Tuesday, November 20, 2018

FATHER FÉLIX VARELA & THE IRISH IN NEW YORK

FATHER FÉLIX VARELA & THE IRISH IN NEW YORK

Plaque at the Church of the Transfiguration

Father Felix Varela became the advocate for the Irish immigrants in New York from the 1830s to 1850s. He was exiled to New York from Cuba because of his passionate support of independence, abolition of slavery and equal education for women. His first teacher, an Irish priest, introduced him to Gaelic.

Excerpts from a Google search:

Varela fled to New York, the first Cuban exile. There he eventually became Vicar General of the New York Diocese. His special apostolate was to New York's recently arrived Irish immigrants, who were as detested and persecuted in the 19th century as Hispanics are today in this country. Varela built the first Catholic schools for them (open to both sexes, for the first time); the first mutual aid society; the first orphanages; and the first parish to cater to their spiritual and material needs, in the notorious Five Corners section were most of them lived. The Irish clamored for Varela to be their bishop, but Spain vetoed his selection because Varela continued to agitate for Cuba's independence from New York, creating, through his patriotic writings, a distinctive Cuban consciousness and nationality. Martí himself journeyed to Varela's grave, then in St. Augustine, FL, to pay homage to "the man who taught us to think" and consecrate his work of liberation to him.

http://reviewofcuban-americanblogs.blogspot.com/2007/10/why-father-flix-varela-has-not-been.html

Varela y Morales, Félix (1788–1853)

Félix Varela y Morales (b. 20 November 1788; d. 25 February 1853), Cuban priest, thinker, and patriot. Orphaned at an early age, Varela was still a child when he moved to Saint Augustine, Florida. (The area had been returned to Spain by Britain in 1783 under the Treaty of Paris.) There he was consigned to the care of his maternal grandfather, the commander of the city's Spanish garrison. He became the pupil of Fr. Michael O'Reilly, then the vicar of East Florida, who eventually became his role model. It was Fr. O'Reilly who influenced his decision to enter the priesthood rather than become a soldier, as his family traditions called for. "I wish to be a soldier of Jesus Christ," Varela said at the time. "I do not wish to kill men, but to save their souls."...

Varela published his pro-independence articles in the newspaper El Habanero, which he founded in the United States. At the time, there were many Cubans who were in favor of Spanish rule, and some of them advocated the annexation of the island to Colombia or Mexico, just as others would support annexation to the United States a few years later. Varela argued against all of these paths. He morally justified rebellion against the oppressive colonial government, saying that it was "inspired by nature and upheld by the sacred laws of self-preservation." As for the idea of Cuba becoming the province of a neighboring state, he wrote: "I am the first to oppose the union of the island to any government. I should wish to see her as much of a political island as she is such in geographical terms."

https://www.encyclopedia.com/humanities/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/varela-y-morales-felix-1788-1853

In 1837, Varela was named Vicar General of the Diocese of New York, which then covered all of New York State and the northern half of New Jersey. In this post, he played a major role in the way the American Church dealt with the tremendous influx of Irish refugees, which was just beginning at the time. His desire to assist those in need coupled with his gift for languages allowed him to master the Irish language in order to communicate more efficiently with many of the recent Irish arrivals.

https://www.revolvy.com/page/F%C3%A9lix-Varela

While in the United States, Fr. Varela published newspapers and many articles on subjects such as human rights, religious tolerance, education and the need for the Spanish and English speaking communities to live in peace. In 1827, he founded the Church of the Immigrant in the impoverished Five Points district of Manhattan. Today, known as the Church of the Transfiguration, the parish continues to serve many immigrants. Fr. Varela became renowned in New York for his charitable works, his ministry to the ill during a cholera epidemic, his ecumenical spirit and respect for non-Catholics, his great devotion to the Mystical Body of Christ, and the missions he preached each year in anticipation of the Feast of Corpus Christi.

In 1837, Fr. Varela was named Vicar General of the Diocese of New York, which at that time included the entire state of New York and northern New Jersey, as well. Proficient in languages, Fr. Varela learned the Irish language and was instrumental in helping the Irish acclimate to their new country at the beginning of the great migration of the Irish to the United States.

https://thoughtsandprayersforthefaithful.wordpress.com/2017/02/27/sanctity-in-america-ven-felix-varela/

Protected from Spanish assasination by Irish parishioners

The Spanish Governor in Havana, Francisco Vives, decided to apply Varela’s death sentence in New York, dispatching one of his thugs, el tuerto (one-eyed) Morejón of the Havana police to assassinate him. By that time Varela had built a loyal following among his Irish parishioners, who were no friends of colonialists, and they foiled the plot by warning Varela and intimidating the would-be assassin. A one-eyed Spanish-speaking stranger wandering around an Irish neighborhood in lower Manhattan would have been noticed. In any case, Morejón returned to Havana, presumably without earning the 30,00o pesos Vives had offered him.

https://cubannewyorker.wordpress.com/2012/09/09/the-first-cuban-new-yorker-the-case-for-felix-varela-y-morales/

Varela’s association with Friends of Ireland in 1843 in support of publication of Thomas Mooney's lectures on Irish history

https://books.google.com/books?id=dbHSAAAAMAAJ&pg=PR20&lpg=PR20&dq=felix+varela+and+the+Irish&source=bl&ots=VUb8C2ibDI&sig=WjPGg_Pck--dO0FFV9j90MaCZLQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj5gLDKjrveAhXITd8KHUlWAJ84KBDoATAHegQIARAB#v=onepage&q=felix%20varela%20and%20the%20Irish&f=false

Varela talks about his support of Irish immigrants in 1800’s New York in “Choosing Peace”:

“I work hard to help Irish families build schools for their children, and I tend cholera patients, and I defend Irish American boys and girls against insults from mobs who hate them just because their parents are immigrants.”

