South Korea’s K-pop enthrals Cuba’s youth, 5 years after dawn of mobile internet on communist island

The South Korean sensation that has already swept much of world has now made it to the shores of Cuba, which once banned the music of the Beatles

Cuba has diplomatic ties with fellow-communist nation North Korea, but not with its democratic neighbour to the south

Reading Time:2 minutes

Young Cuban K-pop fans dance at the San Fan Con square in Havana. Photo: AFP

Published: 3:33pm, 7 Nov 2023

In Cuba, the home of salsa, young people are being seduced by a music phenomenon from a place that could hardly be more geographically – or ideologically – remote.

K-pop, the South Korean sensation that has already swept over much of the rest of the world, has made it to the shores of a communist isle that once banned the music of the Beatles.

“I am myself [with] K-pop. I can free myself,” said aficionado Mikel Caballero, a 17-year-old who like many of his peers, spends hours each week perfecting the carefully choreographed paces of South Korean sensations like BTS and Blackpink.

Samyla Trujillo, 14, show a jumper featuring Korean Idols to her friend at her house in Havana. She has posters and T-shirts plastered with K-pop artists’ faces, and watches K-dramas with subtitles. Photo: AFP

Since Cubans gained access to the mobile internet just five years ago, much has changed in a nation where the one-party state nevertheless retains a firm grip on many aspects of life.

There are ride and food-delivery apps, social media, and access to some entertainment sites such as YouTube.

Some Cubans now celebrate Halloween, one of the most quintessential festivals of the United States – which has upheld sanctions against Caribbean nation for more than six decades.

Caballero’s friend Samyla Trujillo has been a K-pop devotee for the last four of her 14 years on Earth.