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| Yoani Sanchez - Cuban Dissident Blogger |
With that, Ms. Sánchez officially cemented her bond with the old guard, the city’s Cuban exiles.
"They came from all over to hear her speak. Old Cuban ladies with wrinkled faces and pristine makeup. Young students with iPhones and digital cameras. Men and women who fled Cuba decades ago and just last year, on makeshift rafts and planes.
When Cuban dissident and blogger Yoani Sanchez entered the room to speak Monday, dressed simply in white, they all stood up in applause and the politics that divide Cubans, even here in Miami, temporarily disappeared.
"In the Cuba that so many of us dream of, there is no need to clarify what type of Cuban you are," she said. "We'll be just Cubans. Cubans, period."
The crowd of several hundred stood on their feet, chanted "Freedom!" and applauded.
Sanchez, a Cuban mother and wife who turned to blogging just five years ago, has gained a following and accolades worldwide for her candid descriptions of modern life in Cuba on her blog Generation
In 2008, she was named one of the "100 Most Influential People in the World" by Time magazine. She is currently on an international tour that has taken her to three continents after being allowed to leave Cuba for the first time in nearly a decade.
She went to Brazil, where boisterous protesters backing the Cuban government called her a "mercenary" financed by the CIA and even tugged at her hair. She incited controversy when, in an ironic tone, she suggested the U.S. should let five Cuban men convicted in 2001 of attempting to infiltrate military installations in South Florida free because of all the money Cuba could save and spend on more important matters than campaigning for their release.
She has met with young Cuban-Americans born in the U.S. with dreams of a homeland they have known only in photographs and stories. And she has shaken hands with some of the most powerful politicians in Washington and the EU, while calling on the U.S. to end its longstanding embargo against the communist island.
But the most anticipated stop of her 80-day tour has been Miami, the heart of the Cuban exile community."
Note EU-Digest: to Americans and Europeans alike Yoani Sanchez is a modern day hero in defense of Democracy and Freedom of Speech, which is becoming more and more threatened by political and corporate manipulation.
Read more: MIAMI: In Miami, Cuban dissident blogger calls for unity - Florida Wires - MiamiHerald.com
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