El dos de mayo/May 2nd

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Photo from cervantes.es. Click HERE. 
¡Feliz cumpleaños a ... Zoé Valdés! (1959-       )

"La libertad es lo primero. Luego todo lo demás."

A Cuban writer novelist, poet, scriptwriter, blogger, and activist, Zoé Valdés was born the same year that Castro came to power. She was taught to read and love poetry by her grandmother, who was of Chinese and Irish descent, and she published her first poem as a teenager. In the 1980s she worked at the Cuban Delegation of UNESCO in Paris, and then the Oficina Cultural de La Misión de Cuba, also in Paris, before returning to Cuba and serving as editor of the magazine Cine Cubano. In 1994 she was officially exiled from Cuba for political reasons (she had ruffled feathers when she was arrested in the 1980s for driving two Spanish tourists around Havana, as this was against the law under the regime, and by refusing to donate an award she won in 1991 to the Castro regime, but the final reason was her signing a publishing deal for her novel La nada cotidiana without consulting the government, and then giving interviews about the work in France). Because of this, she moved to Paris with her husband at the time, filmmaker Ricardo Vega, and her one and a half year old daughter. In 1997 she received Spanish nationality with the help of her editor, and then she received her French residency. She is openly anticommunist and speaks out against the Castro (now Díaz Canal) regime, often on her blog/website (click HERE). She speaks about her views in this interview (in Spanish) with El País (the quote at the top comes from here), and in this video (also in Spanish).

For resources for teaching Spanish, Level 1 through AP, CLICK HERE.

Other May 2nd birthdays of note:

Norma Aleandro (1936-    ): Argentinian actress and screenwriter. She starred in the 1985 movie The Official Story, among many others.

 Mon Laferte (Norma Monserrat Bustamante Laferte) (1983-      ): Chilean singer-songwriter and actress. She has been nominated for many Latin Grammys and in 2017 won "Best Alternative Song" for her song Amárrame. See her official website HERE.

Farruko (Carlos Efrén Reyes Rosado) (1991-      ): Puerto Rican reggaeton musician who has more than 9 million Instagram followers.

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