority in the U.S.: Preliminary Report on Need Identification and Program Evaluation Final Report for Fiscal Year 1973. Vol I. New York: Arno, 1980.
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