"La Cosa" ("the thing"), bigger and more intimidating than "Cosa Nostra" ("our thing" ["Mafia"])
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From Keith Barkley:
There was a story on Morning Edition this morning about using “thing” as code for something you don’t want the government to overhear:
'La cosa': In Cuba, this single phrase carries coded truths
Eyder Peralta, Morning Edition, NPR (February 6, 2026)
Listen to the 4-minute audio recording (linked in the title above) and / or read this transcript:
In Cuba, "la cosa" speaks louder than words. That single phrase carries the weight of daily struggle, coded truths and the country's unspoken realities.
—–
LEILA FADEL, HOST:
In Cuba, expressing opinions in public can get you in trouble. But for Cubans trying to tell you what they really think, there's a single phrase that does a lot of work and carries coded truths. NPR's Eyder Peralta reports from Havana.
EYDER PERALTA, BYLINE: If you want to get a Cuban talking, just ask…
(Non-English language spoken)?
"How's the thing?"
MARISLEYSIS: (Laughter).
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: Marisleysis (ph) sizes me up, and she takes a leap.
MARISLEYSIS: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "My love. The thing is very bad," she says. Her friend stops her. She's saying too much in front of a microphone. But Marisleysis dismisses her because that's the thing about the thing. The thing can be anything.
MARISLEYSIS: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: The thing is our food, our sustenance, our clothes.
MARISLEYSIS: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "How's the thing? It's super high. It's super expensive. It's super bad." Fidel Castro argued that there was freedom of expression in Cuba, but he was cryptic about the limits. He famously uttered…
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
FIDEL CASTRO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: Within the Revolution, everything against the revolution, nothing." Cubans who crossed that line have ended up in jail. So like bishops deciphering an encyclical, Cubans have learned to navigate. I catch Nino (ph) and Gabriela (ph) running errands in downtown Havana. Everyone in the story asked us only to use their first names because, well, things are complicated in Cuba, and they didn't want to get into trouble.
GABRIELA: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "La cosa is the situation in general," says Gabriela. La Cosa, says Nino, is abstract. It can mean something as simple as the struggle to find gas, or it can mean the corruption scandals plaguing the Cuban government.
GABRIELA: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: The meaning also changes depending on the trust you have with the other person, she says. Sometimes, only both of you know what you're talking about. So la cosa in Cuba is like a wink and a nod. It's a phrase you hear on the streets, but also beaming from the high altar of Cuba's music royalty.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
PERALTA: In his latest album, the singer-songwriter Silvio Rodriguez has a song titled "Here Comes The Thing."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "VIENE LA COSA")
SILVIO RODRIGUEZ: (Singing in non-English language).
PERALTA: "The thing is coming," Rodriguez sings. "It's going to be bad."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "VIENE LA COSA")
RODRIGUEZ: (Singing in non-English language).
PERALTA: It's a song about an unstoppable change, and it comes at a time when Cuba is facing a crushing economic crisis, discontent on the streets and a belligerent President Trump who's predicting the demise of the communist government. The thing is coming with eyes wide open, he sings, and lies won't ever stop it.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "VIENE LA COSA")
RODRIGUEZ: (Singing in non-English language).
PERALTA: The thing Rodriguez writes about could be anything – a popular rebellion, a communist renewal or a vicious foreign intervention, and that mystery gives him plausible deniability. Back on the streets, I find Mario (ph) leaning against the government building where he works as a receptionist. He says, defining the thing is not complicated.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "It's our reality, and you can see it," he says.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "I work from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m.," he says, and he earns about $4 a month.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: His whole paycheck buys him less than a carton of eggs.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "I don't lie," he says, "because I'll defend my country with my life." And then, like every Cuban, he turns cryptic.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: His 41-year-old son tells him, "Dad, you have to stop believing because this will never get any better." And how do you respond? I ask.
MARIO: (Non-English language spoken).
PERALTA: "Things will get better," he says, "but it's hard. The thing is tough," he whispers.
Eyder Peralta, NPR News, Havana.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "VIENE LA COSA")
RODRIGUEZ: (Singing in non-English language).
"La cosa" is Spanish for "the thing," commonly used to refer to an object, situation, affair, or abstract concept. It frequently appears in phrases like "la cosa es que" (the thing is that). In Cuba, it often refers to the current, unspoken daily situation or struggle. (AIO)
My guess is that a similar expression exists in many languages and societies, but perhaps not so ubiquitously as in Cuban Spanish.
