A Matter of Faith II: Thanks for the Fire / Cuestión de Fe II. Gracias por el fuego

On January 3, 2024, I asked Enrique Eugenio Zayas Batista—better known as Naomi, Karol G, Madrina, Charito, or Caco Tiratiros—for permission to take some photographs inside the building where he was living at the time.

A year earlier, Charito Tiratiros had been released from prison. He slept in arcades and stayed for several nights with friends until he found this half-collapsed building in the historic center of the city of Matanzas.

Around 1870, the building had been the prestigious Sacred Heart of Jesus School, “for boys only,” founded and run by the Order of the Vincentian Brothers. With the triumph of the Revolution, it was intervened and turned into a language school, serving in that role for more than 50 years until part of its century-old structure collapsed and it had to be closed.

After occupying the building, and over the course of several weeks, Caco cleared rubble and planted ornamental plants until he turned those ruins into something quite close to a home. Washing and cleaning comforted him. He hated cooking because of the smoke, the soot, and the lack of a proper stove and decent pots. He collected empty beer cans and sold them as raw material, and with that money he managed to put something in his mouth each day.

For more than six months I documented Charito’s life. At one point he told me that he wanted to tell his story, filled with his father’s lack of understanding of his sexual orientation, with abuse, and with antisocial behaviors of his own, punished by law four times. I witnessed his attempt to survive, to reintegrate into society. I took photographs of him and made a short documentary from part of his experiences. He wrote my name on the wall, next to those of others he considers his friends. On June 26 I stopped by to see him, as I had done so many times. But he was not there. He had been arrested after allegedly committing another offense.

“Thanks for the Fire” captures Enrique Eugenio Zayas Batista’s grateful memory of the building that served as his home for a year and a half—the Sacred Heart School, “for boys only”; and it is also my own gratitude toward him for the meager meals we shared while we talked, and for the friendship.