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2076178949

Essay by Cardinal Egan My Special Saint

https://archny.org/news/my-special-saint

Two observations from Hernán Guaracao, a major on line publisher for the Latino community in Philadelphia, originally from Colombia. He brings Varela into the present.

"But his greatest achievement in life was not this advocacy for the independence of his homeland, written out in that journalistic enterprise he launched in Old City Philadelphia, but what he did in the following 30 years in New York City, where he moved to lead a life of charity in defense of the poorest of the poor, the undereducated immigrants coming to America in the first half of the 19th century, mostly from an island called Ireland."
...
“No single Latino left a greater imprint on 19th century American culture than Varela,” writes former Philadelphia Daily News writer and New York Daily News columnist, Juan Gonzalez in his book “Harvest of Empire.”

http://aldianews.com/articles/opinion/american-saint-latino-descent-father-f%C3%A9lix-varela/42744

Does anybody remember the “Kensington Riots,” when the Catholic Irish confronted the backlash of resistance to their presence they found in Philadelphia in the 19th Century, either because they were poor, or they were undereducated, or they were simply “different”, on top of being catholic, exactly like a good number of Latinos are today?

The life of Father Felix Varela y Morales, when properly publicized and well understood, can be a major point of reference to the current dilemmas of immigration into the United States.

And it can be a call, from the shrine of the memory of a man one step away from being declared a saint by the Catholic church, for the moral responsibility many leaders with power and influence, some of Irish descent, must feel today.

In the profound immigration crisis of today, Varela life’s example can be just an inspiration for action in view of the millions that have come and are now trapped by obsolete laws that keep many on the run, or stigmatized because of the negative images propagated by a society of immigrants that have been harsh with their own kind.

http://aldianews.com/articles/local/essential-latino-furtive-champion-irish-immigrants-19th-century-us/44122

Additional URLs for Cuban, Irish and Irish American links https://tinyurl.com/IrishCubalinks

VENERABLE FÉLIX VARELA

HIS SAINTLY LIGHT STILL SHINES IN NEW YORK
SPRING 2022

Illustrations by Vinny Bove.

By Michael S. Cain

VARELA'S PATH TO SAINTHOOD
TRACING VARELA'S LIFE

FOR A DISTINGUISHED NATIVE OF THE CARIBBEAN, it was a rude welcome to America. Fr. Félix Varela, a renowned Cuban philosopher, educator, writer, and statesman, arrived in New York Harbor on December 15, 1823, disembarking from the cargo ship Draper C. Thorndike and stepping into a full-blown blizzard. Unfamiliar with the perils of walking in a northern winter, on his first steps in the country where he would live the next three decades, he slipped and fell on an icy walkway.
It was an unaccustomed low point in the life of the 35-year-old priest. A few weeks earlier, he had been representing Cuba, then a Spanish colony, as a delegate to the nascent legislative assembly at Cádiz, Spain. In a swift turn of events, the deposed Spanish king had been restored to power and ordered the execution of all who had advocated democracy. Facing certain death if he remained in Europe or returned to his beloved Cuba, Varela escaped at night to Gibraltar, where he boarded the Thorndike, bound for New York.
Suddenly an exile, the thin priest in his thin cloak stood up from the icy harborside pavement and found his footing in the streets of a new city. Over the next quarter of a century, he would become a humble but prominent force in the Catholic community there, serving the faithful of New York with a selfless devotion that matched the patriotic fervor he felt for his homeland.

"FATHER VARELA . . . HELPS US TO LIVE OUR FAITH AS A FORCE FOR CHANGE IN SOCIETY. SEEING HIS EXAMPLE, WE CAN OFFER OUR OWN CONTRIBUTION WITH THE SAME ENTHUSIASM THAT HE HAD FOR HELPING THE SOCIETIES OF HIS TIME TO LIVE ACCORDING TO JUSTICE AND TRUTH."

ARCHBISHOP VINCENZO PAGLIA, POSTULATOR IN VARELA’S CAUSE FOR CANONIZATION

Félix Varela would never again set foot in Cuba, but he also never stopped working on behalf of its people, pointing the way for them toward a freedom that would not come in his lifetime. Two centuries later, he is still revered by Cubans and Cuban-Americans of all political persuasions. The cause for his canonization, initiated in the 1980s, is principally overseen by the Archdiocese of Havana. But it is his life after 1823 – his years as a New York priest – that mark Varela unmistakably as a man of God.

FÉLIX VARELA Y MORALES WAS BORN into a military family in Havana, Cuba, in 1788. Orphaned at the age of 3, he was raised by his paternal grandparents in St. Augustine, Florida, where his grandfather was commander of the Spanish garrison. An intelligent, curious child, slight in stature, young Félix took eagerly to his studies in Latin, religion, and history.
When Varela was 14, his grandfather told him it was time to turn from academic pursuits and enroll in military training. The boy politely refused. “I want to be a soldier of Jesus Christ,” he said. When the commander became angry, Félix responded, “I don’t wish to kill men. I want to save their souls.” Though he was not destined to be a warrior, young Varela did not lack for courage.
Instead of a military academy, his grandfather sent Varela to the Seminary of San Carlos in Havana. There the young man was quickly recognized as a rising star. He became a priest, a professor, and by his mid-twenties, one of the colony’s foremost philosophers and thinkers.
As a professor and speaker, Varela showed no fear in exploring and expanding the potentially dangerous ideas of the era he lived in: the abolition of slavery, the overthrow of absolute monarchies and colonial empires. He became known as a speaker who explained ideas so clearly and persuasively that even those who disagreed with him sat up and listened. As a writer, teacher, and delegate to the Spanish Cortes, the priest stood up for what he believed in.

