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By Gary Marx. Tribune foreign correspondent. April 27,
2003. Published in
Futuro de Cuba.
The first time I met Manuel David Orrio was at a reception last fall at the
home of the top U.S. diplomat in Havana.
I had just begun my assignment as the Tribune's Havana correspondent at a
time when the 40-year standoff between the U.S. and Cuba appeared to be
softening.
Strolling the mansion's expansive, Victorian-like gardens were diplomats,
American journalists and some of Cuba's best-known dissidents, a small group of
individuals who in recent years had been given space to oppose Cuba's one-party
state.
And there was Orrio, a short, slight man who walked with a severe limp
because of childhood polio. We spoke briefly about his work as an independent
journalist writing articles for a U.S.-funded Web site. We talked about getting
together again.
But I got tied up with other stories. Months passed. I forgot about Orrio
until several weeks ago, when the Cuban government began arresting dozens of
opposition figures and independent journalists in the most severe crackdown in a
decade.
Now I can't get Orrio out of my mind.
As the crackdown intensified, I began searching for an independent
journalist whom I could profile. A U.S. diplomat and a well-known Cuban
dissident both suggested I contact Orrio. I tracked him down. We spoke for three
hours.
He told me what it was like fighting a dictatorship, living in fear of being
arrested at any moment. He talked of being ostracized by his community, of being
denounced on state-run television by President Fidel Castro himself. I wrote
about all this in a story that appeared in the Tribune on March 24.
The story was a lie. I didn't know it at the time. I learned about it 12
days later while on assignment in Colombia. Orrio was actually an agent for the
Cuban government --an exquisite con artist who had convinced dozens of people
that he was bravely fighting for change in Cuba.
No one knew this until he stood in a Cuban courtroom April 4 and denounced
several of his former colleagues as paid agents of the U.S. plotting to destroy
Castro's revolution.
Based in part on Orrio's testimony, Raul Rivero, a renowned Cuban poet and
writer, was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Another writer tried at the same
time also was given 20 years.
I can't imagine how the betrayal felt to them. To me it was a kick in the
gut. It flattened me, took my breath away, made me question everything I had
seen, everyone I knew and everything I had written about Cuba.
Shocking new awareness
My experience with Orrio has become an exclamation mark, a brick wall, that
defines my first nine months in this baffling country, a place where nothing is
as it seems and the truth --I hate to even use that word-- is buried under so
many layers of fear and distrust that a reporter needs a jackhammer to even
scratch the surface.
It didn't always seem that way. Like the swarms of tourists that pass in
front of my office every day, I initially questioned how severe the limits were
on daily life. From the gorgeous colonial buildings to the crystalline sea, I
knew that Cuba tolerated no dissent and considered the United States its mortal
enemy.
But I listened and watched the anti-American tirades on the state-run media
with more curiosity than concern, as if they were some sort of charade that no
one paid much attention to but everyone had to partake in.
I knew that my office and telephones were bugged, maybe even my car, my home
and my bedroom. But so what? It felt more like a game than real espionage. I
didn't feel very threatened when I pointed to the ceiling of my office to let
visitors know that someone was probably recording our conversation. I had
nothing to hide.
I also wondered about the extent of the repression as I wandered through
that reception at the U.S. mansion last fall eating hors d'oeuvres and
exchanging business cards with all those dissidents. Not long after, scores of
giddy American businessmen were shoving key chains and other keepsakes into
Castro's hand as he toured the first U.S. agricultural trade fair held in
Havana.
As Castro bottle-fed a fuzzy baby bison, munched on french fries and penned
millions of dollars in new contracts, U.S. business executives and Cuban
officials were boldly declaring that a new era had begun between the two
nations, that maybe these enemies could do business.
But there were hints that all was not as it appeared.
"How long have you been here?" was often the first question asked
of me in my first months. My enthusiastic response would be met with a long
pause and a knowing smile. Nothing else had to be said. I was duly warned.
But of what?
"The lies," one woman said. "Everyone here lies. They lie
straight to your face."
Not long after, I spoke to a student who said she didn't trust anyone and
said that I shouldn't either.
"Everybody wears a mask," the student said.
New perceptions
I started to notice more. I could see the mask.
Cubans commonly used hushed tones and sign language to communicate anything
other than the mundane. But it surprised me when I saw how mistrust infected
families.
There was the chat with a cabdriver on his day off whose voice slipped into
a barely audible whisper when he cursed the government. He said nothing would
change until "you know who is gone," stroking an imaginary beard to
indicate he meant Castro.
I didn't understand why he stopped speaking until I saw his wife flash him a
stony look of disapproval.
And there was the retiree from a state-run company who said simply, "People
don't talk openly because they are afraid to go to prison. And you never know
when the government will crack down."
I remember that conversation clearly. But I also remember not quite
believing him.
Now I do.
Much has changed in the days since Orrio revealed his true identity. More
than 75 people, some of whom I chatted with at the reception last fall, have
been given lengthy prison sentences. Three men have been executed by firing
squad 10 days after hijacking a ferry in a failed attempt to reach the United
States.
Spy's tears of joy
Orrio has appeared numerous times on state-run television, crying tears of
joy and saying he was profoundly moved to have fulfilled his revolutionary duty
by squashing the opposition.
The opening in Cuba is over. Everyone is watching their back.
I often speak in whispers now and obscure my real views even at home,
knowing that someone else may be listening. I obsess about things I have said
and people I have interviewed, wondering who they really were and whether they
were wearing that mask.
The challenge now is to find my bearings in the post-Orrio Cuba. I'm here to
write about this country, talk to its people, listen to their stories and
chronicle the events of daily life beyond just the political battle between the
U.S. and Cuba.
I have to put aside my own feelings of mistrust and betrayal. I have to
somehow forget about Manuel David Orrio. | 
