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A Cuban resident in Uruguay participated in a spontaneous exchange at a store in Maldonado, which ended up becoming a widely shared video on social media. This occurred when he responded with his own experiences to a customer who attributed all of Cuba's problems to the United States embargo.
The episode was narrated by content creator Eddy Reflexiona in a video posted on June 28 on his YouTube channel. By the end of this week, the recording had garnered nearly 4,000 views and over 400 positive reactions.
According to his explanation, the conversation arose while he was buying cheese to prepare a pizza. In the store, he heard a Uruguayan customer speaking with a Cuban worker about the difficulties faced by athletes from the island. When the man stated that all of the country's problems were a consequence of the American embargo, Eddy decided to interject.
"With all due respect, please excuse me for interrupting the conversation, but I am Cuban and I want to share what I experienced," he recalled having said before recounting his experience.
His main argument was that the greatest restrictions he faced in Cuba did not come from the United States, but from the policies of the Cuban state itself.
"The only blockade that has ever existed in Cuba has always been the one imposed by the Castro dictatorship and the Communist Party against the Cuban people," he stated.
Medicines, hotels, and internal restrictions
To support his position, Eddy cited several personal experiences he lived through before emigrating to Uruguay seven years ago.
He recalled the difficulties in accessing medications, noting that while in Uruguay he was able to obtain treatment through the healthcare system or purchase it freely at pharmacies, in Cuba many times those drugs were not available to the population.
He also stated that there were pharmacies designated for foreigners where certain medications could indeed be found, but to which Cuban citizens did not have access, even if they had foreign currency sent by relatives from abroad.
Another example mentioned was the prohibition that for years prevented Cubans from staying in numerous hotels designated for international tourism, a policy that the government officially abolished in 2008.
The content creator also stated that while traveling from Santiago de Cuba to Havana, he was stopped by the police due to the internal migration restrictions in place at that time, and he recalled that interacting with foreign tourists could lead to penalties.
As an example of the challenges faced even by high-performance athletes, he mentioned the former Santiago baseball player Norge Luis Vera, stating that he had seen him traveling by bicycle to his training sessions despite representing Cuba in international competitions.
A conversation without confrontation
According to Eddy, the exchange took place in a respectful manner and concluded without incidents. He later decided to share the experience on YouTube to highlight, from his perspective, aspects of everyday life in Cuba that he believes are not well known outside the island.
"Cuba is governed by a dictatorship that restricts the average Cuban. That is the real blockade that exists," he summarized in the video.
Upon concluding his reflection, he emphasized that being able to freely express his opinions in Uruguay represents a fundamental difference compared to the reality he claims to have experienced in Cuba.
"I say it again, this simple thing I am doing here, expressing my opinion and talking with you, we cannot do it in Cuba," he noted.
A growing Cuban community
Eddy's testimony occurs in the context of the increase in Cuban emigration to Uruguay, a country that has established itself in recent years as one of the main destinations for those leaving the island.
Her message is also part of other interventions from Cubans living abroad who have publicly questioned the official narrative about the causes of the Cuban crisis. Among them, the influencer Anna Bensi stands out, who in March of this year published a viral video in which she stated that "the only real blockade in Cuba is yours against the stomach of the people."
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