Group aids Cuba effort

Dyrinda Arthur was not a Beatles fan, but now a single chord can bring her to tears. In 2004, Arthur, a student at Stirling University in Scotland, visited Cuba for the first time on a housing and art study trip. At first, Arthur thought her new Cuban friends were playing the Beatles to ease her homesickness; she did not realize how feted the Fab Four were across the island nation, nor that their music had been banned until the 1980s. After returning to Scotland, she went through a self-proclaimed "period of mourning." She is now returning to Cuba as a member of the 2005 Caravan to Cuba sponsored by Pastors for Peace, a humanitarian aid ministry based in New York City. \nThis July, buses filled with donated food, medical supplies, textbooks, toys, and musical instruments travel along 14 routes toward McAllen, Texas. There, the buses attempt to enter Mexico, challenging the license required by the U.S. government to enter or send aid to Cuba. The vehicles then journey south to Tampico, where volunteer dock workers unload the supplies onto cargo ships headed for Cuba. All of the caravan members who start the trip cross the border, and many also fly on to Cuba. Bloomington, which retains a sister-city relationship with the Cuban city Santa Clara through the local organization Cubamistad, was one of the stops on the Caravan route. \nKathryn Hall, a public health administrator from Sacramento and caravan leader, spoke to a small, but enthusiastic crowd during a picnic stop at Bloomington's Bryan Park on July 11. Hall is the founder of The Birthing Project, the only national African-American community based maternal and child health organization. Cuba, which has the lowest infant mortality rate in the Americas, is a source of inspiration for her: "Cuba has some answers to our problems, so I want to tell its story." \nInitiated in 1988 as a special \nministry of the Interreligious Foundation for Community Organization (IFCO), the Pastors for Peace caravans aim to deliver direct humanitarian assistance to a number of Latin American countries. Because of a persistent U.S. trade embargo against Cuba, Caravan members who are U.S. citizens face significant legal fines as well as possible imprisonment for attempting to import material goods into Cuba. Recent changes have made the embargo even more stringent. On a recent trip, Homeland Security officers confiscated from Hall a bag made in Taiwan that had the word "Cuba" written on it. \nPastors for Peace also faces difficulties on its caravans to Mexican cities. Bob Abpalnalp, who has driven for the caravans since 1998, recounts the time when Mexican soldiers stopped their bus on the way to San Cristobal. The soldiers boarded the bus and one chambered a round, a shocking sound even to Abpalnalp, an ex-naval officer. \nHall considers the Caravan to Cuba as much a humanitarian effort as an opportunity for cultural and educational exchange. Today's Cuba is home to both Lenin Park and Lennon Park, with long-term leader Fidel Castro personally unveiling a bronze statue of the Beatle John on the 20th anniversary of his death. Arthur finds the American preoccupation with Cuba interesting because this anxiety is virtually absent in both Europe and Cuba: "A lot of Americans are very anxious to know what outsiders think of Cuba. But as a UK citizen, I have the freedom to express my solidarity with the Cuban people"