By Alfredo Corchado / The Dallas Morning News. Monday | May
28, 2001
HAVANA – Cubans have a saying: "Forbidden love is more passionate
than the same old thing." That applies to American tourists too.
In spite of tough talk and heightened tensions between the Bush
administration and the Castro regime, more Americans are bypassing more
traditional getaways and heading to this forbidden land in numbers expected to
surpass 200,000 this year.
In the process, the proliferation of Americans, growing by as much as 20
percent annually, poses policy implications for Havana and Washington. While the
two governments quarrel, the island of 11 million is gradually becoming less
taboo, changing American perceptions and attitudes.
"It is the American nature to cross frontiers and taste forbidden
fruit," said Pamela Falk, a Cuba expert and professor of international of
law at the City University of New York School of Law who arranged a recent visit
to Cuba for actor Kevin Costner. "It is how the Wild West was settled, and
it is why more and more Americans want to travel to Cuba – whether or not
they agree with the political system there."
For Americans, Memorial Day weekend represents the unofficial start of
summer vacation season. Few places and people are as eager to receive these
undercover visitors and their coveted dollars as Cuba, where the tourism
industry this year is preparing for the largest onslaught of Americans ever.
In open markets, seaside foreigners-only shops, restaurants and pristine
beaches, Americans sip mojitos, a Cuban rum drink, puff on hand-rolled cigars
and gaze at decaying colonial buildings and their fading grandeur.
They're drawn by the allure of the island's rich history, vibrant culture
and lively salsa music. But many also revel in the mystery of one of the last
communist nations on earth and the former playground of wealthy mobsters,
crooners like Nat King Cole or Frank Sinatra, Hollywood actors and, of course,
novelist Ernest Hemingway. His old bar haunts and daiquiri drink are top tourist
attractions.
"It's a land known for salsa music and revolution," said Gordon
McCollester, a businessman from New Hampshire traveling with a group of friends
on their first trip to Cuba. "Canada is like our boring cousins and Mexico –
no one dares to visit [because of the crime]. So there's Cuba."
Since 1962, when the U.S. government imposed sanctions on Cuba that included
a travel ban for its citizens, a trickle of Americans, mostly journalists and
academics, have obtained special permission to travel to Cuba. Americans, by
law, are forbidden to spend money on the communist island and so are effectively
barred from traveling there. The penalty for violators: up to 10 years in prison
and a $250,000 fine.
But since the mid-1990s, following the breakup of the Soviet Union and the
end of subsidies to Cuba, Cuban leader Fidel Castro was forced to throw out the
welcome mat for Americans, many of whom responded by traveling through Mexico,
Canada and Caribbean nations to avoid detection.
Last week, Cuba's foreign minister estimated that last year, about 80,000
Americans, the majority traveling illegally, had entered Cuba, along with more
than 120,000 Cuban Americans. The total of an estimated 200,000 is up from about
120,000 in 1998, according to the U.S.-Cuba Trade and Economic Council, a New
York nonprofit group that, in part, tracks travel.
Critics argue, however, that even without sanctions, Cuba's totalitarian
regime and repressive policies would limit trade and discourage tourism. "As
long as Castro is in power, he will control every detail and always have the
last word," one Western diplomat said.
Earlier this year, the International Trade Commission made a comprehensive
study of the embargo and announced that lifting the sanctions on Cuba could
result in 1 million American tourists visiting the communist island. Pointing to
such a study, some Cubans say the ramifications would go beyond an impact on the
economy.
Many older Cubans lament the increasing disparity between those working in
the tourist industry, earning dollars, and those earning Cuban pesos.
But many younger Cubans are embracing American music and culture, Ms. Falk
said.
"In Cuba today, you hear more Gloria Estefan, Eminem, and see Cuban
teens wearing Ralph Lauren T-shirts," she said.
Some Cubans offer advice to U.S. policy-makers who want to bring change to
the island: End the embargo and put a McDonald's restaurant, the very embodiment
of U.S. capitalism and culture, along Quinta Avenida, one of Havana's main
avenues. Then watch change come, they say.
"Americans represent change," explained Guillermo Aviles, 21, as
he kept a watchful eye for Cuban authorities from a makeshift market near the
Cathedral in Old Havana. "Dollars and ideas."
Marisolis Ornelas, 19, a waitress, had a similar view. "Isolation is
the cause of this mess," she said, referring to her country's economic
woes. "We have to put it behind us and open up."
Washington isn't likely to heed that message soon. Lately, the two sides
have been trading barbs, laced with cold war rhetoric. President Bush has called
Mr. Castro a tyrant.
Mr. Castro has responded by mocking Mr. Bush's "bad Spanish."
Change, however, is inevitable, some analysts say. Last year, the U.S. House
voted by a surprising 232-186 margin to dump travel restrictions, but the Senate
didn't follow through. With the political shift last week caused by Republican
Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont switching political parties, giving control of
the Senate to the Democrats, some analysts and lawmakers see a possibility that
travel restrictions might be lifted or, at least, eased.
But many Americans aren't waiting. One recent poll, sponsored by the Cuba
Policy Foundation, showed that Texans, by a margin of 75 percent to 20 percent,
want the embargo lifted.
Last week, for instance, American tourists waited for a morning flight from
BWI International Airport in Baltimore to fly to Montego Bay, Jamaica, and then
on to Havana. "By early afternoon," one tourist said, "I will be
in Old Havana sipping a mojito."
KHOU-TV Mexico City Bureau Chief Angela Kocherga contributed to this
report. | 