HAVANA, Cuba. – Lately there are a lot of crazy people in Parcelación Moderna, the suburban neighborhood in Arroyo Naranjo, south of Havanawhere I reside. They are seen ragged, half-naked, very dirty, obviously hungry, walking aimlessly through the neighborhood. They shout out in their homes for food, a piece of bread, a glass of water with sugar, or cigarettes from those waiting for the bus at the stop.
One of them, a sexagenarian, chose the pharmacy doorway to camp. There he moved with his belongings: a sack full of rags, newspapers, old shoes and plastic bottles. He ate what he got, thanks to the neighbors or by rummaging through the garbage that was scattered around the establishment. He urinated and defecated on the sidewalk, visible to everyone. A few days ago he disappeared. Maybe the police picked him up.
The unusual presence of so many orates in the neighborhood is due to the fact that they are leaving Solidaridad Latinoamericana, a former school for adolescents with behavioral problems that was converted into a shelter for “deambulants,” the euphemism used by the regime to refer to homeless people. home, mostly beggars and people with mental disorders, who in increasing numbers wander the streets and who are periodically and temporarily picked up by the authorities.
Solidaridad Latinoamericana is located near the town of Las Guásimas, about three kilometers from Parcelación Moderna, which is where you can board, at the first stop, the buses on routes P6 and P8 to Havana.
As one sheltered person explained to me, “they leave because that is a concentration camp where they are dying of hunger.” And, apparently, those in charge of the shelter do not make much effort to retain them.
From the call Special Periodthe bosses began to lose the habit of hiding crazy people, as they did on the eve of international events or when they were expecting high-ranking foreign visitors.
Certain orates from Old Havana, opportunely disguised as traditional characters – with the license of the City Historian’s Office – were turned, as “extras”, into tourist attractions.
In Havana there were always many crazy people, but not as many as we see today. And you don’t have to be a sociologist to explain the causes of the proliferation of insane people, of all ages and genders: the overwhelming daily stress of living, poor nutrition, lack of medicines…
In psychiatric hospitals, if the cases are not serious and without family members to care for them, it is very difficult to get an admission. In short, if there are no medications for them in those insane warehouses…
I know people who have had to buy the pills that their relatives admitted to Mazorra need on the informal market, because the hospital management has told them that they do not have them nor do they know when they will be available.
In my childhood there were many nice crazy people. They did not even remotely engage in the impertinence and even aggressiveness of those I now see on the sidewalks of Havana or shouting in the buses crowded with people distressed by daily problems. And if they don’t shout, they scream boleros, rancheras or evangelical songs.
Many went from alcoholism to dementia. The worst thing is that they still smell like alcohol. Alcohol, added to hunger, complicates things considerably for the orates.
In recent years, more and more insane people have been seen asking for food or money around cafeterias. Some have hatred shining in their eyes, as if we were all guilty of what is happening.
In P6 I usually see an octogenarian who lives in the Reparto Eléctrico, who, as he himself claims, fought in the Sierra Maestra and is willing to die for the “Revolution”, proclaims loudly that he is “yuma”.
It is surprising the number of crazy people who say they have earned degrees in the Sierra Maestra, Girón or Angola. Some boast of being very close to their bosses, of speaking face to face with them. When people hear them, they comment that “they were burned because of this”.
But there are more who burst into insults against the regime. Sometimes they shout truths that the sane, intimidated, do not dare to express loud and clear. And I can’t understand why what crazy subversives say can make someone laugh or irritate. Because the delirious and worn-out speech of the bosses is much more absurd and annoying. After all, in one way or another, we are all patients of the great asylum that psychopaths with communist cards turned Cuba into.
