Ampliar

Ampliar

ON THE ISLAND THAT NOT TOO LONG AGO WAS OFF LIMITS FOR ANY KIND OF U.S. VISITOR, YOUNG AMERICAN STUDENTS ARE EXPRESSING THEIR INTEREST IN COMING BACK TO CUBA FOR LONGER STAYS

TTrips to Cuba organized by professors and students from the most diverse American universities to scour the island nation’s educational system and take a closer look at the Cuban way of life are yielding curious outcomes, at least based on what the travelers say.
Testimonies published in the college media following their return reveal a marked interest in coming back to Cuba for longer stays, mostly because they could only spend a handful of days on the island nation, a destination that not too long ago was off limits for any kind of American visitor.
One of the most enlightening reports that bear out this trend was put out recently in BU Today, the Boston University’s information and news website, under the title Cuban Culture Shapes a Spring Break Trip.
In his article –illustrated by two dozen pictures- author Joel Brown underscores the “transforming” impact that “the encounter with Havana, the free medical care and the outstanding cultural centers in town” actually had on the students.
Even when Washington still bans its citizens from traveling to Cuba as tourists, preventing them from enjoying its larger-than-life beaches of turquoise waters, the clash with the Cuban reality, the strong contrasts between what “they expected to see and what they really find,” leave in many students an unwavering desire to recount their surprising adventure.
Andrew O’Brien, 21, lives in Massachusetts and studies Linguistics and Social Communication at the Georgetown University in Washington DC. He’s one of the hundreds of U.S. college students who opted for a semester stay in Cuba to take a closer look at the suggestive stories he’s heard in his homeland about the island nation.
O’Brien accepted to narrate his own personal experience to Excelencias Magazine from his Havana residence, a private house where he enjoys a room that overlooks the famous Havana promenade, a home that was rented by the educational program signed between the University of Havana, Casa de las Americas and the Consortium for Advanced Studies Abroad (CASA).
CASA is a non-profitable organization that came into being in the wake of the restoration of diplomatic relations between Cuba and the U.S. It’s made up of ten leading U.S. universities: Brown University, Columbia University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, Northwestern University, Trinity College Dublin, The University of Pennsylvania and Vanderbilt University.
The International Programs Office of Brown University, headed by Kendall Brostuen, has a website (http://casa.education/home) where the center shares details on its own projects.
O’Brien told us that since his arrival on January 23, 2017, he hit his first ton of lead” in Cuba when he discovered that the building where he was going to stay was flooded by sea surge. Yet, that situation didn’t bar his housekeeper from getting him another house rental in the vicinity, a home where he stayed until the sea receded and everything went back to normal. The solution came out as a result of a gesture of friendliness and solidarity in a critical moment, he said.
Now when there’s only one month left on this island for him and his 23 classmates, the young American student said he’s very pleased with the courses he signed up for on Latin Languages and Latin American Thinking at the University of Havana, let alone courses on the History of Relations between Cuba and the U.S. and Cuban Cinema at the Casa de las Americas.
As to the hardships he came across in Cuba, O’Brien said he realized that people that do a lot with too little could actually do a whole lot more if they had much more to work with.
The first spring trip for the Boston University (BU), for instance, gave Queentela Benjamin, one of the thirteen International Relations students who made up this group, the chance to score points on a lesson topic entitled “Knowing Cuba: History, Culture and Politics.”
After meeting at the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM) with half a dozen of the 140 American students that hope to get a degree as physicians there –with free tuition and a chance to compare the healthcare systems of both Cuba and the U.S.- Benjamin told the BU reporter that “this visit had opened my eyes.”
Among the words of praise received by Brown after posting the feature report
(http://www.bu.edu/today/2017/cuban-culture-study-abroad/), at least two readers –Dave Gagne and Skye Wentworth- expressed their intention to visit Cuba really soon.
Something similar happened with the first cultural semester planned by Howard University under the theme “Spanish for the News Media”, and consisting of a bunch of eighteen students and professors from the Spanish and Journalism departments, that visited Havana in late 2016.
According to a report penned by Jacinth Jones during a weeklong visit to the University of Havana, where they shared views with Prof. Max Barbosa, they toured the Morro Castle, the Revolution Square and the Hemingway House and Museum. They also spent their meal breaks and spare time to practice the Spanish language at any moment.
According to Prof. Monesha Woods, “knowing Cuba firsthand is an eye-opening experience because it let me reach a new perspective on the way the Cuban people live, which at a large scale challenged my previous knowledge.”
A few weeks ago, Bob Blanton published on the Gaston Gazette details of trip that a study group from Gaston College had been waiting for with great anticipation, one that brought the students aboard the Adonia ship, run by the Fathom, the only U.S. cruise company cleared to visit Santiago de Cuba, Cienfuegos and Havana.
Blanton said that given the restrictions imposed by Washington, they couldn’t promote the Cuba trip as a tourist excursion.
“Once aboard,” Banton said, “one of our inquiring passengers asked about the difference between a tourist and a traveler. I quickly answered that tourists see, while travelers learn as they visit new destinations around the world.”
At the end of our conversation with O’Brien, the student from the University of Georgetown said emphatically: “I came to Cuba to face with ideas, criteria, standpoints and conceptions I couldn’t find in my own country.”
Despite having no statistics on the exact number of U.S. college students that visited the country last year or in the course of 2017, the long-term impact on one of the crucial public opinion segments for the growth of the travel market between the U.S. and Cuba is plain and clear to a naked eye.