AFTER HIS LANDING IN AMERICA, it took Varela more than a year to get his credentials verified to serve as a priest in the Diocese of New York. By February 1825, he had begun serving as a parochial vicar at St. Peter’s Church on Barclay Street in Manhattan. He had learned to speak English, and had begun to settle into his duties: saying Mass, hearing confessions, performing baptisms, visiting the sick. In the evenings, the priest also found time to write and edit El Habanero, a magazine for Cuban readers. And the rulers of Spain and Cuba still wanted him dead.
In March 1825, an assassin landed in New York City, dispatched by associates of Francisco Vives, the colonial governor of Cuba. His instructions: to kill Fr. Félix Varela.
The priest received a letter of warning. His friends in the Cuban expatriate community were able to learn the assassin’s identity, but not his whereabouts. They entreated Varela to go into hiding, but he refused. Instead, he went about his business apparently unperturbed. He was not going to let threats turn him from his new mission of helping to build the Catholic Church in America, ministering to the needs of its people.
One day, walking the streets of his parish, the priest encountered the man who had been sent to murder him. In a spirit of compassionate forgiveness, he approached the would-be assassin and counseled him against committing a grave sin. The man listened. Then he returned to Cuba, his mission unfulfilled, while Varela carried on his own with hardly a pause.

BEFORE THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, under British rule, Catholicism was banned in New York. Five decades later, as Varela began his priesthood there, a strong anti-Catholic sentiment still prevailed among many in the Protestant majority. Catholics had to be careful. They could be assaulted in the streets. On one occasion, hundreds of Catholics had to form a human shield around St. Patrick’s Cathedral on Mulberry Street (now known as the Basilica of Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral) to stop a Protestant mob from ransacking and burning it.
There were two Catholic churches in New York City in 1825: St. Patrick’s Cathedral and St. Peter’s Church on Barclay Street. The diocese opened a third, St. Mary’s, in a former Presbyterian church building on Sheriff Street, in 1826; and the following year, Varela, using his own funds and money raised from the community, purchased a fourth: an old Episcopal church in Ann Street called Christ Church. Varela became pastor of a new Catholic parish there. Its population was generally very poor, and most of the money to operate it came from Varela’s supporters in Cuba and New York.
"FATHER VARELA DEDICATED HIS LIFE TO THE SICK, THE POOR, AND THE HELPLESS. HE WAS CALLED ‘THE APOSTLE OF THE IRISH’ FOR HIS WORK WELCOMING IMMIGRANTS AND TENDING TO THEIR NEEDS."

BISHOP OCTAVIO CISNEROS, VICE POSTULATOR IN VARELA’S CAUSE FOR CANONIZATION

The skills and the passion for justice that Félix Varela had developed in the first 35 years of his life turned out to be just what the Catholic Church in New York needed. His command of the principals of governing served the Church well when parish board members made unruly demands; his problem-solving skills helped keep parishes financially solvent; and his command of language enabled him to build strong community bonds. His talents at oratory captivated congregations during his homilies and, at public forums, unmasked the distortions of demagogues fomenting anti-Catholic sentiment.
Soon he was writing articles in English and co-publishing the New York Weekly Register and Catholic Diary, which was widely read among the immigrant Irish. He wrote an English-language catechism for religious education and opened free Catholic schools for girls and boys next door to Christ Church, where he oversaw instruction and taught many classes himself. The schoolchildren there could hardly have imagined they were being taught by one of the most celebrated professors in the Americas.
In 1829, Bishop Jean Dubois named two vicars general for the Diocese of New York: Fr. John Power, the pastor of St. Peter’s, and Fr. Félix Varela. Varela would serve in the role until 1850. Under their management, the Catholic Church in New York grew rapidly. Six new parishes were created in the diocese (which at the time encompassed the entirety of what is now New York state, plus part of northern New Jersey). With the help of the Sisters of Charity, schools and orphanages were created – often with a considerable portion of the funds obtained through the efforts of the Cuban priest. Upon receiving one particularly generous donation, Varela funded an asylum for widows and their children, which would be run by the Sisters of Charity; the site of the asylum would eventually become St. Vincent’s Hospital.
With its founding philosophy of religious tolerance, the United States attracted many Catholic immigrants, especially from Ireland, where the faith was being suppressed. This added fuel to the virulent anti-Catholic movement in New York and elsewhere, and Félix Varela proved to be one of the church’s most effective forces to counterbalance it. In 1830 and 1831, in addition to appearing on debate stages, he published a periodical called The Protestant’s Annotator and Abridger, in which he patiently dissected each scurrilous charge of a popular anti-Catholic periodical called The Protestant. While other Catholic leaders responded angrily to the insults of the Church’s detractors, Varela was a peacemaker. “In an era of blinding religious animosities,” wrote biographers Joseph and Helen M. McCadden, “Varela was the pioneer ecumenist, able to conduct dialogue without violence, astonishing his opponents by his learning, his patient exposition.”

