In Cuba not all pigeons are the same: some have statues, others end in the pot

Havana/The packed and in the peak an olive branch, this is the sculpture of a dove that this week was located in the anti -imperialist gallery of Havana. The statue, placed on a huge Cuban concrete flag, shines under the sun of July a few meters from the Malecon wall. The sweetened representation of the AVE contrasts, however, with the treatment that this same animal receives in other parts of the city, where hunger has returned to many residents of the capital to a past of hunters-gatherers.

Also near the sea, but this time in the vicinity of Havana Bay, this Friday a man caught pigeons that later, still alive and fluttering, were introduced into a sack. “What do you look at? This is to eat,” Soreez replied the impromptu trapro to a woman who questioned the dreadful show. Attracted by the promise of some bread crumb, the birds approached the tree where the predator was hidden who, using a tyrapye, did not discriminate against size or species. Also the rabiches, smaller and thin, who made the mistake of approaching too much, ended up beaten and put in the stash.

The two vignettes, one in front of the United States embassy and the other surrounding the port, could not be more confronted. On the one hand, political propaganda, full of retouched symbols and with a bucolic tone away from Cuban reality. On the other, a relentless hunt where one kills and others die to serve as relief to the roar that comes out of the stomach. If the bronze dove is motionless in an empty square, which had already been put in the sack by agile hands, they continued kicking and moving their wings to try to escape their ordeal.

When the new touch -ups of the anti -imperialist tribune are completed, there will surely be some political act led by thick neck officials and bulky abdomenes. The idea that this bird that they have immortalized in a sculpture could also end in their dishes would not even happen. They cannot understand the hunter-gatherer who expects stealthy between the branches of a tree. They can choose what to eat and send others to look for their food. They have reached a higher level after imposing themselves through the selection, nothing natural, of the monopoly of a match.