Word: havana
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Suspicions rose about who, exactly, was being allowed to depart. Rumors persisted that the Cuban Premier was releasing common criminals from jail and ordering them on the boats, partly to prove his charge that those fleeing his island are "lumpens and antisocials." Crowed Radio Havana: "The U.S. has always wanted to pick the best brains of our people. Let them also pick up the bums...
...Three-quarters of a pound of meat per person every nine days. Five pounds of rice per month. Many times we went hungry." Marveled another at the refugee center: "There are more pages of want ads in newspapers here in Miami than there are pages in all of Granma [Havana's Communist Party paper...
Others felt the real sting of political repression. Ordinary citizens are forced to play informer, Roger Arencibia, 27, a Havana dental assistant, said resentfully. "My brother-in-law was laid off from his factory and could not get another job," said Caridad Carrodeguas, a bookkeeper from Batabanó. "The factory managers want good revolutionaries. You can't complain, you can't speak out against anything openly...
Underlying all these complaints, however, was a general weariness with a way of life that has gone on demanding sacrifice with few rewards. "I just couldn't live there any more," said Aldo Montenegro, 39, a Havana cook. "They kill ambition. One has to live in misery." Concurred Lazaro Bijande, 18, a Havana student: "I was born in the revolution. They taught me that all this is good. In the end, it's all a fraud. Cuba doesn't advance...
...others put the figure at 1 million and more. As for the man who started the flood, he apparently has no intention of turning it off. "We don't want them, we don't need them," thundered Castro of the refugees at a May Day rally in Havana last week.. He claimed that he had opened Mariel to teach the U.S. a lesson for welcoming as heroes those who hijacked boats from Cuba in order to reach U.S. shores. Chortled Castro: "We really have an open road now. Let us see how they can close...