WHILE VARELA'S WRITINGS AND SPEAKING engagements afforded him a public platform from which to proclaim his faith, the work that he did in New York quietly and without calling attention to himself was an even more remarkable sign of his devotion to the mission of Jesus on Earth. The Cuban priest embodied the notion of selflessness. His service to the poor and marginalized was immediate, direct, and deeply personal. Among Irish immigrants, many of whom came off the boats in desperate need, Varela was known as a tireless champion and supporter.
During the cholera epidemic of 1832, according to one contemporary, Varela “virtually lived in the hospitals.” He went to greet immigrant ships, going to the aid of the penniless and often sick passengers as they disembarked. Because of his loving approach to people of all denominations, even those who looked down on Catholics, he was able to gain access to institutions that other priests were barred from, including New York City Hospital, which was managed by Protestants (but full of Catholic patients).
Eventually, stories of his benevolence made him famous despite his avoidance of the spotlight. On one occasion, Varela was approached by a poor woman while eating his lunch. He excused himself for a moment, washed the spoon he was using, and handed it over to her. “Money have I none,” he is reported to have said. “But take this silver spoon, the last from my homeland – it will fetch enough to feed your family.” The woman was subsequently arrested on suspicion of having stolen the spoon, and when Varela went to the police to vouch for her, the incident was reported in the press.
Other accounts of his selflessness also spread through the city. There was the wintry day on Chambers Street when a poor, shivering woman with a baby in her arms was approached by an unidentified man who quietly removed his own cloak and draped it over her, then slipped away coatless. Onlookers followed the mysterious benefactor and recognized Varela letting himself into his residence on Reade Street.
In Félix Varela: Torch Bearer from Cuba, the McCaddens describe his housekeeper’s “constant battle to keep him supplied with essentials. Whatever was nearest to hand – his watch, his silver, the dishes from his table, the household linens and blankets, his own garments – he gave to those in need.” When people came seeking help, “he often supplied the receivers of alms through a side window or rear door.”

BY THE LATE 1840s, Varela’s health was failing. He had never fully adapted to the climate of New York, and his respiratory ailments became increasingly serious. Between 1847 and 1849, he experienced debilitating bouts of asthma and “consumption,” going south to recover and then returning north with renewed vigor, resuming his daily rounds of “sick calls, confessions . . . confraternities &c.,” in the words of one of the priests in his parish. In 1850, however, he left New York for the last time, relocating to St. Augustine, Florida, where he had lived as a boy.
By now the Cuban was widely renowned among American Catholics. He made a deep impression in Savannah, Georgia, as Fr. Jeremiah O’Connell recalled in an 1878 article: “In Savannah . . . his memory is held in deep veneration by the faithful and all who made his acquaintance. How he lived was a wonder to his friends, for he gave everything he had to the poor.”
After three years serving the people of St. Augustine, Fr. Félix Varela died in February 1853, surrounded by parishioners who sought his blessing or simply wanted to be in his presence. Among the congregation, he was already considered a saint for his kindness and good works.

"VENERABLE FÉLIX VARELA WAS A HERO OF CUBAN INDEPENDENCE AND A GREAT NEW YORKER. . . . HE SERVED THE CHURCH AS PRIEST, PASTOR, AND VICAR GENERAL, ATTENDED THE SICK, WELCOMED IMMIGRANTS, AND GAVE OF HIS OWN BELONGINGS TO HELP THE NEEDY: A PURE SERVANT OF CHRIST."

CARDINAL TIMOTHY DOLAN

“Varela loved all men, and Varela has been loved by all,” observed Cuban scholar José Maria Casal a month after Varela’s death, in a speech to dedicate a St. Augustine chapel built in the priest’s memory. “Cubans owe Varela not only love, but profound veneration.”
Many non-Cubans felt – and feel – the same way. At the Church of the Transfiguration on Mott Street in Manhattan, a parish Varela founded in 1838 after Christ Church suffered irreparable structural damage, he is still proudly claimed as the original force behind a parish known to this day for diversity and service to the poor.
The Archdiocese of New York proudly endorsed the cause for Varela’s canonization when it was launched in 1983, and New York Catholics rejoiced in 2012, when the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints declared him venerable. “Venerable Félix Varela was a hero of Cuban independence and also a great New Yorker – the kind of man who just couldn’t help being generous and kind,” says Cardinal Timothy Dolan. “He served the Church as priest, pastor, and vicar general, attended the sick, welcomed immigrants, and gave of his own belongings to help the needy: a pure servant of Christ.”
The streets of lower Manhattan that he walked almost two centuries ago would be unrecognizable to Varela today – though if he searched among the tall buildings and busy streets he would find two parishes that claim him as founder. His light still shines there, and throughout the world. †

A statue of Venerable Félix Varela at Transfiguration Church.
https://archwaysmag.org/venerable-felix-varela

Tuesday, October 16, 2018

Drastic Reduction in Cuban Migrant Visas

New report shows significant drop in agreed 20,000 annual immigrant visas for Cubans

BY MIMI WHITEFIELD

mwhitefield@miamiherald.com

With visa-issuing operations at the U.S. Embassy in Havana at a virtual standstill, the United States is expected to fall far short of the minimum of 20,000 annual immigrant visas for Cubans that is the target in the U.S.-Cuba migration accords.

A semiannual report that the State Department is required to submit to Congress shows that through the end of July, only 3,195 visas were issued, making it highly unlikely when final visa numbers are tallied for the last two months of the fiscal year that the United States will come anywhere near the 20,000-visa target for Cuban migrants who don’t have immediate family members in the United States.

Meanwhile, from the beginning of the fiscal year on Oct. 1, 2017 through Aug. 3, U.S. consular officers issued just 134 family reunification documents, even though the United States had more than 20,000 applications pending. The report said that the State Department and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services were considering options so that the family reunification program could continue.

Since the beginning of the fiscal year, the United States also has neither accepted nor processed applications for Cubans seeking refugee status in the United States, according to the report.

About two-thirds of the diplomats at the embassy were withdrawn last year after about two dozen U.S. personnel fell ill to a mysterious constellation of symptoms of unknown origin. While the United States hasn’t directly blamed Cuba for the incidents, it says it does hold Havana responsible for not ensuring the safety of American diplomats while they were in Cuban territory.

