If you are Cuban, wear the T-Shirt that matters and if you are not Cuban, still wear it because the chances are you have a Cuban friend.

We are everywhere..!

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The story of this symbol

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My parents were political activists...not of the first degree, which is what I call political prisoners as seen in the movie Plantados, but of the third degree. What does this mean? Because of their discontent and disagreement with the political system, my father served in the “Agricultura” (unpaid labor for the communist party); our entire family endured being singled out with disgust and labeled “gusanos” (worms) by our neighbors up until we left the island and once in “El Norte,” (the USA) they went to every possible march to denounce the violation of human rights by a regime that obtained its control promising to be better than what was previously there.

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In hindsight, they could not have given us a better label: Gusanos. As I have learned, worms are quite industrious little creatures, essential to the Earth’s ecosystem and we Cubans have proven ourselves to be quite an industrious community de el exterior, outside of Cuba.

Throughout the years we have had many names- Gusanos, Marielitas, Balseros, Disidentes, Plantados, Peter-Pan-Kids, and the most recent, Patria o Vida movement. However, the one bonding agent amongst these labels is that they all scream of injustice, abuse, and loss of freedom.

I designed this map for my parents in 1992 to use in their

many human rights awareness demonstrations, rallying

right in front of the United Nations during one of

Fidel’s Castro’s visits.

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It sadness me to know Fidel Castro lived a long affluent life and one can say he “had his cake

and ate it too.” He secretly established a family and amassed a 900 million fortune at the expense

of the Cuban people, at the expense of a country that believed his rhetoric and, pardon my French, his B.S. Nine

hundred million extorted from the people, 900 million dollars that belonged to the people and not the

descendants of the hardcore assassin and oppressor that “El Comendiante"…pardon…El Comandante en Jefe was.

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