W & I.: It is wonderful that you have been released from Castro's prison and you are now free to live with your wife. You must have missed her a great deal during your long separation.
Valladares: Well, she told me that we might be separated for many years and that we would have to endure much during that time, but that I should realize that someone was waiting for me out there, waiting with love. Really, she has been a great support to me. She was a kind of "rock" with her love and caring during some of the more difficult times. Actually, she could have divorced me if she wished. But she didn't. She not only supported me with love and hope, but from a practical point of view, she organized the entire campaign to have me released from prison.
W & I: Were you able to maintain communication with her all the time you were in prison?
Valladares: No. There were long periods of time when there was no communication. I did all I could to try to reach her through other prisoners, especially the ordinary prisoners who were in prison for a short time. And too, I was able to get word out to my wife through those of the military who communicated with me. Also, secretly, I was able to sneak a note through one or another person by paying them with some little thing I might have, with a little rice gruel. In this way, too, I was able to get some blank paper to write on, and some sort of pencil stub to write about my circumstances, and thus communicate with the outside. There was a long period of time when my wife and I didn't see one another. She left to go to my family in 1970 so she was gone for about thirteen years. She left Cuba in 1970 and we finally saw one another in Paris.
W & I.: What did you find most unexpected or surprising in the world you returned to from prison?
Valladares: Well, it's difficult to express all the many impressions I had when I was set free.
From a material point of view, many of the technological advances were like things from a storybook. To see TV with remote control and those video games that children play - all the many electronic items, computers, and all those other electronic things. All these things were completely unknown to me in Cuba.
From a spiritual point of view, I was appalled at the great spiritual emptiness I found, and the crisis in values, especially among the young people. I think this crisis of values, this spiritual crisis, has resulted in the use of drugs. It has caused a kind of ignorance in man of what are, in reality, the eternal values of mankind: love and faith. I think that this great crisis has, as [its] result, the estrangement of man from God. When I say the estrangement of man from God, I don't refer to estrangement from the various liturgies that are found in different religions. I refer to the general estrangement of people from God, their interest almost entirely in material things and ignoring of what is essential in mankind, namely, man's soul, his spiritual values and his relationship with God.
W & I: So this surprised you?
Valladares: Yes, it was truly surprising to me. In a
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