I am full.

This is just one of the symptoms of  "the Gitmo disconnect"* I've experienced this week. There were others: The sputtering plane bouncing onto the runway after skimming a lonely coast. "Cuba? I'm in Cuba?" Standing on the shore of Windmill Beach and reminding myself, "Yes,...

Everything's been going so well.

I don't get much sleep, but I get my morning coffee.

My press affairs minders are authentic, funny, and fascinating, not the party line puppets I thought they might be.

I'm one of a small number of people who have been at this important place at this important moment in...

"So, guys, what are the plans for the day?" I ask the press affairs officers who are quickly becoming my buddies. The days so far have been full: a tour of Camp X-Ray, current detention facilities, and the Northeast Gate--the dividing line between the base and "Cuba proper", and interviews with the JTF's...

The happiest woman at Guantanamo is Sam, the assistant manager of the food service division, responsible for preparing detainees' meals.

I've published a video of my interview with Sam on my own website, and I encourage you to watch it: she's not only the happiest woman at Guantanamo, she's one of the...

The most popular books in Guantanamo’s detainee library are the Harry Potter series.

Amidst Spanish language copies of Don Quixote, five or so copies of Stephen Covey’s The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, and novels like The Picture of Dorian Gray and Candide, as well as Tolstoy’s...

“What are you here to write about?” the Harvard professor and historian who’s researching what will be one of the few histories of Guantanamo asks me. We're the only two people on this media trip, and we're making small talk as we cross the water from the landing strip to the base.

“I’m...

Good times with friends

February 17th 2008

Just got back from Cuba yesterday. My hair is braided, back of legs burnt, suitcase in the hallway and new bongos sitting on the floor. 

Those bongos almost got my luggage searched at the airport.. but that's getting ahead of ourselves. 

I kept a travel...

Anyone I’ve ever known who’s gone to Cuba says that there’s something indescribable about the way you feel when you’re there. It's true, and there's not much more I can say about that; it really is beyond words.

But there's also something about the way you feel when you’re leaving...

Papa Tao crooked a finger at the waitress and barked, "Boligrafo!" He made a rough sketch--very rough--of the path to Casino Chung Wah and accompanied its production with overly complicated verbal directions. After four visits to Chung Wah--closed each time--I am finally able to speak with...

For Brayan

In my mother-in-law's version of the tale, Francisco came home the Friday before Mother's Day in 1980 and announced he was leaving: His girlfriend. His son. His mother and his sister. His country. They were the wake he left behind as The Green Girl pulled out of Mariel's harbor. His...

We hitched a ride out of Central Havana to the seaside town made famous by Ernest Hemingway to research a couple of articles I’m working on. The driver barreled up a dusty road speckled with potholes, noting, “This is the best road in town,” and dropped us off on a forlorn corner, pointing...

Every week and a half or so, I stop writing, reading, or whatever else I'm in the midst of on my to-do list and rummage around for the wax. Francisco sits in my desk chair or rests first one side of his head and then the other on my lap as I shape his dreds back into place. Once the little nubbins...

Fresh from the press:

"Castro's Resignation Letter" (English Version):

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/02/19/castro.letter/index.html

and Spanish Version:

http://www.granma.cu/espanol/2008/febrero/mar19/mensaje.html

"Castro...

It is 3 AM on October 2, and the trip that we have waited years to make together is over. We are in the Panataxi and are pulling away from the curb. Brayan calls out one last time and comes to the car, reaching through the window and grabbing Francisco in a silent hug that speaks hundreds of words. We...

It is our last night in Cuba and I am anxious for Francisco and his son to get some one-on-one time together. So far, Francisco has been consumed by the home repair projects at his mother's apartment, and there hasn't been a minute, really, for him to be alone with Brayan to talk about 27 years...

One of the reasons most people travel is to stimulate their senses--to feel, hear, smell, taste, and see something new. In each country where I've lived or traveled, I have powerful sensory associations that are connected indelibly and particularly to that place. Here are some...

In Cuba, I love the...

In Cuba, it´s good to have two pockets, especially if you´re a Cuban residing abroad who has come home to visit. At present, there are two currencies in Cuba...the convertible peso (CUC) which is the only money tourists are supposed to use, and the peso, which is the national currency and is the...

Cuba, of course, is famous for its old cars and, specificially, the ingenuity of their owners who are able to keep 50 year old Fords and Chevys on the potholed roads. It´s so famous, in fact, that a documentary, ¨Yank Tanks," has been made on the subject. Even if you´re not interested in old cars...

Andrea and I were married June 18, 2005 at a hacienda 30 minutes outside of Bogotá, Colombia. It was a colorful, traditional, festive wedding with lots of people and lots of flowers. I am not catholic, but I attended one on one catechism school prior to the wedding with an older very devout Catholic...