The Cuban broadcaster and actress Laritza Camacho published this Friday on her Facebook profile a reflection articulated in intertwined metaphors about the deterioration of life in Cuba, whose most striking image sums up in a few words the paradox of nostalgia in times of crisis: "no one would miss the taste of bread if they weren't eating stone."
The text starts from a philosophical premise: "Human beings do not usually speak or think about the past when they are living a good present or sensing a bright future." From there, Camacho builds a chain of analogies to explain why Cubans long for what they have lost: not because it was perfect, but because what has come afterward is worse.
The metaphor of the collapsed building articulates the central argument. According to the presenter, demolishing an iconic structure "would not cause as much pain if the project that will occupy its space is not just a neglected lot or a tasteless little park." The image directly points to the regime's management: what was destroyed was not replaced by something better, but rather by emptiness and neglect.
The publication extends this logic to other realms. "No one would miss the intelligence of the word if they weren't subjected to nonsense, each worse than the last," writes Camacho, in a critique of the official discourse that has persisted throughout 2026. He adds, "No one in times of peace misses war," before concluding with the most personal wound: "No one would complain of loneliness if their family weren't absurdly separated, divided, like the homeland today."
That last sentence refers to a documented reality. According to the National Office of Statistics and Information (ONEI), Cuba recorded a negative external migration balance of 251,221 people in 2024. The scale of the exodus could be significantly higher according to independent estimates: the demographer Juan Carlos Albizu-Campos estimated that around 1.79 million people emigrated between 2022 and 2023, a number unprecedented in the recent history of the country.
The material background underlying his words is equally serious. According to the Food Monitor Program, 96.91% of the Cuban population lacks adequate access to food. The average official salary is around 7,000 pesos per month —equivalent to between 12 and 15 dollars— compared to the approximately 96,000 pesos that a person needs to cover their basic needs.
Additionally, extreme poverty now affects 94% of Cubans, according to a recent report from the Cuban Observatory of Human Rights (OCDH) and the Observatory of Social Rights Cuba; and the unprecedented energy crisis has left the country in total blackout eight times so far this year.
The publication this Friday is part of a sustained line of criticism that Camacho has maintained throughout the year. In July, she declared: “I am against the Cuban government because the Cuban government is against Cuba.” In August, she questioned the regime's economic policies and added: “This erratic government that we keep afloat with our disunity is the costliest product we are paying, compatriots.” At the end of that same month, she ironically remarked that Cuba is “a country free of everything that would make us a... free country”.
In September, he questioned the censorship of images depicting destroyed hospitals, shortages, and economic crisis with the phrase "the problem has never been the photo or the photographer."
The list that concludes your text this Friday says it all: "heroes, traditional recipes, customs, celebrations, idiomatic phrases, leaders, means of transportation, bookstores, shops, streets, avenues, and even paths." Everything that Cubans long for, according to Camacho, is not missed out of romanticism, but because what has taken its place is worse.
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