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CUBA
NEWS
The
Miami Herald
Democratic contender Dean alters Cuba stand
On easing the embargo: 'Can't do it right
now'
BY PETER WALLSTEN, pwallsten@herald.com.
SPOKANE, Wash. - As he surges to the top of the
race for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination
and begins to think about a potential contest
against President Bush, former Vermont Gov. Howard
Dean says he is shifting his views on the trade
embargo with Cuba.
Speaking to reporters during a four-day national
campaign swing, Dean said he supports rolling
back the embargo in order to encourage human-rights
advancements -- but citing Fidel Castro's recent
crackdowns on dissidents, says that in recent
months he has become convinced that ''we can't
do it right now.''
Dean called Cuba a ''political question,'' and
said that recent developments on the island would
prevent him from his goal of ''constructive engagement
of Cuba.''
''If you would have asked me six months ago,
I would have said we should begin to ease the
embargo in return for human-rights concessions,''
he said, responding to a question from a Herald
reporter at a dinner Sunday night in Seattle.
''But you can't do it now because Castro has just
locked up a huge number of human-rights activists
and put them in prison and [held] show trials.
You can't reward that kind of behavior if what
you want to do is link human-rights behavior with
foreign trade.''
Dean's comments marked the first foray into Cuba
policy for a candidate who in recent days has
ridden an unexpected wave of financial support
and political momentum to lead the race for the
Democratic nomination, and suggest that he is
beginning to think about issues that will be key
to competing in the general election next year
for Florida's electoral votes.
In recent weeks, some Cuban-American exile leaders
have openly questioned their years-long loyalty
to the Republican Party, accusing Bush of breaking
campaign promises to ratchet up the pressure on
Castro's government.
POLITICAL ISSUE
The reaction -- sparked by the repatriation last
month of 12 suspected boat hijackers who were
sent back after negotiations with the Cuban government
to spare them from execution -- has turned into
a potential political problem for Bush's reelection
next year, and Democrats are already looking to
exploit the situation.
Bush's political advisors know that he needs
strong Cuban-American support next year.
In 2000, more than 80 percent of the state's
400,000 Cuban-American voters backed Bush, helping
him win a narrow victory in Florida and put him
in the White House.
The Bush administration last week took two steps
aimed at softening the criticism and adhering
to demands of exile leaders: indicting the two
Cuban pilots who shot down two Brothers to the
Rescue aircraft in 1996, and announcing technology
improvements to TV Marti.
The trade embargo in recent years has divided
the Republican Party, with Bush backing sanctions
and many GOP leaders from industrial and farm
states with their eyes on a new market pushing
to eliminate the embargo.
The major Democratic candidates for president
have varying records on the embargo, with Florida
Sen. Bob Graham and Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman
two of its strongest supporters.
REP. GEPHARDT
Missouri Rep. Richard Gephardt, a critic of free
trade in general, has backed the embargo as well,
while Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and North
Carolina Sen. John Edwards have spent months meeting
with exile leaders to study the issue.
Dean, whose home state is largely free of the
immigration and trade issues that dominate South
Florida politics, is a stranger to Cuban-American
leaders and issues.
'SENSITIVITY SEEN'
''I can't say I know him, but I appreciate his
sensitivity to the issue,'' said Joe Garcia, executive
director of the Cuban American National Foundation
and one of the harshest recent critics of Bush's
Cuba policies. ''He's saying what any reasonable
person would say.''
''Look, the road to the White House goes through
South Florida, and anyone who's running for president
is looking at the numbers,'' Garcia added.
Memories of Cuba thrive in South Florida
shops and beyond
BY FABIOLA SANTIAGO, fsantiago@herald.com.
Posted on Sun, Aug. 24, 2003
Ay, mi Cuba.
For those who dream of it, yearn for it, still
miss it decades of exile later, there's something
heartfelt about coming upon a little piece of
the lost island that speaks to you.
Like that $4.99 jute bag to hold your loaf of
Cuban bread.
