What Does A Dictator's Son and I Have In Common?

I have been using computers since I was six or seven years old. I was eight when my mom snapped this picture of my older sister and I, while we were in the middle of one of our many games on the computer. I remember the day that my father told us that we were going to be getting something called "the internet." I was confused at first what this meant but when I looked around the "communities" and saw that what it meant was interacting with different people all around the world, I was hooked. I remember finding it very exciting to communicate with people from different areas within the US and abroad. My parents didn't worry too much about their eight year old son chatting with strangers, only rule was I could not share our family's email account or tell anyone my "ASL" (age/sex/location). I followed this rule religiously until I met "Gabby." I was in an IRC chatroom for young people and Gabby was one of the more interesting people I encountered in the chatroom. She was funny, smart, flirty and she was able to construct her sentences well. I was in love with her, even though I had not seen any pictures of her and I wanted to know more about her. I remember the rush that I felt when I gave her my email with the hope of having one on one conversations with my internet crush. After I hit the enter key on our old mac computer, terror came over me and immediately I felt sick to my stomach.


Recently, I read this story about another young man who developed an internet romance with a woman he had never met before. They would chat for long periods of time and sparks began to fly between the two lovers. Unlike most of the internet romance stories we hear on the news that end tragically, it has a big plot twist almost like in a movie. The young man is the son of former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro and his woman is actually a 46 year old male journalist from the states. The journalist was using his dialogue with the dictator's son to reveal how the Cuban government has forbidden their citizens from getting online via their homes or internet cafes.

After I had told my parents that I told Gabby our email, I was told not to do it again and to be more careful of who I shared my private information with whoever I talked to online. Now as a long-time internet user of fifteen years, I have better discernment of who I share my information with. Castro's son should have been more careful of his 'net fling because of the consequences of his actions.