The Cuban writer and humorist Enrique del Risco, Enrisco, launched on June 7 a petition signed by artists, intellectuals, and journalists from Cuba opposed to the repression of university students on the Island who protested following the ETECSA rate hike.
No without effort, the author of "Our Hunger in Havana: Memories of the Special Period of 90s Cuba" has managed to bring together names from the Cuban cultural scene (as well as Latin American) that rarely meet, either physically or virtually. He has gone beyond "the usual suspects," and his list features a diversity that seldom gathers.
In an interview granted this Monday to CiberCuba, the comedian from the "Plegaria a San Zumbado" explained that this challenge to the disunity of the Cuban intellectuals in exile or emigrants has been put forward so that the students who have raised their voices in the faculties of the Island "know that they are not alone." And not only that, but also to make them aware that their protests are supported by those who, at the time, did not act, although the writer acknowledges that "we all wanted to do it at some point."
Enrisco is not one to get involved in complicated situations, which is why even he doesn't know why he decided to organize a petition drive. He is starting with his own contacts and sometimes has to deal with the negative responses of those who want nothing to do with the initiative he has launched on change.org titled "No to the repression against Cuban university students". Conversely, there are those who absolutely want to be on the list, but the platform does not allow full visibility of all names.
"The idea isn’t even mine. Someone told me, 'Look, Enrique, I think you should do this.' I’m involved in another project, and it’s a bit heavy. It’s very burdensome to be writing to people; some even respond negatively, in an unpleasant way. Though this time, not much has happened, to be honest," he commented in a one-and-a-half-hour interview, during which he also recounted his odyssey in exile, from when he left Cuba in 1995, arrived in Spain, didn’t manage to obtain political asylum, and two years later succeeded in moving to the United States. He has been living in New Jersey for thirty years and works in New York as a teacher.
"We did this, on one hand, so that students in Cuba feel supported, so they know their demands are not falling on deaf ears, that they are not alone. But also so that the exile community, people who are outside Cuba, whether exiled or not, Cuban or not, feel that this cause is also theirs and should indeed be theirs."
In his conversation with CiberCuba, Enrisco reflected on what the 1970s were like for him on the Island, a time he remembers as "North Korean." He criticized the intellectuals serving totalitarianism, who "say what they want to say, in language tolerated" by the regime. He spoke about how much he values freedom because "being free is priceless" and, of course, about the significance of humor for someone like him who dedicated himself to writing texts for theater to be performed by comedians like Osvaldo Doimeadiós. "For me, humor is the richest part of life."
Currently, Enrisco is preparing a trip to Madrid, scheduled for July 11, to present an anthology of texts about the impact of Perestroika on the Cuban intellectual scene of the late 1980s. He has also been working on a book about the writer Cirilo Villaverde, who, like Enrisco, was also exiled in New York. Enrisco explains that Villaverde crossed paths with Martí, although their relationship does not seem to have been smooth; hence, Martí only referenced the author of "Cecilia Valdés or the Hill of the Angel" in an obituary.
"I write to explain my life and life in general," he said to this platform, resigned to the fact that he is an intellectual who goes "against the flow."
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