It's not that you had one in Cuba -- you didn't.
It's the memory the piece evokes of the smell
of freshly baked pan cubano at the neighborhood
bodega in Matanzas, or Pinar del Río, or
Habana, or Las Villas, Camagüey, Oriente,
any of the beloved six provinces, pre-Castro,
of course, as there are officially 14 now.
Ay, the nostalgia.
It runs deep and it cloaks Miami like a mystical
mantilla, a people's never-ending ode to loss
and hope.
''It's, it's . . . it's a feeling,'' says Maria
J. Vazquez, searching to describe all that she
has packaged into her Little Havana memorabilia
store, Sentir Cubano, which means to feel Cuban.
Her colorful year-old shop on the corner of Southwest
Eighth Street and 31st Avenue is part of the Cuban
nostalgia boom sweeping South Florida. From artisans
who make lovely hand-painted coffee cups with
Cuban motifs and purses out of cigar boxes to
an ever-growing cast of collectibles, memorabilia,
guayabera and cigar stores, it's an industry that's
risen around all that evokes the island of Cuba.
''Those of us who came to this country as children
are fueling this boom,'' says Vazquez, 52. "We're
all in search of this virtual Cuba, the one that
exists in the stories of our parents. We have
never gone back, but we grew up listening to stories
about a Cuba where the palms are greener, the
sky is bluer and the pork meat tastes like real
pork.''
As she speaks, Vazquez glides between rows of
miniature Cuban flags and shelves filled with
commemorative plates to a window display where
the centerpiece is an oversized stuffed rooster,
golden feathers and all.
She claps her hands.
The rooster crows.
It's a stretch, but you did wake up in the island
of your childhood to the ki-ki-ri-ki of roosters
(Cuban roosters did not crow cock-a-doodle-do).
This one comes in various sizes and crows indoors,
while outside on this steamy summer morning, a
Cuban yuppie packs into his black SUV a taburete,
the typical hide-covered chair of the Cuban countryside.
EXPANDING NICHE
Yep, it's a Cuban thing.
So much so that one of the earliest nostalgia
retailers, Ambrosio Martin Art Collection of Old
Cuba, has trademarked the phrase ''It's a Cuban
Thing'' to advertise its Internet memorabilia
store.
The interest in all things Cuban -- also attractive
to tourists who want to experience Miami's famous
Cuban culture and take home souvenirs -- has grown
way beyond its prime showcase of the last five
years, CubaNostalgia, a three-day trade show of
arts, culture and history that has attracted some
30,000 people.
The boom is also finding its way to suburbia,
mostly by way of cigar shops that carry collectibles,
and other businesses like jewelry stores that
now sport a special line featuring Cuban national
symbols.
Even mainstream stores such as the arts and crafts
Michael's in Pembroke Pines are carrying vintage
pre-1959 posters that hail Cuba as a travel destination.
In historic Little Havana, where recently opened
art galleries, shops and cafes sport the Cuban
theme, the marketing of nostalgia is helping fuel
a cultural renaissance.
Starting with Little Havana To Go in 2000, the
charming storefronts on Calle Ocho between 13th
and 17th avenues are giving the area the first
brush strokes of a village feel.
''There's a warmth, a feeling of community here,''
says Jakelin Perez, the 38-year-old owner of Old
Cuba The Collection on 15th Street. "The
whole Elián thing brought everybody in
our community together. The 5-, 15-, 40- and 60-year-old
agreed on one thing: Whether we want it or not,
we're Cuban and we have an interest in Cuban culture.
The old generation always had it, but it started
it with the next generations.''
The younger Cuban-Americans want to embrace their
Cuban roots, but ''not everyone wants to go out
with a bandera (flag),'' Perez says.
It's the reason her Cuba-themed clothes have
a designer flair.
''It's cool to put it on a T-shirt that's done
trendy and with a twist,'' she says, pointing
to her black baby-T with ''cubanita'' written
in tiny white rhinestones.