After the downsizing, the United States switched all but emergency visa-issuing operations to its embassy in Bogotá and then to the embassy in Georgetown, Guyana. Cubans who want visas to visit the United States also must apply for their documents at U.S. consular offices outside Cuba.

The U.S. Embassy in Georgetown, Guyana, began conducting interviews for Cubans seeking U.S. immigrant visas in early June. 2018.

Doreen Hemlock Special to the Miami Herald

“Almost all visa processing in Havana has been suspended,” said the State Department report, and immigrant visa-processing for Cubans at the latter two embassies is being handled at a “much reduced capacity.” Many Cubans also can’t afford to make expensive trips to Guyana and Colombia to apply for migrant visas, especially since they have no assurance such visas will be granted.

Cuban migration to the United States has been greatly reduced across the board since the embassy draw-down and since the United States ended a preferential policy for Cuban migrants in January 2017. Previously, under the “wet foot, dry foot” policy, Cubans who arrived at U.S. borders without visas were given automatic entry into the United States and allowed to stay and get permanent residency and green cards after they had been in the United States a year and a day.

Now Cubans who attempt to enter the United States illegally and who don’t qualify for humanitarian relief are subject to removal, putting them on equal footing with potential immigrants from other countries.

Especially dramatic since the policy change is the reduction in the number of Cubans interdicted by the Coast Guard as they try to make their way to the United States by sea.

In fiscal year 2016, there were 5,651 Cubans interdicted at sea. That fell to 1,606 in 2017. And through Aug. 14 of this fiscal year, 200 Cubans were picked up at sea. If they have a credible fear of persecution if they return home, they are generally taken to the U.S. Naval Station at Guantánamo Bay for processing. Otherwise, under the migration accords, they are returned to Cuba.

A rustic vessel made by Cuban migrants is docked behind Key Largo Ocean Resort in Key Largo. It arrived during a spike in migration from Cuba. Now that has slowed.

Photo by Eduardo Barandiaran

The U.S. Coast Guard and the Cuban Border Guard routinely cooperate in maritime migration matters, including “active target hand-off operations” in which the Cubans pursue a vessel until it leaves Cuban territorial waters, allowing the Coast Guard to interdict the vessel, according to the report.

Cuba patrols its coast to prevent illegal people smuggling operations and has reported 27 cases of illegal migration so far this fiscal year, according to the report.

The number of Cubans trying to make their way to the United States by traveling through Latin America to the U.S. border with Mexico also has fallen sharply this fiscal year. During fiscal 2017, U.S. Customs and Border Protection had 15,557 encounters with Cubans along the southwest U.S. border. Through Aug. 21 of this fiscal year, the number was 5,465 encounters along the southwest border.

Cuba also has obligations under the migration accords, which were implemented to try to insure safe, legal and orderly migration between the two countries. Although Cuba no longer requires Cuban citizens to get exit visas before they leave the country, the report said some medical personnel “have reported challenges” when they ask to leave and there also have been “credible reports of dissidents being denied permission to travel.”

Slowly both countries have worked to chip away at a list of 2,746 Cubans who left the island during the 1980 Mariel boatlift and were later deemed ineligible to remain in the United States for various reasons such as a prior criminal record in Cuba or because they had committed a crime in the United States.

Since 1984, 2,034 Cubans from this list have been returned to the island and 254 have died. Through August, a total of five Cubans on the list were repatriated in fiscal 2018.

There is also a backlog of around 37,000 other Cubans who are subject to final orders of removal, according to the report. Many of those on that list are convicted felons who have served their time for crimes committed in the United States but couldn’t be returned to Cuba before the U.S. and Cuba reestablished diplomatic relations in 2015. In recent years, according to the report, the U.S. has submitted 2,000 cases to Cuba of those who it would like to return to the island. In an historic first, Cuba agreed to the repatriation of 10 Cubans on this list in December 2017.

Under a 2017 joint statement signed by the United States and Cuba, all Cubans who left the island after Jan. 12, 2017, and tried to enter or remain in the United States illegally also are subject to being sent back to Cuba. But Cuba has interpreted this non-binding guideline differently from the United States, saying it doesn’t have to accept individuals who left the island before Jan. 12, 2017 but then didn’t try to illegally remain in or enter the United States until after that date.

As of Aug. 8, the report said, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had proposed 687 Cubans it wanted to repatriate under the guidelines of the 2017 joint statement, but Cuba has denied entry for 362 of them due to its different interpretation. “The Department of State and ICE are attempting to resolve this difference in interpretation,” the report said.

The last time the United States and Cuba met to review migration trends and how the migration accords were working was in July in Washington. The two sides expect to hold the next round of migration talks in late 2018.

Follow Mimi Whitefield on Twitter: @HeraldMimi

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article219849305.html

My comment

We have assumed that the inability to do visas in Cuba was the unintended consequence of the dumb policy to gut the embassy (i.e. reward whomever was responsible for the mysterious maladies affecting US. diplomats/intelligence operatives).

However, given the xenophobia that characterizes the Trump Administration, the drastic reduction of migration from Cuba is no doubt a welcome side effect if not the motivation.

Sunday, October 14, 2018

New York October - November Programs

There are many exciting Cuba related programs taking place in New York in October and November. If they fit your schedule, these are all worthwhile.

Migration and RemittancesRacial Inequality in Cuba

Monday, October 15, 4-6 PM
Segal Theatre
The Graduate Center, CUNY
The Cuban Revolution of 1959 sought to sharply reduce various forms of social inequality. However, today's Cuban society finds itself marked by rising levels of poverty and inequality, growing unemployment, dwindling social services and continuous outward migration. Moreover, in the context of a changing economy, defined by the declining role of the state and the introduction of market mechanisms, new social stratifications are emerging - and doing so along clearly visible, racial lines. Inequality and race, both dominant themes in pre-revolutionary Cuba and ones that the Revolution fought hard to eliminate, have once again become key, overlapping issues.

