Americans find Cuba worth trip

Visitors on rise despite embargo, EliÃ¡n case HAVANA - George came from Chicago, Jack from North Carolina and Bud from Georgia. They sauntered along the MalecÃ³n, puffed on

Wednesday, April 19th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Visitors on rise despite embargo, EliÃ¡n case

HAVANA - George came from Chicago, Jack from North Carolina and Bud from Georgia. They sauntered along the MalecÃ³n, puffed on freshly rolled stogies and passed the time looking at locals walking along the famed seawall while surveying the blue horizon of the Caribbean Sea.

For these Americans, Cuba is the forbidden fruit, a tempting and exotic blend of culture and communism they officially are banned from experiencing because of the U.S. economic embargo. The penalty for violators: up to 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine.

For many Americans, the shroud of mystery that has cloaked Cuba for more than 40 years is gradually being peeled away. Thousands of American tourists with pocket cameras and pockets full of dollars are converging on the island in numbers not seen since Fidel Castro and his revolution swept Cuba in 1959.

Despite charges of espionage and human-rights abuses and the custody battle over 6-year-old EliÃ¡n GonzÃ¡lez, the number of Americans flocking to the adopted land of Ernest Hemingway has more than tripled in the last five years. Tourism officials and academics said more than 200,000 Americans are expected to set foot on the island this year, compared with 50,000 annually in 1995.

"Other than an embargo, things feel pretty normal here," said George, who like his buddies spoke on the condition that his full name not be used since spending money in Cuba is illegal. "I came here thinking I was getting away from Americans, and here they are. Look around you."

Most of the Americans come through legal "people-to-people" exchanges promoted by the Clinton administration. But illegal travelers represent more than 20 percent of U.S. visitors, several Cuban academics said.

Not what they expected

The flood of Americans also poses sweeping political consequences for two nations divided by four decades of political mudslinging, assassination conspiracies, mass exodus across the Atlantic Ocean and the threat of nuclear war.

The more Americans arrive here, some analysts said, the more they realize Cuba is not the brutal, Yankee-hating dictatorship they had been led to believe. Although political freedoms are sharply curtailed, there are no death squads, army camps or old Soviet tanks roaming in the neighborhoods.

What the Americans encounter, some said, are a people waiting in suspense for the next U.S. or Cuba political move, and an end to the economic embargo. Some analysts said that embargo is hurting the Cuban people more than their graying leader, who's on the brink of outlasting his ninth U.S. president.

"The more people who travel to Cuba and see the Cuban reality with all its warts and defects, the more the pressure for a more sensible policy," said Wayne Smith, a senior fellow for the Cuba project at the Center for International Policy in Washington. "Similarly, the more people [who] engage in Cuba, the more pressure on the Cuban government to move toward greater respect for human rights and a greater opening. It's positive for both sides."

Santiago Benitez PÃ©rez, a Cuban political analyst, said: "Human contact between both sides could signal a new U.S.-Cuba policy."

Varied reasons to visit

The Americans come to Cuba for a variety of reasons, from a California-based group that brings old pianos and then tunes them, to stiff, inhibited people eager to learn how "let go" by dancing salsa, as Michelle AragÃ³n from Oregon said. Others are seeking fun, or are curious about the communism museum.

Some simply seek business opportunities, such as a group of Texas farmers who want to sell rice, wheat, citrus, dry corn and cattle.

"The embargo doesn't make sense," said Gene Hall, spokesman for the Waco-based Texas Farm Bureau, a group of farmers who will leave Sunday for a second trip to the island in hopes of creating a business opening for Texas crops and cattle.

"I'm not a fan of communism, but it's clear that the embargo makes no political or economic sense," Mr. Hall said. "If it hasn't brought down Castro in 38 years, the possibility of bringing him down today is remote, in our view."

Last September when the Texas farmers visited Cuba, Mr. Hall and others had a late dinner with Mr. Castro, who appeared "quite gracious and quite strong for his age," Mr. Hall said.

New business

To be sure, this bastion of communism is no beach resort like CancÃºn, Mexico, where signs are in English and American dollars rule. Still, it's getting more difficult to avoid merry Americans experiencing what may be the last vestiges of the Cold War on the Cuban island.

For many, traveling to Cuba has become so trendy that even a former CIA agent recently opened an Internet travel service aimed at teaching Americans how to visit the Caribbean island, 90 miles off the Florida coast. So many Americans are visiting the island, including throngs of college students during spring break, that one Cuban entrepreneur who operates a thriving bed and breakfast is searching for a map of the United States to determine exactly where her new clientele comes from.

"Some send me postcards from Minnesota, New Mexico, California, Kentucky and Pennsylvania," said Zeny Puig LÃ³pez, a historian who's also fluent in English and whose home in the tony neighborhood of MiramÃ¡r has become a star attraction among visiting Americans.

As she thumbed through the most recent postcards, she asked: "Where is Napa Valley? Where are these states? The Americans are great people. They always write, and that signals a natural affinity between us. It's almost as though we have been longing for these moments for decades."

Travel to Cuba is allowed only through a special permit from the U.S. Treasury Department. Historically, those receiving permission are government officials on business, working journalists, professional researchers and people visiting close relatives for humanitarian reasons.

Other travelers are granted licenses on a case-by-case basis, but not for tourism. Tourists, however, have a choice of ways to skirt the embargo: They can sail from Key West in a boat, dock in Havana and refrain from spending money on shore. Or, simplest of all, they can fly to a third country, such as Canada or Mexico, and catch a flight to Cuba, which is what Henry Franks, and his girlfriend, Juliana, both of New Jersey, did recently.

"Too many Americans in CancÃºn," he said as he boarded a flight from Havana to CancÃºn, where he was going to connect to the United States. "Cuba was absolutely fascinating. We're going back soon. We made many friends there."

Making it easier

Last year, President Clinton eased licensing procedures as part of his people-to-people contact policy - cultural, educational, religious and athletic exchanges between U.S. and Cuban citizens. He also made it easier to get to Cuba, approving direct charter flights from New York and Los Angeles in addition to those that already fly from Miami. Flights from Los Angeles are scheduled to begin soon, U.S. officials have said, declining to elaborate.

Mr. Clinton said the people-to-people contacts "demonstrate the United States' compassion for the Cuban people, our strong interest in building bonds between citizens of our nation, and determination to provide the Cuban people with hope in their struggle."

Cubans are welcoming to Americans, arguing that Cuba's economic future depends on them. The government recruits tourists by setting up offices in the Bahamas and CancÃºn to lure Americans to the island. The Cuban government also is investing many of its meager resources to build luxury hotels and create jobs in tourism - the most sought-after in the country.

Not all Americans who come to Cuba leave convinced that U.S. policy toward the island is wrong. Some Americans say they're disgusted with laws that forbid Cubans from entering hotels reserved for tourists and stores and pharmacies that take only dollars. Jack from North Carolina had befriended a Cuban woman and her family and had invited them to his hotel for dinner.

Hotel officials, however, barred the family from eating there. The incident left Jack perplexed and angry. As he stood and watched yet another EliÃ¡n political rally unfold along the MalecÃ³n, a rally dominated by children, he reflected on U.S.-Cuba policy.

"I'm not sure lifting the embargo is the answer because there are no basic freedoms for people here," he said. "But isolating Cuba for another 40 years isn't the answer either. We need to help each other, and not punish each other."