This electronic sales outlet allows for the acquisition of a great variety of Cuban products via the Internet, and its multimedia offerings, grouped in eight thematic categories, have been very well-received, according to the company.
The publishing house (www.editorialcitmatel.com) is an offshoot of the enterprise Citamel, founded in 1999 and affiliated with the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Environment.
Among the new products added recently are the e-books Todo de Cuba, an encyclopedia with information on Cuba’s culture, music, history, sports, religions, and more; as well as Cocina cubana, cinco siglos de tradición, with more than 500 recipes.
The catalogue section on History & Culture offers visitors some 60 materials, including titles such as Recorra Cuba, and the e-books Capablanca, el rey; Un paraíso en el Caribe; and Sitios de buceo.
Of special interest in this section are works devoted to the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution Fidel Castro, among them the audiovisuals Fidel es Fidel, by Roberto Chile and Fidel la historia no contada, by documentary filmmaker Estela Bravo.
FIDEL’S UNTOLD STORY AND OTHER WORKS
Estela Bravo has lived in Havana for 40 years with her husband Ernest Bravo, an accomplished Argentine biochemist. Available on the website are several works from her filmography of some 50 documentaries, among them Operación Peter Pan – which tells the true story of a 1962-63 CIA operation to encourage Cuban parents to send their children unaccompanied to the U.S. – and ¿Quién soy yo?, about the disappearance of babies born to mothers imprisoned during the last Argentine dictatorship.
One of Estela Bravo’s classics is precisely Fidel, la historia no contada (Fidel: The Untold Story), which she herself has explained, began in 1996, when she began gathering materials for the project, culminating in the film’s 2001 premiere.
The filmmaker was able to get original interviews with Fidel and a great number of archived materials, which allow viewers to see the Comandante in an intimate light – swimming with his bodyguards, visiting the home of his birth, a relaxed conversation with Nelson Mandela, and celebrating his August 13th birthday with the famous Buena Vista Social Club.
To develop the storyline, Elsa enlists family members, and close friends like Gabriel García Márquez, and figures such as Alice Walker, Sydney Pollack, Ted Turner, Muhammed Ali, Harry Belafonte, and Ramsey Clark.
In 91 minutes, Estela Bravo manages to surprise with this look at the more personal, little known side of Fidel’s life. She commented that after finishing
Fidel, la historia no contada she still had a great deal of unpublished material and was afraid that it be lost due to the humidity and its delicate formats.
The solution? Another three exceptional documentaries: Fidel y Mandela, Anécdotas de Fidel, and Conversando con García Márquez sobre su amigo Fidel. All contain testimony of incalculable value, enriched with the inclusion of unpublished photos and singular sequences.
A quick look at Bazar Cuba online allows users to access a variety of Cuban cultural products, especially high-quality audiovisuals like Estela Bravo’s Fidel la historia no contada.
