Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to join airborne scientists seeking rain

Venezuela's efforts to combat severe drought conditions may include President Hugo Chavez going airborne with scientists as they try to generate rain from clouds.

Chavez has said a team of Cuban scientists are in Venezuela to fly aircraft with special equipment designed to influence weather patterns, specifically to bring on much-needed precipitation.

“I’m going in a plane; any cloud that crosses me, I’ll zap it so that it rains,” Chavez said late Saturday, according to Reuters.

Though Chavez did not explain what method would be tried in Venezuela, many countries have attempted to influence weather through what is often referred to as cloud seeding. The practice involves shooting substances into clouds, such as silver iodide, salts and dry ice, that bring on the formation of large raindrops, triggering a downpour. 

Meteorologists in China actually used similar "weather modification" techniques to try to prevent rain during the 2008 Summer Olympics by reducing the size of raindrops and delaying any rainfall.

The drought in Venezuela has resulted in water rationing and government calls for residents to do whatever they can to save water, including taking shorter showers.

-- Efrain Hernandez Jr.

Photo: Venezuelan President Chavez greets supporters at a recent protest in Caracas against installation of U.S. military bases in Colombia.  Credit: Reuters

Havana ceremony honors actor Benicio Del Toro

Oscar-winning actor Benicio Del Toro has been presented with an award by the Cuban government in Havana, in recognition of his body of work, reports the BBC.

"The inaugural Tomas Gutierrez Alea prize was presented at a ceremony attended by U.S. actors Robert Duvall, James Caan and Bill Murray.

"Their visit is seen as a sign of warming Cuban-U.S. relations."

Puerto Rican-born Del Toro played the revolutionary Argentine Ernesto "Che" Guevara in two films released last year by director Steven Soderbergh.

Read the full report here.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: A still from "Che, the Argentine," in which Benicio del Toro portrays Ernesto "Che" Guevara addressing the UN General Assembly in 1964. Credit: www.cheelargentino.com/

Columbia's Cabot Prize honors Cuban blogger Sanchez

Cuban blogger Yoanie Sanchez has won Columbia University's Cabot Prize for her postings from the island she calls home.

The Cabot Prize, which recognizes reporting on Latin America and the Caribbean, gave Sanchez the gold medal for her work on her blog, Generación Y.

She was the only digital reporter of the four journalists recognized by this year's prize.

"Generación Y does not repeat the battle of words which Cuba and the U.S. have hurled back and forth for five decades. Instead, it is a pitch-perfect mix of personal observation and tough analysis, which conveys better than anybody else what daily life — with all its frustrations and hopes — is like for Cubans living their lives on the island today," says the press release, which you can see here.

You can read Sanchez writing about the prize here on her blog, Generacion Y.

"I think I will use the prestige and protection that the Cabot Prize brings with it to continue to grow the Cuban blogosphere.  The alternative journey that unites us every week has reached a point where it must become an authentic blogger academy.  As I don’t plan to wait to be allowed to open a school of digital journalism in order to realize this project, I will begin it [without] bureaucratic and legal formality.  The distinction that I have received today can contribute to the birth of a new kind of instruction here, one without ideological conditions, and without those ugly costumes which at one time made me distance myself from the academic world," writes Sánchez.

Cuba's Craigslist

The restriction and high price of Internet access in Cuba hasn't stopped the island's black market from flourishing online.

Nick Miroff reports for GlobalPost on Revolico.com, Cuba's answer to Craigslist.

"Cuba’s informal economy is an imperfect marketplace. Without advertising, it relies heavily on word-of-mouth, and its commercial activity tends to flourish in small circles — among neighbors, coworkers and other trusted acquaintances.

"Then came Revolico.com. Its name essentially translates as “disarray,” and while Havana residents jokingly call it “the Cuban eBay,” the site is really closer to Craigslist. For Cubans who make a living through the black market, it's a godsend."

Read the rest of the report on Revolico.com, which claims to be the third-most-visited site in Cuba, here on GlobalPost.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Photo: Vendors sell spices, fruit, flowers and more every Sunday at the farmers market across the street from the Capitolio Nacional in Havana. Credit: Lianne Milton / For The Times

New call to release Cuba's jailed journalists, reports Knight Center for Journalism

The International Press Institute has called on the Cuban government to free 22 jailed journalists, almost all of whom have been imprisoned since 2003, the Spanish-language news agency EFE reports.

The Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas blog writes that "a report by the United Nations Human Rights Council praised Cuba for its successes in promoting the right to education, food, and health care but criticized it for restricting freedom of expression. The IPI commended the council for airing those concerns but worried that the report effectively minimized freedom of expression and the press as fundamental human rights."

“Cuba’s suppression of dissenting voices, thoroughly and systematically carried out for so many years, strongly affects our ability to understand and assess the situation in the country,” the director of the International Press Institute said.

Read more about journalism in the Americas on the Knight Center blog.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Reggaeton shakes up Cuba

Cuba's underground reggaeton artists are causing a stir on the Caribbean island, according to this report from Reuters.

