Bueno -- Reyita was her nickname -- recounted her life story to her daughter Daisy, one of her eight children, who recorded and preserved her mother's memories. And how lucky for us that she did. This revealing document offers a lively portrait of the life of a self-proclaimed "ordinary person" both before and after the Cuban Revolution. In plain but poetic language that radiates intelligence and dignity, Reyita discusses her life of poverty, her experiences with racial discrimination in Cuba, her spiritual beliefs, her decision to join the revolution, her 118 descendants and, in the following excerpt, her role as the community's practitioner of folk remedies:

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In 1952 Rubiera had a duodenal ulcer which burst, despite the treatment he'd received. When I saw him with that huge hemorrhage, I went crazy. And before taking him to the hospital, I knelt down and begged for his life and his health, but not to my Virgencita, but rather to Saint Lazarus, a saint who frightens me with his sores and flies. I promised him if he saved my old man I'd put him in the front hall of my house facing the street sharing the position with the Virgin of Charity of El Cobre. An awesome pledge, if you take into consideration that he wasn't the saint of my devotion! That's why I had faith he would help me. Your dad was saved and I fulfilled my promise when I moved to Bayamo a little while after the old man's illness ...

A long time before, I'd already had experiences as a healer with people other than my own family; I took my first steps when we lived in Cristina, here in Santiago, in about 1950 or 1951. Four or five houses away from mine, a Dr. Portuondo had his consultancy; he was always telling me: "Maria, don't get mixed up in all these cases, it'll only bring you trouble."

Since my neighbors would come to my house for me to sobar un empacho for their kids, bless them, cut an erysipelas -- what they call lymphangitis these days -- give them remedies for asthma, colds or diarrhea, Portuondo told me that not actually to keep me from getting into trouble, but because I was taking clients away from him, who charged money or in kind. I, on the other hand, didn't want anything from anybody; I did it as an act of charity. Another thing Portuondo lost was the commission from the pharmacists, for the medicines he prescribed -- shameless, they were! -- sometimes they'd recommend more medicine than the patients needed, without taking into consideration their poverty.

Once a neighbor came to get me to look at her husband who had a bad stomachache. I went with her, looked at the man, asked the Virgin to inspire me to alleviate his suffering and at that moment I had an idea: I told the woman to go get a bit of corn silk and I made an infusion. When she came back I gave it to the man. As soon as he took it he vomited up a ball that looked like the seed of a toledo mango -- black with white fuzz -- and fainted. The woman, seeing her husband unconscious, began to scream:

"You killed him, you killed him!"

Not knowing what to do, I went to get Dr. Portuondo.

When he came and examined the man, he said he was alive, and asked what I'd given him, and I explained. He put the ball into a glass vial to send to a laboratory. I never found out the result; the fact is, the man didn't die for another five or six years, when we didn't live in that neighborhood anymore ...

I began using home remedies, or herbal medicine, after I had you children. At that time health care in Cuba was very neglected: if you didn't have money to pay a doctor and buy medicines, then you could easily die, it was each to his own! Things were revealed to me in dreams, I had this grace or gift; that's how I received the knowledge to cure some pains. These cures always had some spiritual aspect: a bath with leaves or flowers or something.

You know I don't believe in miracles, but in the curative properties of the herbs and roots I used for those remedies, plus the faith and good will with which I made them: they were what really did the healing; I never worked with spirits, just with my inspirations; nor did I ever charge for what I did. I was born with this but I never considered myself a special person.

Now that I'm old I still attend whoever comes to my house looking for help. Mostly mothers who bring me their children so I'll rub out an empacho, or bless them because someone's put an 'evil eye' on them. Doctors don't recognize the empacho. This is nothing more than something they've eaten, that's given them indigestion and stuck in their stomach. It's easy to fix: you pass your hand -- smeared with a bit of oil -- from the pit of the stomach downwards, but gently; then you pull the skin of the back, over the spinal column. If the person is really empachado, you crack it three times, then they have to drink three mouthfuls of water, and the problem is solved.

The 'evil eye' -- which is the depressive state one falls into when they've been elogiado by one with evil vision -- is removed by cleansing the victim, while reciting the oration to Saint Luis Beltran. Animals and plants can also get the 'evil eye,' in those cases the procedure is more complicated. It is a very bad thing, it can even kill.