This panel will discuss the results of a two year long, German Research Council (DFG) funded, research project, including a unique, island-wide survey, which examined the role and impact of migration, remittances and citizenship, within the context of the island’s recent economic reforms, on Cuba’s growing racial inequalities.

Katrin Hansing (Ph.D., University of Oxford) is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Baruch College, CUNY and Senior Research Fellow at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA). Hansing has spent the past twenty years conducting research on issues of ‘race,’ inequality, migration, transnational ties and youth in Cuba and its diaspora. Her latest publications include: "Race and Inequality in the New Cuba: Reasons, Dynamics, and Manifestations" (Social Research: An International Quarterly, 2017), and "Race and Rising Inequality in Cuba" (Current History, 2018).
Bert Hoffmann (Ph.D., Freie Universität Berlin) is Senior Researcher at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA) and Head of the GIGA Berlin Office. He is also Professor of Political Science at the Freie Universität Berlin. His latest publications include: Emigrant Policies in Latin America and the Caribbean (FLASCO Chile 2016) with Luicy Pedroza and Pau Palop; and "Bureaucratic socialism in reform mode: the changing politics of Cuba’s post-Fidel era" (Third World Quarterly, 2016).
Odette Casamayor-Cisneros (Ph.D., School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences, Paris) is Associate Professor of Latin American and Caribbean Cultural Studies at University of Connecticut. Some of her areas of expertise include Afro-diaspora and Blackness in the Americas. Her first book of essays, Utopia, distopía e ingravidez...(Iberoamericana-Vervuert,2013) examines the existential void experienced by Cubans after the collapse of the Socialist Bloc in the 1990s. Casamayor is currently writing a new book, On Being Blacks: Challenging the Hegemonic Knowledge Through Racial Self-Identification Processes in Contemporary Cuban Cultural Production.

TO REGISTER, send e-mail to bildner@gc.cuny.edu

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Carlos Garcia Pleyan
Cuban sociologist / urban planner Carlos Garcia Pleyan is visiting NYC from Oct. 1 to Oct. 28 invited by Pratt Institute's Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment. I was able to hear him last Thursday at the Bildner Center and was very impressed. The following information was provided by his host, Dr. Jill Hamberg.
Carlos is giving four talks open to the public on a variety of topics: the future of Havana, Cuba's emerging real estate market, and participation / decentralization.

Please note that RSVPs are required for two of the events. Two talks will only be in Spanish and the others in Spanish with English interpretation. The PowerPoint slides will be in English for all talks.

Carlos is a highly respected professional with decades of experience both as a practitioner and as a scholar with a incisive analysis of the challenges and opportunities facing urban areas in Cuba. For the English version of Carlos's analysis of the issues facing Havana, see https://www.progressivecity.net/single-post/Havana-an-impossible-equation

Thursday, Oct. 18 3-5 p.m. "El Mercado Inmobiliario en Cuba: Impactos y Desafios." The New School, 66 West 12th St., NY, NY. The Orozco Room, Room 712. RSVP: https://el-mercado-inmobiliaro-en-cuba.eventbrite.com Only in Spanish.

Friday, Oct. 19, 6-8 p.m. "Havana: Challenges and Opportunities." Pratt Institute Manhattan, 144 West 14th St., NY, NY, room 213 with English translation. No RSVP needed.

Tuesday, Oct. 23, 6-8 p.m. "Planeamiento Participativo, Descentralizacion y Desarrollo Local en Cuba," Columbia University Institute of Latin American Studies, International Affairs Building, 420 West 118th St., Room 802. Only in Spanish. No RSVP needed.

Carlos Garcia Pleyan has worked for 30 years as a staff member and researcher in the field of urban planning and land management in the national office of the Institute of Physical Planning (IPF) and the National Institute of Economic Research (INIE), as well as in various Cuban NGOs (MEPLA and Habitat-Cuba). He was an associate researcher at the Federal Polytechnic School of Lausanne (Switzerland). Garcia Pleyan has published numerous articles in books and magazines and given lectures on regional, urban and community development in universities in Cuba, Europe and Latin America. From 2002 to 2011 he coordinated the local development program of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation in Cuba (COSUDE). He has been a professor at the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) and Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC), as well as the Jose Antonio Echeverria Technological University of Havana. He is currently a consultant to COSUDE and the Master Plan department of the Office of the City Historian of Havana.

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Sponsored by the Cuban Cultural Center of New York
Additional programs and annual meeting listed here http://www.cubanculturalcenter.org/

‘DEPARTURES’ ~ A PLAY BY EL CIERVO ENCANTADO
Sunday, November 4, 2018 at 5 pm

El Ciervo Encantado, a Havana-based theatrical group, returns to New York City for a reprise of Departures, which premiered last year at The Greene Space. Written by Nelda Castillo, the group’s founder and director, Departures grapples with the phenomenon of Cuban emigration from 1959 through the present, and seeks communion with its audiences through personal history. Cuban migration has fragmented families, couples, friendships and communities, becoming a unifying element, a part of Cuban identity.

The performance features actress Mariela Brito as Cuba’s everywoman, telling her own story and those of the many who have departed. Surrounded by photographs of both illustrious and unknown Cubans who left to escape hunger, censorship, persecution and terror, she leads us through the national memory that is never discussed, but that is, among Cubans, an almost physical presence.

