Salute and homage to anonymous workers

They are both: workers and heroes. And they are everywhere, perhaps unaware of their heroism. We will not know their names unless they get interviewed by the radio or a TV program. We will never know about their origins, dreams, longings…although we can have a feeling. We can, as we are living among them. We are also part of this people that builds every single day, and defend the nation against adversity. This people boast their own heroes.

When Cuba underwent the darkest hours of the pandemic, men and women fought hard in laboratories and health facilities to ease the effects of the disease.

A lot of scientists and supporting staff worked for long hours to achieve a vaccine. And they did it! And these vaccines were the first in Latin America and the first produced by a poor country. A motto got popular: “It is not a vaccine. It is a nation.” And truly, the deed would have been mission impossible without everyone’s help. And without the specific contribution of great professionals —their skills and effort—, the vaccine would not come to life. They are heroes. They do not believe they are, nonetheless.

But doctors, nurses and technicians are heroes as well. They were all in the front line, in hospitals and isolation centers, risking their own lives in the task of saving others’.

And firefighters and first responders are heroes as well, those who faced the tragedies of the Hotel Saratoga and the Supertanker Oil Depot in Matanzas. The media echoed some of their personal stories. But finding the true value of each of them will be impossible, at least to fully understand their consequences.

These have been difficult years, but Cuba has boasted its extraordinary moral reservations. They are the natural antidote to discouragement, mental exhaustion, and loss of hope.

It is not a miracle. It is hard work on daily basis. It is the permanent work of many people.

Now that blackouts are burdening the nation, we should better think of those workers working all day long in Cuba’s thermoelectric power plants to solve every breakdown. There is a lot of effort in those men and women working there. And they are just up to their responsibility.  That is the greatest of merits: embrace personal responsibility with enthusiasm, rigor, and timing. They do not work to be praised in return. They do work to help others, the common good. And that is usually an anonymous job, the work of millions of people.

Translated by Sergio A. Paneque Díaz / CubaSí Translation Staff