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The majority of older people in Cuba are women

By Dixie Edith

As the majority of older people in the island are women, the number of widows is growing. This came from the study Population aging and marital status, by Raúl Hernández Castellón, an expert working at the University of Havana 's Population Study Center (CEDEM).

"The fact that the number of widows is three times higher than that of widowers poses a great challenge to the family and society", he said.

Benigna Torres Ortega, an 82-year-old housewife, lost her husband three decades ago. "I have been living alone after my granddaughters married and moved away. I often feel depressed. I was married for 30 years and have never got used to loneliness. I am not abandoned; my granddaughters come to see me once in a while", she told SEMlac.

Men were usually older than women when they married and often re-married after divorce, the study showed.

This situation is also seen in other countries, data of the Latin American and Caribbean Population Center (CELADE) showed.

Women in this region will make up 55 percent of the population over 60 years of age and 60 percent of those over 80 by 2050, a CELADE report said. Life expectancy for Latin American women is 84 years, it added.

The situation of these women would seem to be extremely sad, but it is. As they specialize in reproduction and household chores, they are better equipped than men (who spend most of their lives working out of home), Hernández stressed.

Feeling well and self-reliant, Torres has not moved to her daughter or granddaughter's house. "I have lived here for 68 years", she said.

Her first-born Rosa María Domínguez is a divorcée and pensioner. "I respect my mother's decision, but I do not agree with her", she emphasized.

"I am also alone. We can certainly live together. As she is not on the phone, I have to call her neighbors to find out how she is", Domínguez commented.

Torres' decision is in line with Hernández' reflections.

"Traditional roles have given older women an independence and self-sufficiency that men of similar age lack", he noted.

Involving seven cities of the region, a survey on health, well-being and aging in the Americas (SABE) showed that up to 65 percent of older people are living with their children.

The highest figures were seen in Mexico City , Santiago de Chile and Havana , and the lowest, in Buenos Aires , Montevideo and Bridgetown.

The survey was conducted in Cuba by the National Office of Statistics' Population and Development Study Center in 1999 and 2000. It revealed that at least one senior citizen was living with his/her family at 42 percent of visited households.

Out of 364,000 people over 60, the median age was 70 and there were 144 women every 100 men. Widows made up 33 percent of the total.

The number of men over 60 heading households moved from 80.4 percent in 1970 to 75.8 percent in 2002, while that of women moved from 30.4 percent to 48.5 percent in the same period.

There are more women than men living on their own in most countries of the area. Women do not usually re-marry after they get divorced or become widows, a CELADE expert said. As they are supported by relatives, they deal with loneliness better than men, he added.

Older people in Cuba receive aid from their children and look after their grandchildren, the survey corroborated.

"My eldest daughter was a university professor and union leader for many years. My two granddaughters lived with me until they got married", Torres recalled.

Hernández recommended conducting a detailed review of this situation, including changes in traditional roles at home.

Cutting remarks

By Dixie Edith

Insults, shouts, coarse words, disqualifying phrases and aggressive reactions are some of the acts of violence that have become fairly commonplace in the island.

Studies by local Family Guidance Centers, which are under the umbrella of the Federation of Cuban Women, have concluded that lack of affection and respect for children and older people are also expressions of psychological violence.

Cuban intellectuals, experts and media representatives have expressed concern over the spread of acts of violence, mostly in public places.

Two prime-time television shows (Diálogo Abierto/Open Dialogue and Sitio del Arte/Art Site) and a daily newspaper (Juventud Rebelde) have dealt with this issue in the last couple of months.

María Josefa Ramos, a former Spanish literature teacher at a junior high school in Arroyo Naranjo municipality (Havana), told SEMlac that she had in the last few years found it more difficult to calm down her students than make them understand the subject she taught.

"They really loved my classes and read most literary works, but I was often powerless to keep them quiet. If they felt provoked, they used vulgar phrases and insults", she added.

Laura Zulueta, an eighth-grade student in El Cerro municipality (Havana), stressed: "If you get in somebody's way unintentionally, you will probably hear some coarse expressions and end up in a fight after school".

Reynaldo González, National Literature Prize winner and editor-in-chief of La Siempreviva magazine, indicated that verbal aggression generates other forms of violence.

Speaking at the latest Congress of the National Union of Cuban Artists and Writers (UNEAC) last April, he recalled that Juan Marinello and Carlos Rafael Rodríguez, two former Cuban intellectuals he worked with, had a common concern over the accelerated loss of good manners and vocabulary and lack of respect.

These problems have been affecting other countries as well. Published in 1999, a joint report by the Spanish People's Defense Office and UNICEF indicated that half of secondary school children in this European nation had been involved in acts of violence.

"Qualifiers like idiot, son of…, abnormal and asshole had been used to refer to 30 percent of them", the document said.

