Mainers consider journey to Cuba a huge success

Several Mainers who traveled to Cuba last week despite admonitions from a federal agency pronounced their trip a huge success Monday, and said they didn’t encounter any problems from customs officials.

Sheila Wilensky, a social studies teacher at Mount Desert Island High School, said she returned Sunday night with lots of research material.

“I have tons of notes,” she said. “We worked very hard. We had a wonderful time, but we had an intense schedule. We learned so much that we can apply to our professional lives and to our own roles as citizens of the world.”

Wilensky was among a group of 13 educators and health workers who decided to proceed with a long-planned trip to eastern Cuba even though three days before they were to leave the Office of Foreign Assets Control said the trip was illegal, because the participants didn’t meet guidelines for U.S. citizens traveling to the island nation to do research.

Originally 25 people were scheduled to go, but many canceled after the warning from the federal agency, which is charged with upholding the embargo against Cuba.

The travelers flew out of Montreal and returned via the Quebec-Vermont border where they zipped through customs.

Wilensky said she initially felt “conflicted” about whether to continue with the trip. But after getting “positive feedback” from U.S. Rep. John Baldacci’s office Friday night, she said, she decided to carry on.

Baldacci spokesman Doug Dunbar said Monday that the office had acted as a go-between, “dealing back and forth” with the prospective travelers and the Office of Foreign Assets Control.

Ultimately, federal officials “seemed more comfortable with the purpose of the trip … and conveyed to us their sense that the trip would likely meet the criteria that has been set out,” he said. “So we’re pleased obviously that there were no problems with customs officials at the borders because they could raise concerns and ask questions that indicate there might be a problem.”

Wilensky said that worrying about possible repercussions was “somewhat distracting,” but that once the travelers arrived, “we got … caught up in what we were doing and the gracious, warm welcome, the spirit of openness and the spirit of community.”

“I came back so sure … that we had contributed to some kind of path to world peace,” said Wilensky, who plans to write about her experiences in a local weekly newspaper.

Meanwhile, Emily Wesson, a nurse with the Orono school system, said she and others “really felt as though we were doing meaningful research” visiting schools, hospitals and clinics, a school of social work and even an organic farm.

Constant discussion and networking with Canadians and Americans from other groups was part of the nonstop schedule, she said.

“It was an intensive visit. I never worked so hard in my life,” said Wesson who plans to write an article for a nursing journal and make a presentation during a summer institute for Maine nurses.

For April Burke, a student teacher at Old Town High School, the trip was a life-altering experience.

Burke who hopes to discuss her trip with University of Maine students and at the Peace and Justice Center in Bangor, said she delivered letters written by local students to a school in Cuba.

“Having someone from Milford, Maine, writing about what they like to do and asking Cubans what they like to do, was just eye-opening for me,” she said.

“We do have the ability to reach out and have an effect on people from other countries.”