Rising star Michael "El Micha" Sierra, 27, records his songs into his neighbour's old computer, and then burns them onto CDs or USB Flash drives and spreads them around town. "With little official support or air time on state-controlled radio, the songs Cuban reggaeton artists record in makeshift studios lined with egg cartons for sound insulation are mostly transmitted though homemade CDs and on computer flash memory sticks.

"That is how the tropical fever of reggaeton is sweeping communist-ruled Cuba, captivating its youth and enraging a cultural establishment alarmed by the vulgarity of some of its lyrics, which include phrases like 'Coge mi tubo' ('Grab my pipe') and 'Metela' ('Stick it in')."

You can watch El Micha letting loose with another reggaeton artist, Pipey, in a video here on YouTube.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

New flights begin from LAX to Cuba

L.A. Now reports:

Angelenos with family in Cuba will have another option for travel today, when a Long Beach-based company kicks off nonstop flights from LAX to Havana.

The five-hour flight, which will run every Tuesday and can accommodate 150 people, takes off from L.A. at 11 a.m. and is the only Cuban flight for Cuba Travel since July 2004, when the Bush administration tightened rules governing travel to Cuba, according to the company.

Since 1962, travel from the U.S. to Cuba has been banned, but Cuban Americans have been allowed to visit family under various policies. Obama repealed the 2004 travel restrictions in April. According to Cuba Travel, 1.5 million Cubans live in the United States. About 55,000 reside in Los Angeles County.

For details, see The Times' Daily Travel & Deal Blog.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Che Guevara images withdrawn from auction for lack of buyer

Five photo negatives of the Cuban revolutionary figure Ernesto "Che" Guevara that went on sale at the Mexican auction house Louis C. Morton over the weekend were withdrawn from the auction after failing to attract a buyer, Milenio newspaper reports.

Mexican students might love the Argentine now credited as one of the most important figures in the Cuban Revolution, alongside Fidel Castro, but it doesn't appear that art and antique buyers feel the same way.

One of the negatives up for auction was an image of Guevara addressing the First Latin American Congress of Youth in 1960.

The bidding for the negatives started at 80,000 pesos (around $6,075) but were withdrawn due to the lack of interest, reports the newspaper.

As we reported in January, when the first part of Steven Soderbergh's film "Che, the Argentine" premiered here, Guevara is popular among the sprawling student population in Mexico City, where he and Castro, then an exiled lawyer, planned the Cuban Revolution over dinner and cigars on July 3, 1955.

The myth and heroic image of Che have replaced a real understanding of the complex man that he was. His face is often seen emblazoned on flags and T-shirts at student protests and commonly evoked as a universal symbol of social struggle.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Image: Alberto Korda's 1960 photograph of Ernesto “Che” Guevara, not one of the negatives up for auction, has been painted, printed, silk-screened and sketched on nearly every surface imaginable. Credit: Alberto Korda.

Cuban blogger dupes Castro's son

Fidel Castro, the former Cuban president, isn't the only member of his family who likes to express himself online. The BBC is reporting that a Cuban exile blogger from Miami says he used a female Internet alter ego to gain access to Antonio, the 40-year-old son of Castro.

Luis Dominguez said he used the character to begin an online relationship with Antonio. Capitalizing on the younger Castro's purported interest in young women and sports, Dominguez says he snared Antonio Castro by posing as a 27-year-old female Colombian sports journalist named Claudia.

Dominguez refused to apologize for the deception, saying he wanted to show the "opulent lifestyles" of the Castros.

"I'm a Cuban and I'm a Cuban American and I have not been able to go back to my country since 1971 when I left.

"I use whatever tools I have to be able to get back at these people. In Cuba people are put in prison for no reason at all. Their rights are violated ... So, why can't I do the same thing to them? I have no remorse whatsoever," he told the BBC.

"The Cuban authorities have made no comment about the chats, but Claudia says the relationship has gone cold," ends the BBC report.

-- Deborah Bonello in Mexico City

Reviewing 'Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know'

Julia E. Sweig's book, "Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know," is reviewed by the Los Angeles Times' Marjorie Miller, who writes:

"For most of Cuba's history, and certainly since the revolution that brought Fidel Castro's Communist government to power, U.S. policy has penetrated nearly every facet of life in Cuba, making it virtually impossible for average Cubans to forget about the superpower next door. 

"This is driven home in `Cuba: What Everyone Needs to Know,' Julia E. Sweig's forthcoming portrait of the country, where even chapters on domestic issues are as much about Cuba's relationship with the United States as they are about Cuba itself. Beginning with the Cuban war of independence from Spain through the end of Castro's rule in 2006, the long arm of the United States has reached across to the island."

You can read more from writer Sweig in the Washington Post earlier this month, where she wrote: 

"President Obama has promised to shut down the detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, seeking to erase a blot on America's global image. He has also reached out to Cuba, easing some travel and financial restrictions in an effort to recast Washington's approach to the island. These two initiatives have proceeded on separate tracks so far, but now is the time to bring them together. Hiding in plain sight, the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay is the ideal place for Obama to launch a far-reaching transformation of Washington's relationship with its Communist neighbor."

--Deborah Bonello in Mexico City