In the summer of 2014, my colleague Carlos Manuel Álvarez invited me to step out onto the balcony of our newsroom. As the wind whipped around us, we leaned on the railing and gazed out at the sea, engaging in conversation to pass the time since neither of us had access to a computer. At OnCuba, the magazine we worked for in Havana, only the editors were afforded their own devices; the rest of us had to share, often resulting in long waits. A group of my university friends and I had managed to secure contributing roles at OnCuba, which allowed us to remain connected in the newsroom, fostering our camaraderie.
During evenings filled with beer, we fantasized about orchestrating a takeover of the newsroom. We envisioned displacing Hugo Cancio, the publisher, and transforming his resources—a spacious office complete with multiple rooms and a balcony overlooking the sea, as well as computers, internet access, and financial backing—into the kind of media outlet we dreamed of creating. We aspired to establish a publication that bore our unique mark.
Our primary goal would be to focus on investigative journalism. We decided to forgo breaking news in favor of in-depth reporting that involved digging, analyzing, reconstructing, and revealing stories. We believed that storytelling would serve as both our foundation and our signature approach. We often remarked that shallow reporting was futile, lamenting how our nation’s history was fading due to a lack of narratives.
From this initial goal, a secondary mandate naturally arose: we would produce feature articles. We avidly consumed and critiqued every piece from prominent Latin American magazines such as Malpensante, Gatopardo, Etiqueta Negra, SoHo, and Anfibia. We were convinced that thorough long-form journalism, blending reporting, essays, and critique, could unravel the complexities of modern Cuban life.
However, each night, our aspirations would dissipate as reality loomed upon us. To fulfill the social service requirement post-graduation, Carla Colomé found herself at the state theatre magazine, Tablas; Jorge Carrasco worked at the website for Radio Reloj, which broadcasts the time; Maykel González Vivero was at Granma, the Communist party’s primary newspaper, now online; Carlos Manuel Álvarez was at the Ministry of Culture’s communications office; while I was stationed at the Ministry of the Interior.
While OnCuba provided us a platform to express our views, changes within the magazine rendered us increasingly irrelevant. Our critiques of Cuban reality began to clash with the publisher’s desire to maintain a Havana office. Disagreements surfaced with our editors. I was tasked with covering sports, but one day I was informed that my focus should solely be on Cuban teams and athletes, excluding any international coverage.
When I questioned this directive, I was told, “We want to concentrate on the players who are still here. They’re the ones who matter.” The reasoning felt heavily influenced by governmental pressure, prompting me to resign from the magazine.
My departure from OnCuba came shortly after my balcony conversation with Carlos Manuel. He had just returned from Colombia, where he attended a journalism workshop at the Fundación Gabo. This was his first experience outside Cuba. I had accompanied him to the airport for his early morning flight, along with another friend who drove us in his father’s car.
Upon his return, Carlos Manuel brought back a new perspective. At the Fundación Gabo, he learned that there is no ideal time or place to be a journalist. He absorbed insights from writers across Latin America who worked under similarly challenging conditions, all motivated by the desire to safeguard the truth within their nations. The tumultuous landscape of the region was giving rise to a new wave of independent media. Outlets such as Brazil’s Agência Pública, Venezuela’s Efecto Cocuyo, and Mexico’s Periodistas de a Pie were pioneering innovative reporting methods that rejected detached journalism. They critically engaged with power, holding it accountable and addressing significant issues head-on, abandoning the misconception that journalism must remain objective. They aimed to protect human rights, and we felt inspired to pursue the same path.
In Cuba, the absence of a free press left the country’s history and memory vulnerable to governmental control. Being a journalist there often felt like existing in a state of denial. I constantly pondered one thought: if someone were to reconstruct early 21st-century Cuba from existing press archives, they would uncover a narrative of a non-existent country. Our mission became clear: we needed to restore an authentic representation of reality.
The widespread introduction of the internet provided a glimmer of hope. Without this transformative event, our aspirations may not have materialized. In 2015, the government installed Wi-Fi hotspots in 35 public locations, allowing Cubans unprecedented access to the internet for the first time, albeit at a steep cost of $2 for an hour. This made it possible for people to connect online outside of hotels, which were prohibitively expensive, or job centers.
According to Cuba’s constitution, the Communist Party holds regulatory power over all forms of media, including radio, television, and print, and prohibits journalism outside of its control. Launching an independent magazine would effectively mean initiating conflict with the government.
We faced significant challenges: no office, no funding, and no personal internet connection. Our understanding of what it meant to start a publication was still unclear. Nevertheless, we possessed energy and resolve, which we deemed essential. If we lacked a physical office, we decided that the 35 public squares with Wi-Fi would serve as our workspaces. If we were without financial backing, we would labor for free until we could secure support from sponsors outside Cuba. We resolved to undertake this endeavor because we believed in the importance of the stories waiting to be told. All we had to do was venture out, gather these narratives, and share them effectively.
The question remained: what stories would we choose to tell…
