Hi reader! I am Xavier Garcia, a 28 year old that owns a cigar factory in Santiago of Cuba during the Cuban Revolution. I was a factory worker in my early years but grabbed the opportunity of the US market and started a factory. I lived through the Cuban Revolution from 1952-1959, and ended up to live in America after the revolution. Here is my journal! Please read it!

Comparing before and after the Cuban Revolution, there were both changes and continuities. Before the revolution, Cuba was recognized by the public as a democratic country. A presidential election was held every four years to determine the president between two candidates. But after the revolution, Castro publicly stated that Cuba was to become a socialist country, and no more elections were held anymore. Another change of Cuba is the relations between other countries. Cuba was economically dependent on the US before the revolution. 75% of Cuba’s imports were from the US and 67% of Cuba’s exports were to the US. Tourists from the US also boosted Cuba’s economy and Cuba had a good diplomatic relation with the US. However, mainly due to the nationalization of companies and factories angered the US, the diplomatic relation deteriorated. An embargo was placed by the US on Cuba and later the US also funded and directed the Bay of Pigs Invasion on Cuba. Because of the embargo, Cuba had to find a new market and was later trading with the USSR and become an ally of socialist countries.

At the same time, there are also continuities. Dictatorship continued. Before the revolution, although Cuba was recognized as a democratic country, Batista was the person in power behind the scenes. He then came out of the scenes and became a dictator in 1952 after the coup and changed the election results after to stay as president. After the revolution, when Castro came to power, he still was the dictator and didn’t hold any elections. He continued his dictatorship until 2011 and passed away in 2016. Another continuity was that Cuba still needed to rely on another country. Before the revolution, most imports and exports were from and to the US like the data I mentioned above. After the revolution, according to wikipedia “By the late 1960s, Cuba became dependent on Soviet economic, political, and military aid”. Though it changed from the US to the USSR, Cuba still needed another country to help sustain its economy.