The Pan American Games in Guadalajara brought fresh winds to our
television programming, which had been insufferably dominated by
ideology since early October. Although our sportscasters continue to
believe that every competition is a kind of battle where to lose is to
surrender, we could ignore them and enjoy the show. It was even
surprising that, notwithstanding the attempts of the official
journalists to get the winners to dedicate their medals "to the
commander in chief," most preferred to offer them to their families,
girlfriends, mothers, happily waiting for them somewhere in the national
territory. The closing ceremony and the second place finish achieved by
our delegation cheered those still disgusted by the defeat of the Cuban
team in the Baseball World Championship. For a couple of weeks the sound
of the hit balls echoed more loudly than the slogans, and certain
everyday concerns faded into the background.
After the euphoria of victory, however, it's worth analyzing if this
second place finish really corresponds to our development as a country.
Watching this little Island facing down an emerging power like Brazil,
or a country as vast as Mexico, brings the same image to my mind over
and over. In it, a frail and toothless gentleman is showing me his
muscular arms a la Arnold Schwarzenegger. We live, undoubtedly, in a
hypertrophy similar to that of this skinny-legged man with the bulging
biceps, suffering an artificial enhancement of a sector that has nothing
to do with the economy or productivity of the nation. Should we rejoice
over the direct result of this disproportion? Or should we calmly
meditate on why this government tends to climb to the highest seats in
the international sports arena, at the cost of neglecting less visible,
or measurable, areas of our reality.
It is enough to travel Havana in search of a pool where children can
learn to swim, to ask oneself if the resources that should be reaching
many are invested in a just a few. We live on an Island and yet, a good
share of its inhabitants would drown if they fell in the water. To buy a
bicycle in a hard currency store costs as much as a year's salary, but
the women's cycling team won first, second and third place medals in
Guadalajara. The deterioration of the capital's major athletic center,
Ciudad Deportiva, is an embarrassment, while gold hangs from the necks
of dozens of Cuban athletes. My own son spent two semesters without a
P.E. teacher, because few want to work for a salary that is barely
symbolic. Sports require a physical infrastructure and not just in the
specialized schools and academies, they demand investment in facilities
for use by the public as well. Undertaking this could mean we earn fewer
medals, but it would also eliminate the hypertrophied image that today
marks our every victory in sports.
31 October 2011
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