The remains of the ISDi, an illegal construction material quarry

Havana/A dozen men come and go over the gigantic mountain of rubble to which the building that housed the Higher Institute of Industrial Design (ISDi). They go up, choose stones and sand, put them in old bags or recycled boats, and go down with them. Afterwards, they stack them against some lamppost, or move them with a rudimentary wheelbarrow.

What remains of the ISDi, that accumulation of broken columns, stones, sand and dust that was never removed after complete demolition work –that lasted several weeks– has become an improvised quarry for construction materials, presumably intended for sale on the black market.

The remains were not alone for long. Just a few days after there were no machines left around the block formed by Belascoaín, Enrique Barnet, Maloja and San Carlos, in Centro Habana – all of which was occupied by the destroyed building – a tent was installed on top of the remains. A watchman? A beggar?

The mystery was solved by Eduardo Ceballos Pérez, creator of the satirical network program Despingovery Channel: one of those who had built it, who introduces himself to the camera as Raúl, is one of the “demolitionists” of the place. With his usual tone, imitating the bombastic explanations of Discovery Channel documentaries and playing with words, Ceballos introduces the video clip about the ISDi: “A despingosis infrastructural It takes place before our eyes.”

and explains in offwith the same vocabulary: “The ISDi is today a mine of dust and stone. There are miners working here, extracting one of the most incredible minerals we have in the world.” disjointednesswhich is rebar, a mineral that represents 20% of the gross domestic product of Despingolandia”.

The comedian approaches the installer of the precarious structure, presenting him as “one of the protagonists of this masterpiece” and pointing out the precarious booth built with “something out of the ordinary.” In another cut, a pool of water that was left between the ashlars gives rise to another joke: “The first cistern cozy installed in a disjointedness”.

The video does not last long, but its eloquence does not need more minutes: “Over the smoking corpse of the Institute of Design the scavengers prowl destructural that will recycle the stones in future lleguipones“says the narrator of the Despingovery Channeldeforming the colloquial term for the illegal settlements built on the outskirts of Cuban municipalities. And he concludes: “The predation that we find in multiple tribes, the robo-roba and fachatón tribes, is very striking.”