Since the suspension of almost all visa processing in Havana over a year ago, it has been all but impossible for Cuban performers to appear in the United States, making this a rare opportunity for New York audiences to engage with artists from the Island. The performance will be presented in Spanish with simultaneous English translation through earphones, followed by a Q&A with the artists.

http://www.cubanculturalcenter.org/events/2018/08/departures-a-play-by-el-ciervo-encantado/

LA NACIONAL 239 West 14th Street (between 7th & 8th Aves.), NYC

CCCNY & LA NACIONAL MEMBERS: FREE ADMISSION GENERAL AUDIENCE: $10
SECURE YOUR RESERVATIONS at: info@cubanculturalcenter.org

FÉLIX VARELA, EN EL 230 ANIVERSARIO DE SU NATALICIO
Tuesday, November 20, 2018 @ 6 pm
A celebration of the life and legacy of Padre Félix Varela (1788-1853), on the 230th anniversary of his birth. Varela was an outstanding scholar and paramount figure in the gestation of a Cuban national identity in the first half of the 19th century. His influence on intellectual thought and progressive ideas in Cuba, including equal education for women, the abolition of slavery, and the cause for the Island’s independence, cannot be overestimated. In the United States, his work in defense of immigrants in New York City, as well as his exemplary ministry in the service of others, earned him a lasting distinction as a social reformer and a path toward sainthood in the Catholic Church.

The commemorative presentation will be given by Bishop Osvaldo Cisneros, of the Diocese of Brooklyn, at the Church of the Transfiguration, founded by Padre Varela. Bishop Cisneros was named a Prelate of Honor by Pope John Paul II in 1988. He presently serves as vice-postulator of the Cause for Canonization of the Servant of God Félix Varela. He is a founding member and president of the Félix Varela Foundation.

http://www.cubanculturalcenter.org/events/2018/08/felix-varela-en-el-230-aniversario-de-su-natalicio/
This event will be held in Spanish with simultaneous English translation.
CHURCH OF THE TRANSFIGURATION29 Mott St, NYC

RSVP at: info@cubanculturalcenter.org

Tuesday, October 9, 2018

Travel on the Up-swing

After a hurricane, mysterious attacks, and U.S. warnings, travelers return to Cuba

BY MIMI WHITEFIELD

mwhitefield@miamiherald.com

Cuba tour operators began to notice a curious thing in the dead of summer this year. Bookings to the island began to increase month over month, following a drastic slump.

“We’ve gotten back to a more normal situation over the past two to three months. Sales have really picked up,” said Collin Laverty, president of Cuban Educational Travel, which offers cultural, educational, event and luxury travel to Cuba.

The spike followed a rough patch when Cuba became a less appealing destination as Irma hit the island’s north coast in September 2017, the U.S. published confusing new regulations for travelers to the island, and the U.S. State Department issued a travel alert warning Americans to reconsider travel to Cuba in the wake of a mysterious ailment that made 26 Havana-based diplomats sick at their homes and two hotels.

The hurricane and publicity about the diplomats’ illnesses “dampened demand right at a time when travelers generally book trips for the winter season,” said Tom Popper, president of InsightCuba, which offers a wide variety of people-to-people tours to Cuba.SIGN ME UP!

“A year ago it was the never-ending story of the attacks on the diplomats,” said Laverty. Because some of the health incidents, which are still of unknown origin, occurred in a room at the Hotel Nacional and two rooms at the Hotel Capri, the U.S. State Department warned Americans against travel to Cuba, first in a travel advisory last year and then in a Level 3 travel alert that advised travelers to reconsider trips to Cuba.

In August, the alert was downgraded to Level 2, (exercise increased caution) and that has perked up Americans’ interest in visiting the island, said Laverty who has handled arrangements for hundreds of U.S. schools, colleges and universities that have academic exchange programs in Cuba.

Some schools don’t allow any student travel to a country where a travel advisory or Level 3 alert is in place, so they couldn’t offer Cuba programs this year. “Now that the travel alert has been downgraded, many of these schools are going back and reinstating their programs for March 2019,” Laverty said.

Despite the alerts, Road Scholar, which has been offering people-to-people trips to Cuba since 1997, has continued to book its groups into the Hotel Nacional, which the State Department still advises U.S. travelers to avoid along with the Capri even though the health incidents have only involved U.S. diplomatic personnel.

For James Moses, president and chief executive of Boston-based Road Scholar, Cuba remains a safe destination.

“We did our due diligence and talked to the State Department and concluded that these [health incidents] were so specific,” he said. “It’s always been specific to diplomats. The incidents weren’t generalized. Our travelers’ safety is always our top concern.”

Cuba, he said, remains one of Road Scholar’s top-tier destinations. But after enrollment in Road Scholar’s Cuba programs grew by more than 70 percent in 2015 and 2016, it has declined by around 60 percent since then.

Fallout from the travel warnings, as well as other factors, have taken a toll on overall travel to the island. During the first half of the year, the number of international visitors fell by 5.67 percent and travel from the United States, excluding visits by Cuban Americans who are counted in a separate category, was down by 23.6 percent.

IMG_Cuban_Travel_New_Rul_2_1_NSBVVG51_L331098142 (2)

Tourists ride a tour bus in front of the Capitolio in Havana in June 2017.

Ramón Espinosa AP

For the anemic Cuban economy, tourism has been one of the few bright spots. For the past few years, the government had set ambitious goals for international visitor arrivals and always surpassed them. But after a discouraging first half of the year, Cuba revised its 2018 target for international visitors from 5 million to 4.75 million, still slightly ahead of 2017 numbers.

Even though Cuba made it a priority to clean up its north coast resorts after Hurricane Irma’s swipe last September and completed repairs relatively quickly, the hurricane still took a toll on international tourism during the 2017-2018 winter season.

But starting in May, InsightCuba began to notice interest in Cuba picking up again, Popper said. “There were spikes in web traffic leads and bookings,” he said, and through the summer each month showed growth that was about 25 percent stronger than the previous one, he said.