The issue has reached such a magnitude that an International Congress on Impoliteness, Aggressiveness and Verbal Violence will be held next November at the University of Seville.

The event will aim to discuss, inter alia, impolite forms of communication and violence.

This concern over the decline of the Spanish language is shared by Cuban experts.

"The fact that language has become so vulgar is much more serious than pronunciation or any other problems", said Cuban linguist Luisa Campuzano. She was granted the National Latin Award in 2003.

"This shows an extremely poor use of colloquial vocabulary", she added.

González is of the view that aggressive attitudes are deeply rooted in individual and collective psyche.

Ramos is worried about the impact of such a problem on teenagers and youngsters.

"Verbal attacks do not seem to leave visible marks, but they affect self-esteem and health in the long run", she added.

Clotilde Proveyer Cervantes, a sociology professor at the University of Havana told SEMlac that there is a close relationship between social and family violence. She is a member of the National Working Group on Family Violence Prevention and Care.

"If children are subjected to violence at home, they will adopt violent attitudes when they grow", she noted.

"If the school, the media and social institutions promote violent messages and verbal aggression, children will re-produce them at home", she emphasized.

Can we expect them to react otherwise at a time when music and TV shows extol various forms of violence? Ramos wondered.

Most directors argue that the audience demands violence, stressed Julio César González, a professor at the University of Havana and general coordinator of the Iberian American Network on Masculinity.

"We should devise ways of redressing this situation and involve schools, the media and cultural institutions", Reynaldo González concluded.

Transsexuality, Juani Santos' time has come

By Dixie Edith

Sexual reassignment operations are a reality in Cuba after the passing of a relevant resolution by the Ministry of Public Health.

Juani Santos was the first female-to-male transsexual diagnosed in the island in 1972. He told SEMlac that he was looking forward to hearing the news.

Santos was born with female genitals, but soon realized he was trapped in a wrong body.

"When these operations are authorized, no matter how old I am, I will undergo surgery and ask the doctors to finish it up even if I die over the procedure", he stressed.

Signed by Public Health Minister José Ramón Balaguer earlier this month, Resolution No. 126 set forth the establishment of a comprehensive transsexual treatment center to provide complete or partial sex change treatment in the country.

It also establishes the role of the National Commission on Comprehensive Transsexual Care, which was set up by the National Sex Education Center (CENESEX) in 2005 to further the work of a multidisciplinary group that had been created in 1979.

"Operations will begin as soon as the medical team is ready", CENESEX director Mariela Castro told media representatives. "They will be performed only when transsexuals so wish", she added.

A difficult life

"I was very young when I knew I was different. I did not want to grow. I never said I wanted to become this or that, as most children do. When I was 10 or 11, I realized what was coming upon me. I sensed it beforehand", Santos (58) recalled.

"I have for over three decades worked at a gas container production plant. By just looking at a cylinder-shaped container, I can tell if it is good or not", he commented.

"My workmates no longer reject me; they are aware of my situation because I have told them. I often ask them how they would feel if they lose their penis in an accident", he indicated.

Born in Calimete, a village in Matanzas province, Juani was 21 when some friends took him to the Comandante Manuel Fajardo Hospital in Havana.

"A medical team began to treat me there. I had many tests performed. I was hospitalized for 15 days and I was later introduced to some CENESEX specialists who have been treating me ever since", he said.

"I sometimes remember how difficult my family relations were when I was young", he noted.

"My brothers and sisters would not speak to me. If they saw me, they ran away immediately. The situation got slightly better after a doctor went to our place and talked to them. I have been supported by friends rather than relatives", he noted.

Some figures

CENESEX specialists define transsexuals as individuals who, throughout their lives, wish to belong to the opposite sex.

The National Commission has since 1979 received 92 applications and confirmed the diagnosis of 27 transsexuals, two transvestites and two effeminate gays, according to Transsexuality in Cuba, a book launched by CENESEX publishing house on the International Day against Homophobia and Transphobia last month.

Out of the total number of diagnosed transsexuals, 19 are awaiting surgery and eight do not want to undergo any operation, but would like to be legally recognized as such.

Thirteen have had their names and pictures on their identity cards changed, and seven are awaiting approval by the Ministry of Justice.

There are only two female-to-male transsexuals (including Santos) and a male-to-female who has already been operated on and has been living as a woman since then.

A number of amendments to the local Family Code have been proposed seeking to recognize the same legal rights for homosexual and heterosexual couples, including gay and lesbian marriages.

A bill on gender identity is under review. "The idea is to establish that sexual reassignment is not necessary to have transsexual identity changed upon diagnosis", Castro indicated.

Trapped in a different body

"Santos is considered the first Cuban transsexual to request institutional care", according to Mariela Castro's work entitled Scientific approach to transsexuality.

