The apple on the head
By Varela
Many years ago, Carlos Varela wrote a song in Cuba in which he asked that the story of William Tell be inverted. In other words, instead of placing the apple on his son’s head and shooting an arrow at it, it was time for William Tell to put the apple on his own head so his son could shoot the arrow.
The Miami press vibrated with emotion. Women wept. The old folks removed their glasses and dried them. We now had a contentious singer on the island. The people talked about the bravery of that young man who put his cards on the table, singing analogies and parodies with a double meaning in the middle of a dictatorship.
The singer came to Miami to perform in 1998, but didn’t seek asylum like everybody expected. He even talked about dialogue, cultural exchanges, understanding between both shores. And what about William Tell? “He’s fine, thanks, but that was another time.”
Right away, the singer became an enemy of the exile community. Possibly a Castro agent. His protest songs had been the bait he used to hook us. “What a bastard that Carlos Varela is!” they said. And, naturally, people staged an act of repudiation at the place where he sang.
Years went by and the government of Bush the not so smart one denied him a visa to come sing in Miami again in 2004. That was predictable (the visa denial, not the singer’s desire to sing here.)
“That’s a good decision by Bush; a good ban,” they said then.
But Carlos Varela shows up again in the U.S. capital and makes some awful statements, at least the way they’re described by a very combative website. I quote some excerpts here but you can read the whole thing here:
http://www.conexioncubana.net/index.php?st=content&sk=view&id=8322&sitd=364
The Castro-Cuban regime sends him here with his own script because Silvio Rodríguez and Amaury Pérez are much too stale, discredited by the historic and dog-like devotion they have demonstrated.
This character, C.V., should be stoned for creating an aura of protester for himself before they clipped his wings. It’s nauseating and scary that characters like him sell themselves so irremissibly when Cuba is on the threshold of a new life.
What does Carlos Varela know? What papers have they shown to him? What deal did he make so he could compromise his image in the style of Silvio and Amaury? A few checks and anonymity for the day when the structure collapses?
Carlos Varela, you won’t escape us. We’ll put you on trial for your alliance with the Castro-Cuban Holocaust. Varela said that the United States should understand that the Cuban people don’t understand how Luis Posada Carriles can be allowed to walk freely on the streets of Miami.
“The Cubans don’t understand that,” he said. “Posada is responsible for the downing of a Cubana de Aviación passenger airliner on Oct. 6, 1976, and deserves to be in prison. […] Almost all Cubans know someone who has lost a loved one because of the terrorism aimed at Cuba,” he added.
Varela also referred to “the Five Heroes who are unjustly imprisoned in the United States for defending Cuba from terrorism. They have been given unjust and long sentences. Both them and their loved ones, mothers and wives, are suffering unjustly,” he said.
“It is important that people in the U.S. understand that the case of Posada Carriles and the case of The Five is a fundamental issue for the people of Cuba, not only for the government of Cuba.”
That was exactly five months ago, in the midst of the Obama administration, at the Center for Democracy in the Americas and the American University’s Council for Latin America. He spoke in the Grand Hall of the United Methodist Church, across the street from that prestigious think tank in Washington.
So now, Carlos Varela arrives in Miami on his way to Los Angeles (though on the 14th he will return here to sing on the 15th) and at the airport he is impatiently awaited by the Miami press, with table, chair and microphone, to see if he is bold enough to talk in favor of “the five damned spies, deservedly imprisoned, and against our Posada Carriles, who strolls through our streets.”
But Carlos surprises everyone, stating the same he did in ’98, i.e., speaking in favor of cultural exchanges, calling for a halt to the hatred on both shores, and saying he’s against the repudiation rallies both in Havana and in Miami. I don’t quote exact words because the Miami press has done it by every means available. Carlos even has kind words for the Ladies in White and Fariñas the hunger striker.
He’s a hero once again. He’s no longer controversial and nobody wants to put him on trial for any “Holocaust.” He’s as contentious as ever; it’s just that we didn’t understand him well enough!
This is called the business game. If you’re an artist and want to fill a theater, you’ve got to make the statements that hopefully will fill the hall, not empty it. With those statements, Carlos is assured that his show will be SOLD OUT and that it will attract the local luminaries.
Including William Tell and his son. And the apple on the head.
Born in Cuba in 1955, José Varela was an editorial cartoonist in Miami for 15 years, with the magazine Éxito (1991-1997) and El Nuevo Herald (1993-2006). A publicist and television writer, he is a member of the Progreso Weekly/Semanal team.