"Here's the thing… you know."
Selected readings
- "The thing thing" (4/7/11)
- "The origin of 'thing' in Chinese" (5/10/25)
- "When did 'a thing' become a thing?" (4/18/16)
- "Not a gerund, not a thing" (3/5/10)
- "Thing explainer" (8/1/15)
- "Another thing coming about another think coming" (5/3/08)
- "Not a gerund, not a thing" (3/5/10)
- "Are any of those things even things?" (9/18/08)
Carlana said,
February 7, 2026 @ 1:37 am
In US social media, you see a lot of references to “when it happens” meaning when Trump dies. People rightly don’t want to be in trouble with the Secret Service but also a lot of people want him to die.
David Marjanović said,
February 8, 2026 @ 1:01 pm
The people who worked on the first stealth bomber were reportedly allowed to mention it only if they referred to it as "the article".
KeithB said,
February 9, 2026 @ 8:39 am
The part of a nuclear weapon that goes "bang", is probably – more euphemistically than for OPSEC – is called the "physics package".
Mike Grubb said,
February 9, 2026 @ 9:37 am
I'm curious about whether there is something in Spanish grammar that defaults to preferring the singular, whereas in English we seem to default to "How are things?", making the term plural.
cliff arroyo said,
February 9, 2026 @ 12:51 pm
"something in Spanish grammar that defaults to preferring the singular"
IME in European languages in general, the generic is the singular. English is unusual in preferring plurals (without articles) as a generic.
ajay said,
February 10, 2026 @ 4:20 am
My guess is that a similar expression exists in many languages and societies, but perhaps not so ubiquitously as in Cuban Spanish.
As Mike says, the English phrase (BrE at least) is "how are things?" Perhaps, in impoverished Cuba, very few people can afford more than one Thing. Though we also have "how's it going?" rather than "how are they going".
IME in European languages in general, the generic is the singular. English is unusual in preferring plurals (without articles) as a generic.
I'm not sure about this.
"I am interested in trains."
"Je m'interesse aux trains."
"Mam zajem o vlaky."
"Ich interessiere mich für Züge".
"Mi interessano i treni".
"Estoy interesado en trenes."
All plural.
ajay said,
February 10, 2026 @ 4:22 am
The people who worked on the first stealth bomber were reportedly allowed to mention it only if they referred to it as "the article".
"Well, it's been between 600 and 750 days since The Event."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnd1jKcfBRE
cliff arroyo said,
February 10, 2026 @ 7:05 am
"All plural"
Depends….
Dogs are mammals.
El perro es un mamífero.
Pies to ssak.
Der Hund ist ein Säugetier.
Il cane è un mammifero.
A kutya emlősállat.
"The dog is a mammal" is possible but not as idiomatic (at least to me).
I would say that 'la cosa' in the Cuban usage here is not equivalent 'things' in English "How are things?" which is a question about personal circumstances (focus on the addressee's internal state) and 'la cosa' means 'that thing we're not supposed to talk about' a more external focus.
ajay said,
February 10, 2026 @ 8:00 am
""The dog is a mammal" is possible but not as idiomatic"
Good point – though it seems to vary depending on the specifics. I agree that "the dog is a mammal" sounds unidiomatic, and slightly antiquated. A book called "The Diseases of the Horse" sounds Victorian. "Diseases of Horses" sounds more modern.
But "the red-breasted woodpecker lives in Australia" or "the humpback whale can eat three hundred Big Mac meals a week" sounds fine. (factually nonsensical, true, but linguistically fine).
cM said,
February 10, 2026 @ 8:00 am
This transcription contains one of my pet peeves: "(Non-English language spoken)".
There's a lot of that in movie subtitles "[speaking foreign language]". Either translate it or at least transcribe that language, dammit!
ajay said,
February 10, 2026 @ 8:47 am
This transcription contains one of my pet peeves: "(Non-English language spoken)".
There's a lot of that in movie subtitles "[speaking foreign language]". Either translate it or at least transcribe that language, dammit!
I think you know perfectly well why they don't do either of those things.
Mark P said,
February 11, 2026 @ 6:35 pm
A friend spent some time in Cuba maybe 35 years ago. He was there long enough to befriend some Cubans. He said when they talked about Castro they never said his name. Instead they swept their fingers down their chin as if stroking a beard.
David Marjanović said,
February 12, 2026 @ 4:00 pm
Acceptable but dated; I wouldn't generally expect it from anything written after the mid-20th century.