T his , after all , was the mystical place where the legendary , charismatic , Fidel Castro ruled Cuba for 50 years and whose revolutionary legacy with trademark military fatigues is still heralded through blackand-white photographs that adorn the walls in schools , government buildings , and hospitals across the island .
But Cuba is also a place that is continues to be racked by Cold War politics .
More than half a century after it began , the commercial , economic , and financial embargo that makes it illegal for U . S . corporations to do business in this Caribbean Island nation of more than 11 million people remains in place . The embargo has cost Cuba more than $ 144 billion , the communist nation told the United Nations in 2020 .
“ This is a huge blow to our tourist industry ,” one high-level Cuban official said in July . “ We have the right to be a free and independent country .”
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Looking back , while living in Miami , Florida , as a reporter for the Miami Herald during the 1980s , I was peppered with unflattering stories about Cuba from Cubans who fled the island . Reports from Miami ’ s Cuban community always focused on an island nation in constant turmoil under Castro ’ s regime . And when the Castro regime announced in April 1980 that any Cuban who wanted to leave could exit the country , I witnessed the now-infamous Mariel Boatlift where more than 125,000 Cubans fled Cuba for the shores of Florida .
I even came face-to-face with remnants of the Cuban exodus during my own personal journey .
As a certified scuba diver , I logged dozens of dives to a site in the Gulf of Mexico , about 50 miles from Cuba , while researching my book , “ The Wreck of The Henrietta Marie : An African American ’ s Spiritual Journey to Uncover a Slave Ship ’ s Past ” Once , as I emerged from a dive ,
I encountered several rickety rafts – one with waterlogged planks of wood , wrinkled bed sheets that were transformed into sails , baby diapers , empty cans of milk , and a rusted compass floating with no one aboard . The rafts , I thought , were likely made by people who were desperately trying to make their way 90 miles from Cuba to Florida . I don ’ t know what happened to them – I don ’ t know if they were rescued or lost at sea .
But now , some 40 years after the Mariel Boatlift , I arrived in Havana in the summer of 2023 to assess Cuba for myself , to listen to how the U . S . embargo has affected people here ; and to meet with government officials , doctors , lawyers , artists , historians , business owners , poets , filmmakers , community activists , politicians , and educators at the University of Havana .
I was a member seven-person group of Americans led by DeWayne Wickham , the dean emeritus of Morgan State University ’ s School of Global Journalism & Communication . He now runs the university ’ s Center for New Media and Strategic Initiatives .
Also in the group was Jackie Jones , the current dean of Morgan ’ s j-school . The Baltimore university had just executed a new Memorandum of Understanding with the University of Havana and she was there to represent Morgan ’ s president at the signing ceremony – and engaged Cuban educators in wide-ranging discussions about potential joint projects , from podcasts to the use of artificial intelligence in journalism and compiling the histories of people
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