Group of 28 returns from Cuba

While most Tufts students were sitting at home over winter break, 19 undergraduates, seven graduate students, and two faculty members traveled to Cuba for nine days of community service and education.

The trip, sponsored by the Latino Center, marked the second time that the University has given students an opportunity to visit the communist country.

The most significant difference between this year's and last year's trip was the expanded access to all areas of Cuban society. Last year, Tufts students had some contact with Cuban government officials, but were restricted from visiting schools. Between trips, Professor Claudia Kaiser-Lenoir of the Romance Languages Department, who co-led the trip with Latino Center Director Rub?©n Salinas-Stern, discovered a service organization called Proyecto Espiral.

Proyecto Espiral, which is directed in Cuba by Rodrigo Gonzalez, a researcher at the University of Havana, allowed the students to visit an elementary school, a secondary school, a family clinic, and a daycare center. According to Salinas-Stern, "we didn't have that access last year."

The expanded contact increased the students' opportunities to both learn from and help the Cuban community. This year's trip, Salinas-Stern said, was "more intensive, more educational than the first trip."

Students met with Cubans of "relatively their own age" to discuss sex, religion, politics, AIDS, and abortion. During the discussions, no limits were placed on what either side said, and government was openly debated. "It wasn't like we were censored at all," Salinas-Stern said.

As senior Angie Brice explained, contact with Cuban students was an important aspect of the trip. Normally, students, "only hear from the American side."

Visits to schools and doctors offices were followed by community service projects at the establishments, and included helping with gardening and building projects at the schools. Participants also donated laptops and computer supplies to Cuban schools, an opportunity not available last year.

The primary focus of the trip was education for Tufts students about Cuban society and its way of life. The majority of the students had never been to the country. Professor Richard Levins from the Harvard School of Public Health was invited to speak to the students before they left to prepare them for their educational undertaking.

Through the partnership with Proyecto Espiral, the students were able to learn through first hand experience supplemented by lectures. "[The students] learned... about agriculture by lectures but also by spending time in a small farm; about medicine by a general introduction but also by visiting family doctors' clinics; about culture by visiting artists and seeing the artistic production of community groups," Kaiser-Lenoir said.

The students' reasons for participating were generally the same. Because permits are difficult to obtain, senior Dianna Darsney said, the trip was "an opportunity that I won't have at any other time."

According to senior Veenita Kaushik, the trip was a "rare opportunity... to sort through all the stereotypes."

The students' lack of understanding about Cuba reflects a broader ignorance of Cuban culture said Kaiser-Lenoir. "Because of the long standing US embargo against Cuba, people in this country are, in fact, pretty much 'embargoed' as well in terms of any real, balanced, unprejudiced knowledge about that society," Kaiser-Lenoir said.

Kaiser-Lenoir believes that Cuba's "social laboratory" of public services such as healthcare, education, and environmental conservation make the island a tremendous attraction for students and researchers. "Across schools at Tufts, I have found not just high interest in exposing students to various aspects of Cuba, but on-going involvement of students and faculty in projects there," he said.

Students at Tufts are able to obtain educational visas to visit Cuba thanks to a license held by the University, and Salinas-Stern in particular. Students outside of the two Latino Center groups have used the license, including a handful this winter break.

The license, which is granted by the Office of Foreign Assets Control in the US Treasury Department, expires this August; and Salinas-Stern is concerned about the success of the renewal process. "The US has been really messing around with Cubans who want visas," Salinas-Stern said. Nevertheless, he is optimistic about trips in the future, ideally for some type of credit.

Even with all of their appointments and programs, the students managed to squeeze in some recreation. According to Salinas-Stern, at the end of the trip, the group took over a discoth??que, and invited the Cuban students, the bus drivers and their wives, and Tufts alumni who were in Cuba at the time. On their second to last day in Cuba, the students were allowed to spend two hours at the beach.

All of the participating students expressed a tremendous satisfaction in the organization and focus of the trip. The only complaints were about the short length of the trip. "A week was a tease," sophomore Eric Paskowski said.

The students will meet as a group in the upcoming weeks to discuss a means of sharing their new knowledge with the Tufts community.