This past weekend, I traveled to Cuba with the Nuestra América Convoy alongside a delegation of Cuban Americans to deliver aid and stand in solidarity with our fellow Cubans as a US-driven fuel blockade pushes the island deeper into crisis.
We brought critical medical supplies to Hospital Hermanos Ameijeiras, one of Cuba’s most important hospitals, where doctors and nurses continue to perform miracles with dwindling resources. We delivered food directly to families in Parque Maceo, where shortages have made even basic necessities difficult to secure. And we partnered with Cuban LGBTQ organizers to distribute aid.
These moments of connection and care are what stay with you. But so does the reality that makes them necessary.
During our trip, we experienced the island plunged into darkness following a collapse of the power grid. Our friends and families were left without light, without refrigeration, without any reprieve from the heat. The silence that followed was striking. It forced a confrontation with the scale of the crisis that no statistic or headline can fully capture.
This is what scarcity looks like, in its lived form.
It is easy, from the outside, to reduce Cuba’s situation to politics as usual — to flatten it into a debate about ideology or governance. But on the ground, the picture is far more human and far more complex. We spoke with Cubans of all political perspectives. Many were candid, even critical, about their government. Those conversations were nuanced and often deeply personal.
But there was also a shared throughline: a fierce commitment to sovereignty and independence. Regardless of political differences, there was a broad understanding that the current crisis is caused in large part by external pressure imposed by the United States. Cubans want the ability to determine their own future, without being strangled in the process.
That perspective is often missing from conversations in the United States.
As Cuban Americans, we occupy a…
Auteur: Danny Valdes
