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The Celia that…I never knew?They say that Celia Sánchez Manduley was always bound up with nature and her diary. In the latter, she noted down all the issues that she became aware of during her conversations with the people so as not to forget to respond to them on the matter.

They say that every letter from her was a sincere, friendly and certain response, even when it was very difficult to solve the problem.

Because Celia’s talent was her natural simplicity and she perpetuated this in every corner of the island, where she arrived without apparent effort on behalf of the Revolution.

And it seems as though the prediction made by journalist and writer Marta Rojas on the death of the eternal guerrilla fighter has been fulfilled. She wrote on January 11, 1980, "Now the whole world will know Celia Sánchez better and to a large extent, we will feel her irreparable absence."

On the 90th anniversary of her birth – celebrated on May 9th – this exceptional individual is still remembered, and she has been transformed into the soul of the Cuban people in the most difficult days of struggle.

Her nature as a tireless fighter and hard worker, filled with modesty and courage, has transcended into an example of inspiration and a model for the generations born after her death in Cuba and Latin America.

But who was that individual who projected an apparently fragile and delicate appearance?

According to those who knew here, her personality was a mixture of the love and humanism impregnated in her by her mother Acacia Manduley and her grandmother "Doña Irene", and the patriotic spirit of her father Manuel Sánchez , a man of liberal ideas who had the custom of providing the people of his town with medical services free of charge.

Anecdotes reflect a happy childhood without prejudices and conventionality, despite the fact that Celia was the fourth child in a family of eight siblings, at a time when women were discriminated against and their only interests were relegated to the home and raising their children.

However, for Celia, life had more meaning: the independence of her country, the wellbeing of her people and the creation of a social model for the good of all.

For those reason, she joined the 26th of July Movement, using the pseudonyms Norma, Carmen, Liliana and Caridad, as a means of organizing revolutionary actions against the dictator Fulgenica Batista and his assassins.

She also became the first woman to join the "bearded ones" in the Sierra Maestra who descended victorious on January 1, 1959 alongside Fidel Castro, in whom Celia had unyielding faith and with whom she developed a lasting friendship.

At the 1981 inauguration of a hospital in the eastern town of Manzanillo in Granma, the native province of the legendary heroine, Fidel highlighted her support for the Granma yacht expeditionaries who were able to reach the mountains, and the funds for weapons that Celia had managed to collect for the rebels.

Afterward, as the leader of the Revolution stated, she took it upon herself to acknowledge the help offered by campesinos in the Sierra Maestra and former combatants.

A commitment to the construction of a new society was her constant goal. Her work can be found in every sphere of society: in the agricultural and environmental spheres; the design and creation of school uniforms; the attention received in senior citizens’ homes; even in the offices of the Granma newspaper that she visited night after night.

Celia always wanted to be remembered as a woman of her day: revolutionary, American and an internationalist. Recognition of her modesty, humility and aversion to public shows of acknowledgement has endured until the present day, as well as generosity in offering her life to the service of others.

In the minds of our parents, images come flooding back of Celia collecting food, clothes and medicines for the children of Vietnam when that people was attacked by U.S. troops; her support for the independence struggles of nations such as Angola, Ethiopia, Nicaragua, and El Salvador; and her love of the historic memory of her nation, which prompted her to conserve every document as part of our country’s cultural heritage.

This is the Celia who has reached future generations. With an altruism united with honest criticism, she managed to conquer the hearts of the people, who reciprocated that love with respect, eternal affection and who pride themselves in naming her the most authentic flower of the Revolution.