A Roughtail Stingray in Cuba

Artwork by Nicolas Patrick Oppman

By: Nicolas Patrick Oppman, 10, Panama/US

Hello, my name is Nico, I’m 10 years old, I live in Havana, Cuba, and I’m starting grade five. Last weekend I went to a beach in Cuba called Playa Larga for a last summer weekend outing and I saw something horrible! So I decided to share my story with you.

It was a regular day and my sister, my mom, and I had been kayaking off the coast of Playa Larga close to our weekend vacation rental. While we were putting the kayaks back into the house, we noticed a group of people on the beach surrounding three fishermen with nets in their hands.

We walked closer to see what the commotion was about and saw a huge roughtail stingray! Then we watched as one man picked up a bamboo club and slammed it on the stingray’s head. I was so horrified by what I saw that I walked away.

Some time later I came out to the beach to see if the stingray was still there. I was surprised to see the fishermen still trying to untangle the net from its limp body. I figured the ray was dead after all that beating. Then I overheard my mom asking the fishermen if they would eat the ray. “Yes,” one of them said, “It’s a delicacy in these parts.”

Later my mom told me I should write about what I had seen to share with other people, so I wrote this short story. I know now that whenever you catch a fish or sea creature and you plan to eat it, please kill it humanely and quickly so nobody has to suffer.

Adding on to that, I should say that we should stop overfishing because marine life (as all life) is meant to be studied and preserved, not overeaten and massacred.