“That trend was the opposite of what we saw the previous year, and it’s a pretty clear sign to me that the Cuba market is coming back,” said Popper. “The cruise ships are also adding departures and ports.”

Cruising is the big growth segment of the Cuban travel market. U.S.-based cruise lines plan dozens of itineraries for the 2018-2019 winter season.

“If we look at the enrollment now vs. last year at this time, the trend is definitely going up,” said Road Scholar’s Moses.

To keep the Cuba destination fresh, both Road Scholar and InSightCuba have come up with new offerings for 2019 and later this year.

InsightCuba, for example, will be partnering with record label Putumayo World Music for a music expedition in November that will feature meetings with Cuban artists and performances. Over the years Putumayo’s Cuban music collection has sold more than half a million copies. “Now Putumayo can bring people to the music,” Popper said.

“Any company in travel has to constantly renew itself and respond to changing tastes — in Cuba more so than any other destination,” he said. “Not only do tastes and preferences change but the U.S. is also constantly changing how Americans can travel to Cuba.”

Visitors dance as musicians play at a bar in Havana.

Ramon Espinosa AP

Road Scholar offers 12 different Cuban itineraries, including cruises, birding expeditions and cultural and photographic tours. New for 2019 is a cruise that combines Cuba, Jamaica and the Cayman Islands and begins with a lecture in Little Havana on the Cuban-American perspective on U.S.-Cuba relations and a People and Society tour to Havana, Cienfuegos, Trinidad and Santa Clara that includes interactions with Cuban musicians and entrepreneurs.

Tour operators said that a decrease in hotel prices also is playing a role in attracting more visitors to Cuba.

“Another good sign is that prices have gone down in Cuba. We’ll be lowering our prices to reflect that,” said Popper.

During the boom years, Cuban hotels had trouble keeping up with the demand and rates zoomed upward. During 2015 and 2016, visitors found it difficult to get reservations at Cuba’s most popular private restaurants, it was almost impossible to find a hotel room in Havana on short notice, and travelers paid top dollar for accommodations.

But Cuba’s tourism infrastructure wasn’t ready for the sudden increase in demand, and travelers didn’t like paying a ton of money for rooms they often found lacking, said Laverty.

The high prices began to dampen demand not only for Road Scholar trips but also overall travel to Cuba, said Moses. But “now we’re definitely seeing better pricing,” he said, and Road Scholar is passing those savings on to its travelers.

In 2015, the cost per day for a Road Scholar program in Cuba was $471, but by 2017, it had increased to $534. For 2019, the average price will be below 2015 levels at approximately $412 per day.

During the travel boom, rooms at the Saratoga, a Havana hotel where visiting delegations often stay, were going for more than $600 per night. Last weekend a room at the Saratoga was available on a special for $271 a night on Hotels.com. At the more affordable Four Points by Sheraton, which is managed by Marriott, the price for a room last weekend was $104.

The facade of the new Hotel Packard hotel in Havana.

courtesy Iberostar

More hotels coming on line also have begun to ease the capacity crunch. Cuba recently opened its second five-star hotel, the Grand Packard. The hotel with panoramic views of Havana’s Malecón is managed by the Spanish company Iberostar Hotels & Resorts, for Gaviota, a Cuban tourism brand that is part of the military-controlled conglomerate GAESA.

But while bookings for group tours are picking up, Cubans who rent out rooms in their homes and operate other small private businesses say they’re still hurting from a dearth of individual American travelers who often choose to stay in casas particulares (bed and breakfasts) to get a more authentic Cuban experience.

“American travelers were really helping build that part of the economy and were supporting it,” Laverty said. Many private Cuban entrepreneurs made investments in their properties and businesses with the assumption that American travel would continue to grow. “Now we’re seeing a lot of those investments without returns,” he said.

Recent travelers say private clubs and restaurants are still relatively empty and some private rooms in Centro Habana that once rented for $25 to $30 a night have reduced prices to around $15 in an effort to lure in more travelers.

One place that seems immune to the vagaries of Cuba travel cycles, however, is Miami International Airport, the main hub for U.S. travel, especially Cuban-American travel, to the island. Despite the drop in American travelers during the first half of the year, travel to and from Cuba through MIA continued to grow even as some airlines dropped their Cuba service from other U.S. airports.

Passengers at Miami International Airport await a flight to Cuba.

MIAMI HERALD STAFF

Through August, MIA was ahead of last year’s record-setting pace for flights to and from Cuba. From January to August, 550,750 Cuban-bound passengers departed from MIA, a 21 percent increase, and 549,048 passengers arrived from Cuba, 12.6 percent more than in 2017.

And if American Airlines has its way, there may be even more Cuba-bound flights leaving from MIA.

American Airlines asked the Department of Transportation at the end of September for the flexibility to shift its Charlotte-Havana flight to a Miami-Havana route without having to go through lengthy route allocation proceedings in which it would formally give up the Charlotte route and then apply for another Miami route. It also plans to begin a new Miami-Santiago de Cuba route in May.

Follow Mimi Whitefield on Twitter: @HeraldMimi

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/world/americas/cuba/article218231645.html

My comment

John McAuliff

Some of the US press contributed to the decline of tourism by reporting that independent travel had been terminated by President Trump. In fact, it was simply transferred to a new license category, "Support for the Cuban People". The only real difference is that travelers now need to stay in a privately owned casa particular (bed and breakfast) rather than in a state owned hotel. Summary information here tinyurl.com/FITCuba legal provisions here tinyurl.com/regsnov2017

Cuba could increase independent travel by licensing private guides as cuenta propistas and allowing its citizens to create small businesses in the tourism sector as foreigners already can.