By the time he came to us, he had had the uterus and breasts removed. Trying to hide them, he inflicted ulcerations upon his own body, she indicated.

"When I was young, I was always worried about the police stopping me in the street and asking me to show them my ID card. It contained a woman's name and picture", Santos told SEMlac. "It was in 1996 that I was able to change it", he added.

"Life has been easier after that. It was like a blessing. I am still worried, however. What will happen if I have a street accident and I am taken to an emergency department? The staff will not understand what is going on as they do the checkup", he remarked.

"That is why, it is my fervent desire to undergo surgery and become a man in every sense of the word", he emphasized.

"I have had just a few affairs, mostly with heterosexual, married women. I am not very handsome, but I am not as ugly as sin. I pretend not to understand some flattering comments to avoid making things uncomfortable. I will undergo surgery even if there is little chance for success", he concluded.

Alternative energy sources

By Raquel Sierra

Elsa Fonseca, a primary-school teacher in the eastern mountain range, said that solar energy has given local children the opportunity to watch television shows, that serves to complement educational programs.

On the other hand, María Mercedes Prado, a resident in Arroyo Colorado, indicated that the neighbors, who do not have electricity at home, usually go to the video room in the area to watch films and documentaries.

This alternative energy source is being developed in Cuba to supply power to isolated regions and help save electricity.

Solar energy development, however, has so far been limited to heaters for household use and photovoltaic panels.

These panels are currently supplying electricity to educational, healthcare and other social facilities in isolated communities and mountain areas.

While such experiences are not new in the island, they have mushroomed in the last couple of years under the so-called "Energy Revolution" Program. It includes replacing old energy-intensive household appliances and incandescent bulbs.

Over 94 percent of electricity is generated in the country burning oil, experts said.

Other sources

Sugar mills began to generate electric power for local consumption in the early 20th century and most factories are still using biomass for this purpose during the harvest (December-May period).

In an article on renewable energy sources in Cuba, researcher Armando Nova indicated that the idea is to generate as much electricity as possible per ton of sugarcane milled.

Bio-energy provides the best opportunities in the short-, mid- and long-term because Cuba is an agricultural country with a sugar industry producing millions of tons of by-products and wastes. "They can be used to generate power", he added.

Likewise, wind parks have been built in three regions of the country.

A wind energy project in Gibara (a city by the sea in the eastern province of Holguín) has made it possible to save 800 tons of oil in the last 100 days, a press report said last month.

Around 100 towers equipped with wind measuring instruments have been built in this region.

A Wind Map that has been developed by the Cuban Academy of Sciences shows that there are 33 areas with an estimated potential of 600 megawatts per hour.

Experts believe that wind energy and photovoltaic panels will probably meet 4.5 percent of overall power demand by 2030.

While wind energy projects are really encouraging, hydroelectric power projects have very little potential because there are not many rivers and waterfalls in the island.

Studies have concluded that renewable energy sources (including biomass, water and wind) can help save over one million tons of oil.

Homophobia and male-chauvinism

By Ilse Bulit /Foto: Carmona

While some people openly defend sexual diversity, other people look at it with caution.

This is the case of a couple whose four-year-old boy has effeminate ways of talking, walking and gesturing.

They are aware of the fact that the Cuban society is not prepared to accept such differences. They will try to obtain scientific information and find the best way of helping their son.

Most families would be turned upside down under these circumstances. They would accept a "discreet" homosexual son, but certainly not a transvestite.

There is still a long to go in promoting understanding and acceptance of non-heterosexual people. They are tolerated when they are somebody else's rather than your own children.

Although the local media are working along these lines, the traditionally heterosexual model prevails.

The couple mentioned above will probably urge the boy to have as many girlfriends as possible, kiss them all the time, use coarse words and never do girl's stuff. What does this really mean?

Homophobia is deeply rooted in people's mind. Mothers are expected to implant old gender roles, including sorting out clothes for laundry, washing dishes and arranging bedrooms, while fathers never kiss boys, tell them not to cry, and urge them to fight whenever necessary and be always in control. Domestic chores are thus sex-driven.

Mothers will be happy when young boys bring them some flowers, but they will really worry when the boys are teenagers already.

Those who are unhappy with the sexual organs they were born with will try to undergo re-assignment. Some homosexual couples still fall into the trap of tradition, and old-fashioned families distribute domestic chores depending on sex.

Homophobia has always had a tremendous bearing on children's education, but there have been some encouraging changes.

Parents no longer prevent their sons from going to ballet schools. Back in the 1960s and 70s, being a ballet dancer was synonymous with being gay. It would be worthwhile investigating such a positive development. Society has finally broken away from this taboo. It is most desirable now that it should do the same thing with gender-based roles at home.

The Women's News Service from Latin America and the Caribbean (SEMlac), International News Agency, offers this weekly service.

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