“I did not have any feelings of culpability, because in the end, I have always been very honest in my thinking and if I believe in something, I am going to defend it and I will say it no matter where. I have never held my tongue. As a consequence, I have always said what I thought on Facebook and it caused problems in my family, because my mother would then tell me: Listen, do not post more of this. My mother’s friends started telling her: Listen, your son is posting this, it is as if he was crazy, make him delete his Facebook, this will cause problems. I remember that many of my colleagues in Pinar reproached me, because they were themselves afraid. They used to tell me that I was crazy and that because I posted such things on Facebook, I will get into trouble. Many people even stopped talking to me and I am happy that they did it, because they did it because of their own fear and because they used to think in such a way that they believe in all that.”
“It is well known how the indoctrination works and at that time, I was not, obviously, thinking politically, but I used to ask why I should sing that fucking anthem every day or why our classroom has to be full of photos of Fidel and Raúl [Castro], and why don’t they instead put there a painting of Pedro Pablo Oliva, for example, who is a famous painter from Pinar del Río. So I was always asking myself these questions. Although it is strange, because I remember that while studied in primary school, I actually had good teachers who had a lot of experience. I remember that I had a very good mathematics teacher, who was named Omar, and I do not forget him, because I have learned a lot of mathematics from him and he had paved the way for me to later become a software programmer.”
“I have always been a good student, very good, but on the other side, I have been very rebellious. I have always used to wear my shirt pulled up and I did not want to sing the anthem. My friends use to say that I was born as a gusano [worm; an epithet used by the government in order to degrade its opponents]. Ever since I have become conscious, I have always found everything to very bad, I have always known that something here was wrong and have always acted as a rebel. I have never attended a single meeting of Union of Young Communists [UJC; Unión de Jóvenes Comunistas] and I have never belonged to any organization. When I studied in primary school, I was always a quiet boy, and it was the same later in all other educational centres. However, I have always taken a part in the manifestations.”
Rasciel Alejandro Villegas López was born in Pinar del Río, republic of Cuba, on 5th of October 1990. Since his early childhood, he was raised in one of the most marginal zones of that province and because his parents were divorced, Villegas López could see that the Cuban government did not take care of the needs of those most disadvantaged. During his time at school, he had always been a very intelligent, but also a rebellious student, because he used to question all the political indoctrination through which the children of that country go. He studied at the Vocational Pre-University Institute of Exact Sciences. When he reached the age to enter the obligatory military service, it was decreed that he is medically fit to serve. At the university, he graduated as Licenciado, but he realized that his future did not lay on the island, and because of this he started to look for ways to emigrate. He achieved this on 5th of March 2019, when he arrived to Spain, where he currently resides.