One of the hottest new items: Purses made out
of cigar boxes. Eileen Sanchez-Medina, a new artisan
of the nostalgia boom, makes them from her Coral
Gables garage.
And who can resist a beige baseball cap that
says '' Aché 'pa ti?'' That's ''good luck
to you'' in Yoruba, the language Africans brought
to Cuba.
For those attached to the regions of their birth,
there's not a pinareño or a matancero in
the house who can turn away from T-shirts that
boast: ''Made in Pinar del Río,'' then
in Spanish, ''tierra del mejor tabaco'' (land
of the best tobacco); ''Made in Matanzas,'' then
in Spanish, ''con su playa de Varadero'' (with
its beach, Varadero).
And so on for every province of the original
six to which exiles cling, disregarding Castro's
decades-old mandate to split into smaller municipalities.
''People walk into my store and they cry,'' Perez
says. "I am giving them something they have
lost, and I am trying to come as close as I can
to the image of the good. I don't want to give
an image that is blurred. We've had enough of
bad. We've had 44 years of bad.''
And that image has come a long way.
IT'S A PRIDE THING
In the early '70s, when Vazquez left Miami with
her new husband, Miguel, to study in Gainesville
at the University of Florida, the only cultural
comfort Cuban students could find came by way
of a Cuban woman who lived by the train station
in Waldo. She cooked a thick pot of chícharos
(split-pea soup) for the kids in college.
And there was the one Cuban football player on
the UF team. 'We called him `the Cuban Comet'
and at the games we chanted, 'Carlos! Cuba! Carlos!
Cuba!' '' Vazquez remembers.
But in those days, assimilation was the code
word. You didn't flaunt your cubanía. You
lowered your Celia Cruz tape when you came upon
the toll booth. In fact, you really did prefer
The Rolling Stones.
Now that the world is on a Cuban music and cigar
high, it's become really hip to be Cuban, to wear
a guayabera, to smoke a stogie, to listen to old-fashioned
rumba.
''You don't even have to be born in Cuba to be
Cuban, to feel Cuban,'' Vazquez says. "When
you have that gene inside of you, it comes out
sooner or later.''
Hence, the T-shirts that boast:
"Made in the USA . . . With Cuban Parts.''
''The kids are taking it up to college,'' Vazquez
says.
Or this one, especially made for South Florida's
multicultural stew: "Married to a Cuban.''
As with all things modern, the nostalgia boom
has found plenty of space on the Internet.
Vazquez's site at www.cubanfoodmarket.com preceded
the store and launched the business by exporting
food and cultural comforts to exiles across the
country. It features palm trees that sway to highlight
subject areas and little Cuban flags that flutter
to flank search engines.
Just as colorful is the Sentir shop, which sports
a lime-green facade with landscapes representative
of each of the provinces, painted by local Cuban
artist Tony Mendoza. It has become a tourist attraction.
''People come to take their picture here,'' Vazquez
says.
Both Vazquez, who previously owned a car-financing
business, and Perez, who worked with logos at
Bayside and Parrot Jungle, say they started their
nostalgia businesses after their own interest
in Cuban culture sent them on a quest for their
roots.
The retailers reject criticism that the nostalgia
shops are, as Perez says she has heard, "cashing
in on people's emotions.
''You can make a decent living, but you are not
going to be rich,'' Perez says. "I really
want to give back something. I want to instill
our culture in the new generation.''
Perez, who named her one-year-old daughter Habana,
dreams of opening a different kind of nostalgia
shop in a free Cuba.
''I want to find the most beaten up locale, structurally
sound, of course, but something really old,''
she says with the gleam of a young girl describing
her Prince Charming. "I'm going to scour
the streets for all those old treasures people
will be throwing away to modernize. I'll build
something beautiful out of something old, out
of things people have discarded.''
And then perhaps, she will look out across El
Malecón, the famous Havana seawall, and
her nostalgia will find its way north across the
ocean ... toward Miami.
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