The Sharp Edge of Change

<p style="text-align: justify;">HAVANA, Feb 11, 2011 (IPS) - Tougher entrance exams for higher education, to be applied in the next academic year in Cuba, are worrying families who see getting into university as a major achievement for their children."These young people have been raised with the idea that it is important to go to university," Sandra Álvarez, the mother of 18-year-old Lisandra Carbó who wants to study medicine, told IPS.In Álvarez's view, pre-university students "have not been prepared (for the more rigorous entrance exams) and lack the basic skills." Read More

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Olá! Nominated B.C. musician Alex Cuba heads to the Grammys

<p style="text-align: justify;">Postmedia News. Olá! Nominated B.C. musician Alex Cuba heads to the Grammys. By Adrian Chamberlain, Postmedia News February 11, 2011 12:14 PM Photograph by: Adrian Lam, Postmedia News. Not long ago, Alex Cuba and his band were walking along historic Canal Street, the famous thoroughfare bordering the French Quarter in New Orleans. Read More

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A cook from Camagüey goes to Paris!

<p style="text-align: justify;">2011.02.10 - 14:42:51 / radiorebelde.A cook from Camagüey goes to Paris! Camagüey, Cuba. - Francisco Rodriguez is the only Cuban and Latin American that made it to the finals of the International Competition Gourmand World Cookbook Awards. He is the chef of Gran Club Santa Lucia Hotel, located in the tourist resort of Camagüey northern coast,&nbsp; Frank, as everybody calls this native of Camagüey, presented his project “Useful cooking” to compete against almost 8 000 participants from all continents. The winners from each country will compete in the finals for the title of best cookbook of the world. "The Best in the World" Prize will be delivered next March in Paris.&nbsp; Read More

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Omar Sosa joins Barbary Coast for world jazz performance

<p style="text-align: justify;">The Dartmouth Staff. Renowned jazz pianist and composer Omar Sosa will join the Barbary Coast Jazz Ensemble in Spaulding Auditorium on Saturday for the group’s 33rd annual Winter Carnival concert, “Global Jazz: Coast Goes Latin.” Read More

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A quiet corner of Hemingway's Cuba

<p style="text-align: justify;">SEAN McNEELY. CAYO GUILLERMO, CUBA— Special to The Globe and Mail. It was easy to see why Hemingway had been hooked.As my feet sank in the soft sand, and the warm, clear water splashed over my feet, I stared across the Atlantic Ocean and understood why Papa chose Cuba's northern cays to cast his fishing lines. Walking along Playa Pilar, I could also easily accept the argument that this was Cuba's most beautiful beach.Returning to my beach chair carefully placed under a weathered thatch shelter, I wondered what Hemingway thought when he first saw this stretch of land. Read More

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Mobiles in Cuba

<p style="text-align: justify;">Cuba owns a recently updated digital phone network encompassing the whole country, in spite of the fact that the number of fixed or mobile lines are still low, the truth is it is possible to settle a communication from any tourist destination or city with any other place of the island or abroad. At the end of the year 2010, the country reached 1,007.000 wireless lines under a process of new subscriptions with a vertiginous growth. Read More

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Forbidden Cuba now open to students

<p style="text-align: justify;">Lehigh students, along with college students across the country, are now able to visit the one island previously off limits to Americans - the once forbidden Cuba is now an option for study abroad.On Jan. 14, the Obama administration lifted the restrictions on college study abroad programs to Cuba. In 2004, President George W. Bush put limits on college students traveling to the island, but now new programs will be created, and old programs can be restored for interested students. Read More

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Havana's Chinatown

<p style="text-align: justify;">February 6, 2011 Havana PL. Havana's Chinatown has a long history behind it. It is part of the life of the capital, in the same way that migration and culture of the Asian country have qualified the Cuban idiosyncrasy and enriched their crossbreeding.The first Chinese settled in Havana in 1858, were Chang Leng, a small inn, and Siu Lam Yi with fruit and vegetable stand in the current Ditch Causeway. Some former coolies, through their own efforts, had learned various crafts to the public service. Read More

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Fiesta del tambor (Havana Drum Festival) celebrates a decade

<p style="text-align: justify;">The Drum Festival celebrates a decade as the empirical percussionists meeting point. The event will be held on March 8-13 in Havana, organized by the Cuban Institute of Music and the Ignacio Piñeiro Music Promotion Center.Percussionist Giraldo Piloto, President of the Organizing Committee, detailed Cubasi the summoning of the International Percussion Competition Guillermo Barreto in Memoriam and other specifics of the event. Read More

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Cuba likely to get influx of American tourists

<p style="text-align: justify;">San Francisco Chronicle February 4, 2011 04:00 AM. The announcement by the Obama administration last month that it will reinstate policies of the Clinton administration to permit travel to Cuba for religious or educational reasons reminded me of two trips to Cuba that I made during the time of the Clinton administration.I went there under an exemption permitting travel to Cuba by journalists. I traveled there legally, in other words, possessing papers from the Treasury Department confirming my right to do so. I flew to Kingston, Jamaica, and there boarded a short Air Jamaica flight to Havana. Read More

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