Jon Lee Anderson

Yeah, I mean, you were talking about the Marielbo lift, and then I lived there in Havana in 92 to 95 at the time of the Balceros crisis, the Rafters crisis, which happened in 94 and about 50 to 60,000 Cubans left.

And at the time, it was it was two years into the what they called the special period, which was right after the Soviet Union collapsed and all the aid that had kept the island afloat for 30 years abruptly ended.

And, you know, tractors became oxen.

Cars went to bicycles.

People got skinny.

It was a bad time.

This is.

in some ways, much worse, because I say in some ways, because in those days, Cubans couldn't leave.

You had to I even I had to ask permission to leave the island.

And things things were made.

The idea of Cubans traveling abroad or working abroad were eased up under Raul Castro 10 or so years ago.

But

In the years since then, although Cubans could in theory come and go, the economy and the expectations of a future have completely plummeted.

And so in the wake of the opening between Raul Castro and Barack Obama in 2015 to 16, just before Fidel died,

There was this amazing moment when it looked like the barriers between the two countries were coming down.

Americans could visit the island.

Cubans could visit America.

It was all hunky dory.

And then it closed up again and it closed up.

This is a complicated set of reasons why it closed up partly Trump, but also partly the conservatives on the island.