Posted on 02/01/2006 11:07:55 AM PST by Onelifetogive
Top Czech model Helena Houdova was arrested in Cuba last week while taking photographs of Havana's slums – but she managed to smuggle out pictures she hid in her bra.
Houdova – Miss Czech Republic 1999 – was arrested along with fellow model Mariana Kroftova, and Cuban police confiscated a roll of film in the women’s camera. However, Houdova concealed the memory card of her digital camera insider her brassiere.
"The revolution's watchmen rose up because I was taking pictures of something they do not like," Houdova told journalists after returning to the Czech Republic.
The Communist regime of Fidel Castro denies the existence of slums on the island.
The two women spent 11 hours in police custody and were not allowed to contact the Czech embassy. Upon their release, the women were asked to sign a statement saying they would not travel beyond Havana, and they remained under police surveillance until their departure from the island, according to the Czech news source Ceskenoviny.
The photos Houdova saved will be included in an exhibition she plans to organize together with People in Need, a Czech humanitarian relief organization that has supported Cuba's pro-democracy opposition. The exhibition would portray Cuba’s beautiful scenery but also highlight its political oppression, Houdova disclosed.
During her 10-day stay in Cuba, Houdova said, her meetings with dissidents, the wives of political prisoners and ordinary Cubans reminded her of her childhood in Communist Czechoslovakia.
The Czech Foreign Ministry summoned the Cuban charge d'affairs in Prague to explain the conduct of the Cuban authorities in arresting the two women.
Czech-Cuban political relations have been frozen since the fall of communism in Czechoslovakia in 1989. The Czech Republic has attempted several times to push through U.N. resolutions critical of Castro’s regime over its record on human rights.
I believe she lives at least part time in New York, so she'll probably have an exibition there as well.
Thanks Skylab...
[ "She didn't have to smuggle the pictures, she could have just pointed everyone to this site: The Real Cuba" ]
Where do you think that site gets all their photos, silly?! [ \ just kidding ]
Now I'd like to take a look at those.......photos I mean.
resistance is futile.
I surrender already! Take the whole island and me with you.
Just Gooooooooooooogle her name............
Thanks!
And nobody loves them like elitist leftists who think that they will be in charge.
I believe, in this case, it should be "Thanks for the mammaries".
Actually you're absolutely right, I was just trying to get a plug in for that great site.
Fidel is right. To say that there is a slum is to say that some parts are worse than others. The whole island is a in terrible shape.
Actually to call them slums would be demeaning to slums.
You have to ask the question, "Who could possibly want to live in a corrupt police state where a few individuals oppress the majority?"
The only reasonable answer: "Those who think they will be the "few individuals."
Houdova thought she'd smuggle stuff out in her bra?
Beautiful, ethical and has guts. Very nice combination IMO. Good for her, she can sure sleep well at night. Her helping to expose Cuba for what it is at risk to herself is very brave.
All kidding aside, last year Castro decided to "fight" the US by setting up a huge billboard across the street from the American embassy showing the now famous picture of an Abu Ghraib prisoner being "tortured" by being forced to wear women's underwear on his heads.
Cuban women have a wickedly sarcastic sense of humor, and commented that this billboard was the closest they'd been to quality undergarments since 1960.
Even more are of German ancestry, like my great, great, grandparents who settled in 1850's era Texas ... in the Fayetteville area, the so-called "cradle of Czech settlement" in Texas ....
This explains a bit about Texan women - beautiful, smart and headstrong.
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