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简介：Cubans wait to go online at an Internet cafe in Havana earlier this year. The Cuban government announced months ago that a new fiber-optic cable to Venezuela would improve Internet access and speeds, but that still hasn't happened.



参与方式：全文听写
Hints:
$1.50
Web
Hamlet Chirino
Venezuela
Arab Spring
Jessica Cruz
Castro

PS：被采访者外语请无视
Young Cubans line up here to pay $1.50 an hour to send and receive email. A snap poll of a dozen would-be Web users found only two people who said they'd ever been online. One was 27-year-old Hamlet Chirino, who saves up each month to pay $6 an hour for Internet use at a tourist hotel, or goes to underground cafes that offer black market Web access over slow dial-up connections. Life is really good here, Chirino said, but low salaries and the lack of Internet access are the two biggest problems. The government has been saying they're going to change those things for a long time, but we're still waiting. Cuban authorities raised expectations earlier this year when they announced the completion of a $70 million data cable linking the island to Venezuela, boosting Cuba's bandwidth by a factor of 3,000. But Web access remains as slow and scarce as ever with no evidence of any urgency to get the cable working. Rumors swirl about technical problems or bad business deals with others here speculating Cuban authorities have been spooked by the Arab Spring and the critical role social media have played in it. There's been no official explanation, leaving 20-year-old Jessica Cruz saying she thinks she won't get online until the Castro government is gone. There's a saying here that flies can't get into a closed mouth, says Cruz, reflecting the view of many young Cubans who see a paternalistic government trying to deprive them of outside information.