Fidel: a fascinating memory for Iraida

  MATANZAS, Cuba, Nov 30 (ACN) Six years after the caravan carrying Fidel Castro’s ashes passed by this province on its way to eastern Cuba, 60-year-old psychologist Iraida Cruz Estupiñán recalls the times she met the Commander in Chief, whose ideals she is proud to share.
 
“During my life I had the chance to meet Fidel in several places, like when he came to a nearby beach in the middle of the special period and all the neighbors rushed to see him and he explained to us the local development project the government was planning,” she remarked.
 
Hanging on a wall of her home is a photograph of the leader that makes her remember when she participated in the 4th Congress of the Health Union, where Fidel talked for six whole hours straight with the delegates and guests, or when she was sitting two rows behind him as he delivered a long speech, as only he could do, at a local sugar mill.
 
“Fidel is for me the paradigm that we should follow; he left his imprint on all of us, a legacy that makes him a guide for life. He is not physically present today, but everything he left us will be forever in his people,” she points out.
 
 Iraida is thrilled to remember her tears when the leader gave her one of his huge hugs or showed up unannounced at conferences where she never thought she would meet him, as well as the emotions of those who shook his hand. She is convinced that, as it happens to her, everyone who had Fidel Castro in front of them has a fascinating memory of the occasion.