Take Me to Havana

In December of 1952, when I was seven years old, my family, all six of us, traveled by car, two cars actually, from Oswego, New York, to Miami Beach, Florida for a vacation.  Some interesting things happened along the way, including my being unable to climb the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. and a trip to a hospital in St. Augustine, Florida, to receive a shot of penicillin from the biggest needle I have ever seen.  I went to my first college football game, the North-South All-Star game at Miami’s Orange Bowl, but the thing I remember the most was not going to Havana.

My impression is that it was a spur of the moment decision by my parents to take the short flight from Miami to Havana, Cuba for an overnight stay.  Unfortunately, only half of us were going: my parents and one of my older brothers.  My eldest brother would stay behind to supervise the two youngest, which included me.  I felt robbed, cheated, deprived of something; I wasn’t quite sure of what at the time.

On September 18, 1953, one of my boxing heroes, Carmen Basilio, from nearby Canastota, New York, got a chance to fight for the Welterweight Championship of the World against the champion, Kid Gavilan, at the War Memorial Auditorium in nearby Syracuse.  Gavilan was from Cuba, that place I hadn’t visited.  Basilio floored the champ in the second round, but lost a close split decision.  I read all about it in the newspaper the next day.  (Tragically, on April 3, 1962, another Cuban boxer, Benny “the Kid” Paret, a favorite of mine, died from injuries suffered in the ring defending his Welterweight Championship of the World.)  

On July 3, 1960, I was an usher at the wedding of my eldest brother at a hotel in Rochester, New York, also the home of the minor league baseball team, the Red Wings.  That day, the home team played a double header against the Havana Sugar Kings.  Some Sugar King players, including Leo Cardenas, a Cuban, who would move up to the Cincinnati Reds the following month, were hanging out in the hotel lobby.  A group from the wedding engaged the ballplayers in conversation.

The hot topic that day was the aftermath of the revolution that had recently transformed Cuba.  On January 1, 1959, Fidel Castro and his followers overthrew the dictator, Fulgencio Batista.  A year and a half later the Sugar Kings were talking about a very chaotic situation in Havana, that place I hadn’t visited.

On January 3, 1961, US President Eisenhower broke off diplomatic relations with Castro’s Cuban government over concerns about Cuba becoming communist and spreading that ideology to the rest of Latin America.  On May 1 of that same year, Antulio Ramirez Ortiz boarded National Airlines flight #337 from Miami to Key West, Florida.  Holding a steak knife to the pilot’s throat, he commandered the plane and demanded, “Take me to Havana.”  That was perhaps the first of a growing epidemic of airplane hijackings between the US and Cuba over the next couple of decades.

On October 22, 1962, I was home alone when President Kennedy came on television to address the nation.  He mentioned a crisis involving offensive missiles in Cuba, that place I hadn’t visited.  Besides being extremely worrisome for the nation as a whole, I was especially concerned because that older brother who had gone to Cuba ten years earlier was in the US Navy stationed at Key West, right in the thick of what could have been WWIII.  Thankfully, war was averted, but all flights between the US and Cuba were cancelled for decades.  In addition, US citizens were legally bared from travelling to Cuba.

When I was at college, I studied the unique economic system that Cuba’s government had formulated.  It was the only communist country that did not industrialize, relying instead on an exclusively agrarian economy.  Coincidentally, I now live in São Paulo, the latitudinal equivalent in the Southern Hemisphere of Havana in the Northern Hemisphere. 

For all of the above reasons, I have been curious about Cuba for a long time.  I object to the dictatorial policies of the Castro regime, but that is separate from the Island of Cuba itself and the Cuban people.  They and I share a love of baseball.  In 1949, Minnie Minoso became the first black Cuban to play in the Major Leagues, with the Cleveland Indians.  I have had a chance to experiment with Cuban food (including black beans), which I like very much.  One of my favorite music CDs is the Buena Vista Social Club, Cuban music performed by old-time Cuban singers and musicians.  As a father myself, I supported the return of Elian Gonzalez to his father in Cuba.  Besides, being in the Caribbean, the weather there has to be great. 

The whole world can go to Cuba, except Americans.  Americans can go anywhere in the world, except to Cuba.  Recently, the travel restrictions have been eased to a certain extent by President Obama, but Americans cannot simply call up their travel agent and book a trip to Cuba like any common tourist going to any common destination.  It’s a favorite winter place to visit for our Canadian friends to the north.  My Brazilian wife and her compatriots can visit Cuba anytime they wish.  Why can’t I?

In 1971, I legally visited communist Yugoslavia and communist Hungary.  In 1973, I legally visited communist East Germany.  (Wow!  Two of those countries no longer exist.  Was it something I said?)  Hundreds of thousands of Americans legally visit communist China every year.  So, why is Cuba treated differently?  There are reasons; there are always reasons.  But, they are hypocritical.  The bottom line is that my civil and human rights to freely travel are being infringed upon by my government for no valid purpose.  I demand that it stop.  I want to lie on the beach at Playas Del Este and walk the streets of Miramar.  Please, American Airlines, take me to Havana.