By Randal C. Archibold. The New York Times, April 12, 2000
BETHESDA, Md., April 11 -- He has received the likes of the Rev. Jesse Jackson, bearing comfort for the spirit, and Vicki Martin of Madison, Wis., bearing cheese for the stomach.
He got his first taste of snow, Washington traffic and the media glare, from the 20 television cameras trained on the house of Cuba's top diplomat here that is, for now, home.
Juan Miguel González, 31, an employee at a tourist resort seeking custody of his 6-year-old son, Elián, left Cuba on Thursday with a sendoff from President Fidel Castro, and then flew in a private jet to Washington. In short order, over the next five days, he sat down with Attorney
General Janet Reno, chatted with members of Congress, thanked the fishermen who rescued his son and greeted 100 people at a reception in his honor at Cuba's de facto embassy.
If Mr. González has not exactly taken the town, the town is somewhat taken by him. His whereabouts is staked out by reporters and photographers and, some assert with dismay, by the Cuban government. But Mr. González no doubt has received a memorable taste of America, however
limited or unintended.
Sometimes, Mr. González sits on the landing of the brick house here or sees visitors off on the driveway with a wave, now and then glancing at the media pack.
In private moments, he hands out snapshots of Elián taken in Cuba. He repeats over and over that he wants his boy and that he wants to go back to Cuba. He is getting impatient. He speaks to the boy by phone but only sees him on television. He is concerned that it looks like Elián
has lost weight and chafes when the boy flashes the victory sign, a sure influence from the Miami relatives whom visitors say Mr. González has come to loathe.
"The more he sees his son on TV, it's like so close yet so far," said the Rev. Joan Brown Campbell, the former general secretary of the National Council of Churches, who has visited Mr. González several times since his arrival. "It's like having a baby. You wait nine months
and then the last week is interminable."
Mr. González has seen at least five members of Congress: a Republican, Bob Ney of Ohio, and four Democrats, Jose E. Serrano of New York, Maxine Waters and Barbara Lee of California and Donna M. C. Christensen, the delegate from the United States Virgin Islands.
"It was the human thing to do to see how he was doing," said Ms. Lee, who visited Mr. González on Sunday. He showed her the photographs, explaining that it was his way of demonstrating his relationship with Elián.
"It's too bad this thing is so politicized he has to justify his fitness as a father," said Ms. Lee, who had visited Mr. González in Cuba in February while attending a trade show.
Perhaps his most spontaneous contact with an American came Saturday with Ms. Martin, who is secretary of the Madison, Wis.-Camaguey, Cuba Sister City Association. After she told members of the group she would be in Washington on an unrelated matter, they suggested she leave a basket of cheese --
a symbol of Wisconsin -- for Mr. González at the Cuban Interests Section.
When she arrived, an official there, struck by the gesture, arranged for Ms. Martin to visit with Mr. González the next day, she said. They chatted on the green leather sofa in the living room, which she said is sparsely appointed with modern furnishings but no prominent photographs or
icons of Cuba or Mr. Castro.
"I discussed Wisconsin as being the heartland," said Ms. Martin, a real estate agent, who has visited Cuba three times in the last year. "He was interested in that. Camaguey is similar. He told me Elián was very smart, and he thought it was because of the school system
there."
Mr. Jackson, who attended a reception on Sunday night at the interests section and met Mr. González there, said Mr. González expressed "great interest" in United States-Cuba relations but "right now he is guarded in his comments because he is anxious to get his son
back."
Not surprisingly, Mr. González's visitors all have expressed the belief that the boy belongs with his father in Cuba, and a number have visited the country and believe the United States should have stronger ties. But the contacts have drawn the ire of those who oppose Mr. Castro who,
despite the denials of Cuban officials and Mr. González's lawyer, believe that Mr. González's movements and words are strictly controlled by Mr. Castro.
The three Cuban-American members of Congress, who have opposed Mr. Castro for years, said they never received a response to their invitation to have lunch with Mr. González, his wife and baby.
Jaqueline Stevens, a spokeswoman for Representative Lincoln Diaz-Balart, Republican of Florida, one of the Cuban-American congressmen seeking a meeting, said it was impossible for Mr. González to speak or visit freely "when he is surrounded by people who we believe intimidate him and
I'm sure have done something to scare him."
She said, and a State Department official confirmed, that although Fernando Remírez de Estenoz, the diplomat in whose home Mr. González is living, said on national television last Thursday that he would waive diplomatic immunity for the residence, the Cubans never followed through
with a formal request to do so. Therefore, she said, Mr. González is living on Cuban territory and subject to the travel restrictions it places on its citizens.
Nevertheless, Ms. Campbell, who has been close to the González family, said she had seen no evidence that Mr. González's activities were restricted. She said he has focused his energy on reuniting with Elián, and little else.
"He is more limited by the press," she said. "He could go out and walk freely if that is what he wished or that were possible without being accosted by the press."
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